The more I became aware of all the opportunities to growth my wealth, the more I realized I needed a way to keep track of where exactly all my assets were allocated. I came across MoneyCenter by Yodlee through a friend who told me it could keep track of all my assets including bank accounts, credit cards, cds, stocks, bonds and everything else. I linked all my accounts and it has seemed to work so far except for Countrywide where for an unknown reason I’m unable to link my account. Yodlee keeps track of what you spend and how you are allocating your portfolio. Its quite useful and very useful for those who have multiple bank accounts and brokerages. I wish I got paid by Yodlee for hyping them up but try it out for yourself.

I saw an interesting article from seeking alpha on how the percentage of companies which beat expectations has been dropping over the past couple of quarters. This is most likely due to financial companies having huge writedowns and overall pessimistic state of the economy. My intrigue with this graph is comparing it to historical Dow Jones numbers. Does EPS beat rates and the overall economy correlate? In the tech boom no one cared about earnings as long as there was potential. The two charts definitely show correlation but is Wallstreet overreacting and placing too much emphasis on earnings nowadays?

SAN FRANCISCO (MarketWatch) — Priceline.com Inc. shares climbed to an an eight-year high on Friday before closing with a gain of 12% after the online travel site reported a first-quarter profit fueled by a rise in booking and international travel.

PCLN 138.63, +14.85, +12.0%) rose $14.85 a share to close at $138.63 and has more than doubled since this time last year and is now at its highest level since late 2000. Earlier in the session, the shares reached $143.70.

The move came after the company said late Thursday that it earned $18.2 million, or 37 cents a share, on revenue of $403.2 million. During the same period a year ago, Priceline lost $16.3 million, or 44 cents a share, on $301.4 million in revenue.
Excluding one-time items, Priceline would have earned 76 cents a share to beat the estimates of analysts surveyed by Thomson Financial, who forecast a profit of 60 cents a share on $377.2 million in revenue.
The company, best-known for its name-your-own price option for flights, has benefited from consumers searching for low-price flights at a time when many airlines are hampered by rising fuel costs.
Priceline said both its domestic and international businesses grew during the quarter. Domestic bookings rose 51% from a year ago, while international bookings doubled from the same period last year.
“The U.S. business was the big upside surprise this quarter,” Marianne Wolk of Susquehanna Financial Group said in a research note.
Wolk said that Priceline had earlier estimated its U.S. bookings would rise 35% from a year ago and that “the main driver of growth appears to be air ticketing growth” due to the company’s no-booking fee promotion that has been in place since June 2007.
For its second quarter, Priceline said it expect to report earnings of $1.25 to $1.40 a share before items, and full-year earnings of between $5.25 and $5.65 a share. Wall Street analysts had previously estimated Priceline would earn $1.29 a share for its second quarter and $5.11 a share for its entire fiscal year.
“Priceline is proving out as the most defensive ‘Net stock,” Citigroup analyst Mark Mahaney said in a research note. Mahaney raised his full-year earnings estimates on Priceline to $5.59 a share and lifted his target price on the company’s stock to $161 a share.

Priceline.com is an online booking company for flights, hotels and car rentals. Priceline is very similar to Expedia and provides comparisons for the cheapest in accommodations. Even though the recent hikes in oil prices have driven airlines to the brink of bankruptcy, it hasn’t slown down Priceline’s growth. The turnaround has been fueled by a strong US and International bookings. The last four earnings reports have exceeded expectations and raised guidelines. Even though I’ve had a poor experience with priceline when I showed up one day late and found my whole reservation cancelled, the stock looks to be a winner. Below is a chart.

BEIJING, Feb. 14 /Xinhua-PRNewswire/ — New Oriental Education &
Technology Group Inc. (NYSE: EDU), the largest provider of private
educational services in China (”New Oriental” or the “Company”), today
announced that its board of directors has approved a share repurchase
program. The board has authorized New Oriental to repurchase up to one
million of its own American Depositary Shares (”ADSs”) during the period
from February 25, 2008 to December 31, 2008. The repurchases will be made
from time to time on the open market at prevailing market prices, in
negotiated transactions off the market, in block trades, pursuant to a
10b5-1 plan (which allows New Oriental to repurchase its ADSs during
periods in which it may be in possession of material non-public
information) or otherwise.
n) or otherwise.

New Oriental is a China based company that provides English teaching services to many students looking to pursue educational opportunities abroad, business purposes and self-enrichment. The company is in a niche market and is quickly expanding due mostly to globalization and the need for English proficiency.

A company decides to sell shares for many reasons but only decides to buy back for one, GROWTH.

The technicals in the last 3 month look solid as well. Note that this company has projected lower 4th quarter earnings because of the poor weather driving students to defer enrollment to later periods.