Z-SYMBOLS
December 27, 2022 | AAPL, Daily JAM, Top 50 Stocks |
Apple (AAPL) shares were down another 1.21% as of 3:30 p.m. New York time today, December 27. That took the stock down to its lowest price since June 2021. The worry, of course, is China where, first, shutdowns under the country’s 0-Covid policy closed factories and kept consumers out o stores, and then, second, where an abrupt reversal of that policy has accelerated a new wave of outbreaks.
The timing of these developments, though, has some advantages for Apple.
December 23, 2022 | Daily JAM, Jubak Picks, MGM |
On Friday I posted my two-hundred-and-twentieth YouTube video: Quick Pick Sell MGM. This week’s Quick Pick is a little different. Normally my Quick Picks are long (buys) but this one is short (sell). This is a reaction to the terrible Covid outbreak in China right now. China went from a strict, 0-covid policy to hardly any policy at all. While their vaccine rate sounds good at 90%, a lot of that is Chinese-produced, non-RNA vaccines, which have proven to be fairly ineffective against the new Covid variants. As a result, viral projection models expect 1.1 to 1.3 million deaths over the next wave (or waves) of Covid in China. So how does that affect MGM International? Their resort in Macau, China, while recently receiving their gambling license renewal, will get hit hard by the largely self-directed reduction in travel. And the “official” policy, which is to encourage travel and work-as-usual, seems to be having the opposite effect by creating fear among Chinese citizens. Macao, following the lead of the new policies from the central government, has just about dropped its requirements for testing and quarantine. The new rules essentially say, “We just want you to come.” Instead, many people are locking themselves down in an effort to stay healthy as China’s covid problem runs rampant and the Chinese government refuses to share accurate data. I don’t want to watch this Covid disaster further hammer my position in the stock. I’ll be selling it at a loss in my Jubak Picks Portfolio (hey, harvest those tax losses for 2022), but I will look to get back in April or May if I start to see optimistic traders betting on an end to this wave of the Covid Pandemic in China.
December 23, 2022 | Daily JAM, Morning Briefing, Videos, VIX, Volatility |
Today I posted my two-hundred-and-nineteenth YouTube video: Fear Is Still on a Holiday Today’s topic: Fear is Still on a Holiday. This is a peculiar market for many reasons. Stocks are sinking, but volatility fear doesn’t seem to be rising. On December 20, for example, the S&P 500 fighting a 5-day losing streak. Havens of safety were getting smaller. Pharmaceuticals and airlines, which have been strong recently, sold off on December 19. Searching for glimpses of green, like Coke (up just .14%) in a sea of red is getting harder and harder. What’s curious though, is the VIX, the CBOE Volatility Index, better known as the “Fear Index” remains on the average to low end of its recent and historic range. their recent range. The VIX tracks prices for options and futures on the S&P, so as people, in fear of a downturn, hedge by buying “insurance” against a market drop, the VIX rises. But right now we’re seeing a market that truly stinks–that’s a technical term, I know, but you can Google it–while the VIX remains low, showing little sign of fear. My explanation is that at the end of the year, investors aren’t looking to hedge against a market they still hope will turn around. The VIX is an interesting short-term play here. Buying a Call option with a 60-day out as the market returns to fear, or rationality, in 2023 could be the way to go. I’m going to check on the up-to-the-minute price action and see if the Call option is attractive here. Look to my paid JubakAM.com and my free JubakPicks.Com sites on Friday for a buy or not.
December 21, 2022 | Daily JAM, MGM, Morning Briefing, VWAPY |
After swiftly abandoning its 0-Covid lockdown policy–without replacing it with anything resembling a national Covid protocol–China is facing a Covid disaster that could see more than 1 million deaths from the coronavirus in 2023. That would put China’s death toll from the Pandemic on par with that of the United States, which has seen 1.1 million people die from Covid19 since the pandemic began. The magnitude of the disaster is actually understated by that comparison since China’s comparable death toll would be condensed into a much shorter period than that in the United States. We don’t know with any degree of precision what a pandemic outbreak like this would do to the economies of China and the world. But we can make some reasonable guesses.
