November 9, 2017 | Daily JAM, Notes You Need |
In my daily trawling through the market I come upon lots of tidbits of knowledge that I think are important to investors but that don’t justify a full post. I’ve decided to start compiling these notes here each day in a kind of running mini blog that I’m calling Notes You Need. Posts include items like this one from today: “11:40 a.m.: Just a reminder in the midst of all the chaos over the tax bill: The deal to continue funding the federal government expires on December 8. Without a new deal (most probably another temporary extension of funding authority) the government will have to close down after that date. (The deal to suspend the debt ceiling expires on that same date but Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin says “extraordinary measures” will enable the Treasury to keep paying the government’s bills through the end of January.)”
November 8, 2017 | Daily JAM, Short Term |
It’s not like the Republican leadership in the House of Representatives didn’t see this coming. One reason they kept their bill under wraps until the last minute was fear that once the legislation went public, special interest lobbyists would swarm Congress looking to either protect existing tax breaks or head off tax increases or argue for bigger tax cuts.
November 8, 2017 | Daily JAM, EBAY, Stock Alerts |
When eBay (EBAy) and PayPal (PYPL) split up in July 2015 (with eBay shareholders getting one share of eBay and one share of PayPal) I told myself (and readers) that I wanted to keep PayPal in my long term 50 Stocks Portfolio but would one day sell eBay out of that...
November 8, 2017 | Daily JAM, Uncategorized |
You don’t have to do anything now–but come January 2018, if 2017 finishes the way I outlined in my last post on this momentum market and end of the year selling/window dressing I think rebalancing a portfolio will be a very smart way to begin 2018. Rebalancing–selling winning positions and adding to losing positions until all the holdings in a portfolio are equally weighted–will automatically take profits in the biggest winners of 2017 and redistribute some of that cash into stocks that have been sold down in 2017 but that look set to rebound in 2018.
November 7, 2017 | Daily JAM, Mid Term |
In a momentum market, which is what we have, you put money into the stocks that are riding the momentum upward. An equally weighted index of Alphabet, Amazon, Apple, Facebook and Microsoft is up 42% in 2017. That holds true on the downside too. This market has taking the losers and crushing them some more. Bed Bath and Beyond is down 53% for the year.
November 7, 2017 | Daily JAM, Perfect Five-ETFs |
Deutsche Bank just took the ETF industry another step closer to zero fee ETFs. On October 30 the bank cut the net expense ratio charged by its flagship high-yield ETF, the Xtrackers USD High Yield Corporate Bond ETF (HYLB) to 0.2% from 0.25%. The move follows on a decision by ETF giant State Street to lower the expense ratios of 15 of its most popular ETFs. Deutsche Bank’s move to slash fees follows the decision by investment manager State Street Global Advisors to lower expense ratios on 15 of its popular ETFs.
November 7, 2017 | Daily JAM, Notes You Need |
In my daily trawling through the market I come upon lots of tidbits of knowledge that I think are important to investors but that don’t justify a full post. I’ve decided to start compiling these notes here each day in a kind of running mini blog that I’m calling Notes You Need. Blog items are posts like this from today: “12:20 p.m.: China’s Ministry of Commerce has cleared the proposed merger of Potash of Saskatchewan (POT) and Agrium (AGU)–providing diverse its minority positions in Arab Potash and Sociedad Quimica y Minera de Chile (SQM) within 18 months.”Â
November 7, 2017 | Daily JAM, Mid Term, Morning Briefing |
Good news for oil prices:  OPEC raised its forecast for global oil demand in 2021 by 2.3 million barrels a day above last year’s projection. It also raised its oil demand forecast in 2040 by 1.7 million barrels a day to about 111 million barrels. Bad news for oil prices: OPEC also forecast that oil output from North American shale producers will hit 7.5 million barrels a day in 2021.
November 6, 2017 | Daily JAM, Uncategorized |
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November 6, 2017 | Daily JAM, JCI, Stock Alerts |
Johnson Controls, a member of my long-term 50 Stocks portfolio, hasn’t done much of anything for a year now. Over the last 12 months the shares are up just 0.66%. That performance isn’t surprising. The company just about completely remade itself in 2016 by spinning off its automotive interiors business and by merger with Ireland-based Tyco International in what has been called one of the most egregious examples of corporate tax avoidance since Constantine outsourced the Roman Empire to Byzantium. Frankly I don’t think investors have known what to do with the “new” company–and the bad taste left by the 2016 tax inversion ploy and the company’s continued problems in generating cash have given investors very few reasons to put in the homework necessary to figure it out. But I think Johnson Controls deserves a little bit of attention now
November 6, 2017 | Daily JAM, Notes You Need |
In my daily trawling through the market I come upon lots of tidbits of knowledge that I think are important to investors but that don’t justify a full post. I’ve decided to start compiling these notes here each day in a kind of running mini blog that I’m calling Notes You Need. Those daily posts includes itms such as this from today: “Another chair to open up at the Federal Reserve in 2018. This time it’s at the head of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York where William Dudley will retire by mid-2018. Dudley’s term didn’t expire until 2019. The New York Fed plays a critical role in handling the Fed’s open market operations and Dudley has been one of the strongest advocates for the Fed’s policy of monetary stimulus in the years since the financial crisis. The New York Fed, rather than President Trump, will conduct the search and pick a new head to run the bank and to occupy the bank’s seat on the Fed’s governing body. I have to wonder that if, at some point, the financial markets start to worry about the huge drain in expertise at the top of the Fed with the departure of chair Janet Yellen, vice-chair Stanley Fischer, regulatory head Daniel Tarullo, and now Dudley.”
November 6, 2017 | Daily JAM, Morning Briefing |
It’s not so much that the anti-corruption crackdown launched by Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman over the week signals any significant change in the kingdom’s oil policies. It’s just that any turmoil in Saudi Arabia sends oil traders scrambling to get long on the chance that events in the Middle East will upset oil markets. Oil prices hit their highest since July 2015 on Monday
