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Host Hotels and Resorts is poised for a decent run upwards over the next few months I believe. Between the months of May and July, the stock dropped from a high of $18.76 all the way down to $11.14, a drop of 40.6%. Ouch! Ever since that low, the stock has risen back up to it’s current price of $14.27. This is a gain of 28.1%. I think that the stock is on it’s way back up to at least $18/share before the end of the year. This would give it a gain of 26.1% from today’s price.

I have come up with this price target purely by doing a quick technical analysis of the stock’s chart. Take a look at the chart below to see how it has fared over the past three months.

Based on my calculations, the slope of this positive sloping trendline is about +$1.76/month. Remember though that this is a fairly arbitrary line that was chosen based upon my opinion of the chart. I believe that this line does represent a fairly accurate view of how the stock has moved over the past few months. Even more encouraging is that it has continued to fare well, even as the market has been very shaky over the past few months.

Based on a slope of +$1.76/month, I believe that the stock should be well situated in the $18s by November.

One should take note though of a strong patch of resistance between $17.25 and $17.50. As you can see in the chart below, the stock struggled to make it through the elusive $17.50 mark as it traded in a narrow band between $16.00 and $17.50 for about four months between the beginning of January through the end of April.

You will notice at the end of May HST ended its’ short lived one-month above $17.50. As soon as it dropped below this mark, the stock tanked and dropped all the way down to $11.14/share in a little over a month.

I think that the stock will have an easy run up to the $17.50 range and then stagnate for a little while. I would either sell at this point or put a trailing stop loss order on the stock with a roughly $1.50 trail to lock in your profits.

If you get in before 9/30/2008, you will also be eligible for the $.20/share dividend. That puts the current yield at abot 5.6%. That beats any certificate or money market account these days

Stock Recommendations , hst, stock review

For the past few months we have been having multiple people come in telling us how worried they are about their deposits at Washington Mutual. It seems like these days people are starting to act on these worries. Yesterday we took in about $500,000 in new money that was deposited straight from Washington Mutual. $500,000 doesn’t sound like a ton of money for a financial institution, but if you consider the fact that our size is only $500 million, it puts it in more perspective. This comes out to .1% of our total deposits.

One should also take into consideration that this data is for only one of the 8 branches. If this coincidentally happened at each of our branches, this would have totaled $4 million in new money just from WAMU for the day.

WAMU is insured by the FDIC up to $100,000. If they fail though, you won’t have instant access to your money. It can take the feds up to 3 months to get your money back to you. If you were without your money for three whole months, what would you do? This explains why people are starting to panic more and more about WAMU.

If you find yourself worried about your account at WAMU or another institution, consider moving your funds over to a credit union. Credit unions are typically more conservative in nature than banks, and therefore are a safer bet for your money. Credit Unions are insured by the NCUA, which is similar to the FDIC. The NCUA insures your accounts up to $100,000 as well. If a credit union fails though, the NCUA will have your funds back to you within three days, not three months. Something to consider when looking for a new institution.

Financial Institutions credit union, FDIC, NCUA, WAMU