Samsung's Gear VR is virtual reality on the go

NEW YORK (CNNMoney) Samsung is betting that people will want access to virtual reality outside their homes -- at work, during parties, in the park.

You can now pre-register to buy the first commercial versions of the Gear VR Innovator Edition, Samsung's virtual reality headset that runs off of a Samsung smartphone. The device will ship in December, the company announced Wednesday at its developer conference.

It also previewed a new 360-degree, 3D camera called Project Beyond that streams live video to the headset, plopping the wearer down live into remote locations. It can also be used to record locations to watch later.

Samsung (SSNLF) first previewed the Gear VR in September. It's a collaboration with VR headset maker Oculus, which was purchased by Facebook (FB, Tech30) for $2 billion earlier this year. What makes Samsung's version so unique is that it's actually powered by a smartphone, making it one of the first attempts to cut the cords that tether VR to computers.

The unit opens op and the phone snaps inside. Gear VR pulls its power from the phone's battery, turns the display into 3D, and uses its WiFi and cellular connections. When you're done battling dragons or pretending you're at the Grand Canyon, you can take your phone back out and use it like normal.

Why would you want to use a mobile virtual reality headset? Samsung threw out a few ideas. Games are the biggest category, but an architect might want to give clients an immersive look at a potential property or it could be used as an educational tool.

Project Beyond opens up a number of additional possibilities like virtual tourism. For now, the shiny black camera is still very much a beta product. Demo units were only showing pre-recorded scenes, not streaming live. The company is still experimenting with the idea, working out kinks and getting feedback from developers. There is no planned release date or price for the camera.

For now, the Gear VR only works with the Samsung Galaxy Note 4, which has a 5.7-inch display. But Nick DeCarlo, Samsung's VP of virtual reality, said even more Samsung phones would double as virtual reality tools in the future.

"Each successive generation of smartphone would come with a new, even better virtual reality experience, and we can't wait."

5 stocks to watch

The market's rollover Tuesday leaves us with more shorts than longs. Here are two stocks with bullish patterns, and four that look poised to continue lower.

On the long side, Alliance Fiber Optic Products Inc. (AFOP)  has held support at around 17.00 and bounced, reaching 20.43 intraday on Tuesday, before closing at 20.04. That was a gain of 35 cents, or 1.78%, on 1.1 million shares, an increase in volume. It's near resistance. It did back off 20.64, the high it had about two weeks ago, and if it can get through that, it should test 21.00, and then 24.00, my targets.

Check out Harry's video analysis of this stock on the last page.

Consumer Borrowing Surges to $15.9 Billion Record

David Tulis/AP WASHINGTON -- U.S. consumers increased their borrowing in September with gains in credit card debt, and auto and student loans. The Federal Reserve says overall borrowing rose $15.9 billion following a $14 billion gain in August and a $22.8 billion July increase. The gains have pushed total consumer debt to a record level of $3.27 trillion. The category that includes credit cards showed a $1.44 billion increase in September after having dropped by $201 million the previous month. The category that covers auto loans and student loans increased $14.48 billion after a $14.23 billion increase in August. Rising levels of consumer borrowing coupled with strong employment growth are viewed as good signs that consumers are confident about taking on more debt to boost purchases. The September increase in total borrowing put it 5.9 percent above a year ago. Auto and student loans are up 7.3 percent from a year ago while credit card debt has risen a much smaller 2 percent. The large increase in student debt has raised concerns that young Americans are being saddled with student loans that will keep them from buying homes or spending as previous generations have after college. Student loans have soared since the recession ended, topping $1.1 trillion in the second quarter of this year, according to data from the New York Federal Reserve. That's up from $700 billion in 2009 and in part a reflection of the number of people who either lost jobs or couldn't get a job after graduation and decided to go back to school. The New York Fed reported that demand for auto loans reached the highest level in eight years this spring with more people with checkered credit histories obtaining the loans. That has raised worries about the potential for defaults down the road. The Federal Reserve's monthly credit report doesn't cover mortgages or any other loans that are backed by real estate. Yes they can. The CARD Act did get rid of the most outrageous abuse: they can no longer increase the interest rate on existing balances unless you go 60 days past due.

NVIDIA: A Safe Bet For Investors

NVIDIA (NVDA) is an established name in Graphic Processor Units (GPU). The company's latest quarterly results were strong. This is a good sign for the company as well as investors who had patiently waited for some extraordinary growth.

The company's sales in the past were in the doldrums with the sun setting over the PC market, but this was offset by growth in high-end gaming GPU sales. Although the market for mobile gaming and next generation gaming consoles has been rising, NVIDIA was still focused on the declining PC market. This further created a dent in sales figures for a player like AMD (AMD), which was not as focused as NVIDIA in this market.

Now, with analysts reporting a rebound in the PC market, this should further help NVIDIA improve. In recent times, NVIDIA has been impressive with latest new products that have enabled it to make a U-turn in its business. New growth opportunities in the vehicle infotainment segment can be catalysts for NVIDIA's growth. As per IHS, global sales of infotainment systems were $34.6 billion, with Panasonic as market leader. The growing opportunity here could double by 2017 and companies like NVIDIA can take a bigger bite of the market share from Panasonic.

Targeting to be a leader in PC gaming

As already stated, the rebound in the PC market is providing a tailwind to the company's growth prospects. The gaming industry is worth about $100 billion annually. This market is spread across mobile devices, consoles and PCs. Last year, Xbox and PlayStation 4 were launched, which created a boom in console gaming revenue, but the PC market which is said to be declining in the past has a bigger market than console gaming. The major market of PC gaming comes from the Asia Pacific region and it is estimated to be a $15 billion industry, while in North America, it amounts to around $3.9 billion.

