Mark Grammer National Bank of Greece SA NBG-N SELL ON STRENGTH Feb 09, 2015

He would encourage people to really think about what kind of stocks they want to invest in. He always very deliberately look for lower volatility type of stocks, and ones that can still demonstrate growth in earnings and in dividends. This bank is almost the opposite of that. Its major business right now is keeping hold of its deposit base. If it doesn’t do that, there is no business. You are going to have very little growth and a tremendous amount of volatility, the worst of both worlds.

The one year chart shows a long downtrend. It may be breaking out, but he would want to see a series of higher highs and higher lows to indicate a new uptrend. Way too early to enter this stock.

He sold and lost money on this one. There is talk of Greece running out of money. The stock has been diluted tremendously. This is a dangerous, dangerous company. It is hard for them to go under and there may be a lot of upside.

The issue around Greece is that it effectively is a ton of political risks. As the political risks start to recede, then you are going to have the ability to assess the bank in its own right. There is so much political risk that he wouldn’t look at this bank.

(A Top Pick July 23/14. Down 59.80%.) This was his gamble on a turnaround in the Greek economy. It didn’t happen. The Socialists got in and people didn’t want to pay their debts back. They hired back all the bureaucrats that the previous regime got rid of. A very bad call.

For people who want to take on a lot of risks and who want to play he can see them going into this. It is on his radar screen. It is going to be very difficult for people to make money on this, unless they are traders, which he is not. Greece is going to exist in 5, 10, 25 years, but which companies might disappear and which ones will survive and possibly bloom?

When you do a valuation, and it looks cheap, you have to have the ability to take the risk profile. It appears like it is turning, but there are things that could go wrong.

Thinks there will be a National Bank of Greece in a couple of years. The share count has gone to mega billions, a huge amount of dilution, which makes it difficult. The Greek economy will come back, but all the banks are in a very dangerous position. This is a crapshoot. You might want to look at Global X Greece ETF (GREK-N) instead.

The number of shares is absolutely insane. The share count has grown dramatically. They’ve been in survival mode for quite a while, but thinks they will survive. It wouldn’t surprise him if they did a share consolidation. Share consolidations are virtually always bad for stocks. A speculative play, but it could be good. Doesn’t think you will lose all your money. He doesn’t see putting dollars on it at this time.