Australian sharemarket up 34.9% since March

[the australian] The S&P/ASX200 "has now risen for five consecutive months and has soared 34.9 per cent since closing at five-and-a-half-year low of 3145.5 on March 6, a date that now appears to mark the bottom of the bruising global bear market."

Bitter harvest for agri schemes

[the australian] "AUSTRALIA'S managed investment scheme industry was dealt a crushing blow yesterday with the collapse of the biggest agribusiness investment company, Great Southern.

...

"One of the big red flags for agricultural managed investment schemes was the amount of money they had to pay advisers in order to promote their products," Australian Shareholders Association chief executive Stuart Wilson said last night. "There has always been some concern about the tax breaks provided for investors in these schemes and it brought into question whether they were really sustainable over the long term ... and now that two substantial schemes of managers have gone under, it leads us to believe that those who were the pessimists may actually have been right."

My accountant kept trying to push this tax break scheme onto me for years, but I kept saying no and eventually switched to another accountant who actually focused on getting the tax return right rather than trying to cross-sell this high-commission / low-return investment product.

Betting on the house

[smh] "Think house prices here are going to fall? Soon you'll be able to short-sell Sydney housing, by taking out a derivative contract based on indices compiled by Rismark/RPData and quoted daily on the sharemarket."

Now this is an interesting concept, a way to get some exposure to the property market (either on the long or the short side), without have to take on a massive mortgage.

Volatile times

• ASX 200 up 9% in 2 days
• Nikkei up 14%
• DJIA up 11%

I guess I'm supposed to do my bit for the global economy and buy my first home now.

DJ Industrial Average down 18% in five days - worst week ever for stocks