NVIDIA continues to benefit from the rebound of the PC market which led to growth in PC gaming market. Revenue from GeForce gaming GPUs increased 15% in fiscal 2014. The company's market share in discrete GPUs is also rising to an effect that NVIDIA now holds 65% of the market share in this segment. Back in 2010, this was an even market with AMD, but now the gap is widening every year

Outperforming its competitors

This is a segment where NVIDIA anticipates a rapid growth and may out perform its competitors. The latest Maxwell based notebook GPU is slimmer and lighter with higher battery life due to Maxwell's enhancement of energy efficiency. Maxwell is based on Kepler architecture that competes with AMD's Radeon R9 270. On the power efficiency front, it beats its competitor AMD's Radeon, but we don't see a huge speed gain in the new Maxwell GPU. Finally on the price front, it is much cheaper than Radeon with two variants priced at $119 and $149, compared to $179 for Radeon.

A better choice

NVIDIA mainly concentrated on the GPU market while AMD was bootstrapped with its focus on CPUs & GPUs and also to some extent on gaming consoles. As AMD's focus was distributed, NVIDIA only concentrated on the specialized market of GPUs and stimulated itself to be market leader in graphic cards and GPUs.

Research and Development is the platform for any successful product development and enhancement. NVIDIA is extravagant on this. Its R&D budget enables it to churn out products that are innovative.

Conclusion

NVIDIA's latest products are doing well and its business has turned around. Its future looks bright with its new GPU, making it a good buy.

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Texas Roadhouse Inc. Earnings: Steaks Are High

Source: Texas Roadhouse.

Texas Roadhouse (NASDAQ: TXRH  ) is hoping that it's not just its signature steaks that are meaty. The chain of 436 casual steakhouses posted quarterly results after Monday's market close.

Revenue climbed 15% to $385.2 million as new openings and a 5.9% uptick in comps combined to drive the top line higher. Net income climbed 10% to $18.9 million, or $0.27 a share. 

It was a mixed showing relative to Wall Street expectations. Analysts were holding out for a profit of $0.29 a share, but they were also only settling for $375.9 million in revenue. 

The stock initially ticked higher in after-hours trading on Monday, suggesting that the tug-of-war between bulls pulling on the top-line beat and bears tugging on the bottom-line miss is being won by the longs.

It also helps that Texas Roadhouse offered up a couple of legitimate reasons for the failure of earnings to grow as quickly as revenue. Food costs rose and general liability insurance clocked in higher as a result of an overlapping credit a year earlier. Its income tax rate bumped higher, given the expiration of a work opportunity tax credit last year and higher stock option exercise activity last year. The income tax disparity alone took a 12% uptick in operating profit down to the ultimate 10% bottom-line gain.

The market's cool with that, and that's saying something since shares of Texas Roadhouse had hit an all-time high on Monday ahead of the report. With that kind of optimism already priced into the stock, it could have been vulnerable with the mixed showing. 

Momentum is in Texas Roadhouse's corner these days. It has added 27 new locations over the past year, and there's plenty of real estate left to conquer. Investors were already impressed with the 5.9% uptick in comps for the entire quarter, and during the subsequent conference call Texas Roadhouse revealed that monthly comparable sales increased 4%, 6.3%, and 7.2% in July, August, and September, respectively. That's welcome acceleration, as Texas Roadhouse noted that October comps has also risen roughly 7%.

Texas Roadhouse is the last of the casual steakhouses to trade as a standalone namesake company. The market darlings of the 1990s -- Outback Steakhouse, Lone Star Steakhouse & Saloon, LongHorn Steakhouse, Sagebrush, Timber Lodge, Roadhouse Grill, and Logan's Roadhouse -- were taken private or buckled, with some returning as part of larger diversified companies today.

Texas Roadhouse doesn't need to run with a big crowd of its peers. It's doing just fine on its own, judging by the brisk expansion, robust comps, and new all-time highs this week. 

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Newmont Mining: Wait, I Thought It Was Good News

Sometimes a beat just isn’t enough, as investors in Newmont Mining (NEM) found out today.

Zuma Press

Newmont reported a profit of 50 cents excluding items, beating forecasts for 16 cents, pm revenue of $1.75 billion. The numbers weren’t nearly that straightforward, however–or that good. The folks at Deustche Bank explain:

Newmont reported a wide EBITDA miss, posting $378m (~=depreciation+ depletion) vs DBe of $524m and consensus of $465m, on l-t-e copper contribution. A complex reported EPS of 42c was driven fully by the sharing of minority interest losses, a negative tax rate and other gains and we put adj EPS closer to 2c/sh and basically in-line with the company's 2.5c quarterly dividend (Newmont's published adj EPS was 50c) and compare with DBe adj EPS of 22c and Thomson One consensus of 19c. With capex spend projected to rise ~$350m in 2015, free cash flow outlook is turning negative on weaker-than-expected operational results. We cut our Price Target to $20/sh which is now based on 0.9x revised NAV of $22.50 (versus 1x prior NAV of $25) on rising likelihood of financial stress in a declining gold price environment.

Shares of Newmont Mining have dropped 8.3% to $18.65 at 3:04 p.m. today, twice as much as Barrick Gold’s (ABX) 4% decline to $11.81 and the Market Vectors Gold Miners ETF’s (GDX) 4% slide to $17.47.