New registrations for electric vehicles jumped 60% in the first quarter of 2022 from the first quarter of 2021. according to Experian Automotive. Electric vehicles made up an all-time record 4.6% of the total market. The news was even more positive given that overall new vehicle registrations were down 18% in the quarter from the first quarter of 2021.
In my weekend Saturday Night Quarterback I said that this week would, probably, answer the question of whether Friday’s big bounce was just a bounce, the start of a buy on the dip rally, or even a bear market rally with a bit of staying power. Two days into the week I think the market action is moving in favor of a bear market rally, one of those often quite powerful upside moves that punctuate extended bear markets.
My one-hundredth-and-thirty-first YouTube video “Quick Pick: U.S. Natural Gas Fund” went up today. Natural gas hit an 18-year high in the United States on Thursday, May, even as oil was sliding. Consequently I’m looking for a pick that focuses on natural gas and not oil: my pick this week is United States Natural Gas Fund (UNG). I’ll use today’s drop in the price of natural gas and the 8.04% decline in UNG to add this pick to my Volatility Portfolio on Monday. I think that we’re going to see even higher gas prices as the war in Ukraine (and sanctions against Russia) grind on and as everyone rushes to build stock piles ahead of the inter heating season.
After the close on May 3, Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) reported first-quarter earnings of $1.13 a share, excluding some items. Wall Street analysts had projected earnings of 92 cents a share for the quarter. Sales rose 71% to $5.9 billion, topping projections of $5.3 billion. The results pushed shares up 9.10% in trading on May 4.
Normally at this time of year natural gas prices retreat and companies actually stash natural gas in storage for use durin hurricane outages in the fall and winter heating season. Not this year, however. Today natural gas prices in the U.S. hit a new 18-year high. At 11:20 a.m. New York time natural gas for June delivery climbed to $8.08 per million BTUs, up 8.12% on the morning
There were very few places to hide in this week’s stock market decline. A number of the old reliable places to hide aren’t providing much protection in the current stock market drop. But I did see two splashes of green today among the sea of red.
Russia’s Gazprom has told Poland’s government that it will stop supplying natural gas to Poland beginning on Wednesday after Poland refused to pay the supplier in roubles. Western sanctions have made it almost impossible for Russian companies to collect payments in dollars or euros. The decision to stop natural gas supply to Poland also followed on the country’s announcement on Tuesday that it was imposing sanctions on 50 entities and individuals including Russia’s biggest gas company. Polish ministers told a press conference that Poland had sufficient supplies of gas to weather the interruption
My one-hundredth-and-twenty-fifth YouTube video “Quick Pick Plug Power” went up today. Plug Power is building out a network for green hydrogen and hydrogen fuel cells. They’ve been involved in recent big deals with Walmart to power fork lifts in the company’s warehouses. And the company has Amazon, another big warehouse operator, as a customer too.The other market I like for Plug Power is backup power for data centers. This stock is very volatile, so be careful out. I’ll be adding it to my Volatility Portfolio on JubakAM.com on Monday after the April 22 drop of 3.54%
Today, April 21, reports from a number of different sources are pointing to lower oil production–which will mean higher oil prices. Even from current levels. And oil prices are significantly higher in the past three weeks. At 3:00 p.m. New York time today U.S. benchmark West Texas Intermediate traded at $103.44 a barrel, up 1.61% on the day. On April 11 West Texas Intermediate traded for just $94.29 a barrel.
Tesla (TSLA) crushed Wall Street projections for first quarter earnings today, Wednesday, April 20. After the market close, the company reported record revenue of $18.756 billion, up 80.5% from the first quarter of 2021. (Wall Street analysts had expected revenue of $17.76 billon.) And earnings of $3.22 a share. That was well ahead of Wall Street expectations for $2.89 a share.
Forget about all the hoopla over Tesla (TSLA) founder Elon Musk’s bid to buy Twitter (TWTR). (If you can.) On Wednesday, when the electric car leader announces first quarter 2022 earnings the story will be China, China, China.
As of noon New York time today, April 12, the Standard & Poor’s 500 was up 0.47% and the Dow Jones Industrial Average had gained 0.34%. The NASDAQ Composite was higher by 0.73% and the NASDAQ 100 had moved up by 0.67%. The small cap Russell 2000 had tacked on 1.49%. And then by the close stocks had given up all these gains and more. For the day, the S&P 500 closed down 0.34% and the Dow was off 0.26%. The NASDAQ Composite ended lower by 0.30% and the NASDAQ 100 was down 0.36%. The small cap Russell 2000 managed to close up 0.33% on the day.
