Oatly Group (OTLY) shares jumped 8% in premarket trading after the company reported fourth-quarter results before the New York open. And then, in New York trading the stock gave back the gains and was down 1.055 as of 1 p.m. New York time.
After a huge rally like we’re had this year, it’s easy to fall into one of the most common buy on the dip traps. Just because a stock is cheaper than it was, it’s not necessarily a bargain. There’s nothing that says a stock has to return to its previous price after a dip. And especially that it has to return to that former price on your schedule. Let me use Disney (DIS), one of the stocks I’m tracking in my Dip-O-Meter, as an example.
U.S. retail sales rose in October for a third month. The value of overall retail purchases increased 1.7% last month, the most in seven months, the Commerce Department said today, November 16. Excluding gas and motor vehicles, sales gained 1.4% in October. The figures aren’t adjusted for inflation. The median estimate in a Bloomberg survey of economists called for a 1.4% advance in overall retail sales.
Back in October when I made Oatly Group (OTLY) the No. 4 pick in my Buy on the Dip Special Report, I advised waiting until after the company’s November 15 earnings report because there was a good chance that the company would miss estimates and disappoint on guidance. Exactly. Today the company did both and the stock dropped 20.8% on the day. That’s a big one-day plunge, especially since even before today’s beating the stock was down 59% formats June 11, 2021 high. I think it’s safe to say that much of the risk is now out of these shares
This is a very tough market for Buy on the Dip investors and traders. Not, as you might think, because a market that hits a new record high just about every day doesn’t offer very many opportunities to buy on the dip. Actually a market melt up, like the one we’re now experiencing, offers a lot of buy on the dip chances. That’s because while everyone wants to hold the market’s rockets, no one want to hold any stock demonstrating any weakness. Sell at the slightest whiff of bad news–as shares of Oatly (OTLY) demonstrated today, November 15, when they plunged 20.81% on disappointing earnings and guidance for the remainder of 2021 and into 2022. (Oatly is on this Dip-O-Meter list.) One problem is that plunges tend not to last very long.
