MGM

Saturday Night Quarterback says, For the week ahead expect…

Saturday Night Quarterback says, For the week ahead expect…

This week will bring positioning for what’s looking like a record quarter for earnings growth for the first quarter of 2021 that’s likely to keep the stock market trend pointing upward. The first earnings report for the quarter are due from the big banks on April 14 and 15.
On April 1 FactSet reported that the bottom-up analyst earnings projection for the stocks in the Standard & Poor’s 500 for the first quarter had climbed 6% as the quarter itself progressed. That’s the biggest increase in analyst projections since FactSet began tracking quarterly bottom-up earnings estimates in the second quarter of 2002. Normally, analyst estimates slip downwards as the quarter progresses with the average decrease of the last five years at 4.2%
What we’re looking at the the possibility of an almost unbelievable surge in earnings in the first quarter of 2021, the second quarter, and for the whole year–caused by year-to-year comparisons with the pandemic recession in these quarters of 2020.

Raising my target price for MGM Resorts in my Jubak Picks Portfolio to $48

MGM Pick #9 for my new Millennial Portfolio (for investors who have more time than money)

I’m taking advantage of today’s drop in shares of MGM Resorts International (MGM) after yesterday’s earnings report to add these shares to my new Millennial Portfolio. The stock dropped on bad pandemic performance from the company’s Las Vegas casinos and resorts and a slide in revenue from its Macao operations. But revenue from online betting soared. And that business is the future of MGM–and the reason that investors with long-time horizons would want to own this stock. (And it won’t hurt at all, when revenue picks up from Las Vegas operations once the pandemic is in the rear-view mirror.

Market sees fourth quarter GDP slowdown as good news

Market sees fourth quarter GDP slowdown as good news

U.S. GDP growth slowed in the fourth quarter, gaining just 1% from the third quarter. For the full year the U.S. economy contracted by 3.5%. That makes 2020 the first time that the economy has contracted for a full year since 2009 and the Great Recession. At the bottom of that recession that economy contracted by 2.5%. 2020 is also the worst year for economic growth since 1946 when the economy shrank by 11.6% as the country demobilized after World War II. Consumer spending slowed in all 15 categories tracked by the Bureau of Economic Analysis. The sectors that had powered the recovery in the third quarter–restaurants and hotels, for instance–reversed. The growth in spending on cars and health car also slowed from the acceleration in the third quarter. So why is this good news as far as the stock market is concerned?