December 19, 2022 | COST, Daily JAM, Jubak Picks, Videos, WMT |
This week’s Trend of the Week: Christmas? Bah Humbug! Harris recently did a poll for Bloomberg that showed 60% of the people polled said they would be buying fewer gifts for fewer people this year due to inflation. That same poll said that 60% of respondents said they’d be cutting back on holiday travel, and 33% said they were skipping gift-giving completely. We’ll skip the discussion about the spirit of Christmas, and look at how this is going to affect retail and airline earnings in January. Retailers like Costco, Wal-Mart, and Kohl’s have already warned Wall Street that sales will not be great for Christmas, but even with that warning, retailers could surprise investors with lower-than-expected numbers. Costco announced its fiscal first-quarter earnings on December 10 with sales going up 6%. Although they were warned that margins were going to be soft, Wall Street was expecting 6.9% same-store growth and punished the shares accordingly with a huge drop in the stock. Costco is a great retailer for this moment, with affordable pricing on a wide range of goods and gas sales bringing in traffic. If Costco’s trending this way, I think we can expect the same from companies like Walmart and Kohl’s. It’s likely the airlines will take a hit as well, with the drop in holiday travel. For now, drink your wassail and try not to think about impending January earnings!
December 16, 2022 | Daily JAM, Morning Briefing, NVDA, Top 50 Stocks |
Wall Street analysts had begun to cut earnings estimates for 2023 even before this week’s Federal Reserve meeting. The Fed’s signal that it would raise interest rates higher and for longer than anticipated–and Fed chair Jerome Powell’s very tepid support for the belief that there wouldn’t be a recession in 2023, is leading Wall Street analysts to cut forecasts again. I mean how great will revenue and earnings growth be in 2023 if the economy grows at the Fed’s projected 0.5%? And a big chunk of that thinking on Wall Street is asking now if that projection isn’t the optimistic end of a range that on the downside would put the U.S. economy into an actual recession. Which puts downward pressure on stock prices and makes it very difficult right now to put a fair value on any stock. The Standard & Poor’s 500 closed down another 1.11% today, December 16. The Dow Jone Industrial Average was off 0.85%. The NASDAQ Composite closed lower by 0.97%. And the NASDAQ 100 ended down 0.63%. Take a look at how this works for a stock such as Nvidia (NVDA).
December 12, 2022 | Daily JAM, Millennial, PILBF, Special Reports |
On December 8 I made Australia’s Pilbara Minerals (PILBF) my Quick Pick Video. Today I’m adding it to my Special Report: “Own the Future for Pennies with These 10 Penny Stock Picks as Pick #9. And tomorrow I’m adding it to my Millenial Portfolio: For Investors with More Time Than Money.
December 12, 2022 | BABA, Daily JAM, FXI |
Just days after China’s government unwound its 0-Covid policy and eased lockdowns much earlier than expected, the country is seeing a surge of infection that already threatens to overwhelm hospitals. “The speed of changes on the ground has surprised many, including us,” Goldman Sachs Group Inc.’s chief China economist Hui Shan wrote in a note Sunday. “Not even a month ago, official outlets were still emphasizing that ‘20 measures’ were about optimizing the implementation of dynamic zero-Covid policy, rather than abandoning it. A few short weeks later, many controls are removed, and the virus seems to be spreading quickly among the population.” It’s unclear how quickly new cases are climbing
December 8, 2022 | ABBV, Daily JAM, Dividend Income, MMM |
Once a company has put in the time and money to make the Dividend Aristocrats list, the company isn’t likely to squander that investment just because a recession looms. To make the list–and garner a big chunk of cash from conservative dividend investors–a company has had to pay a dividend for a least 25 consecutive years and has had to raise that dividend every year. A company like 3M (MMM), which owns a 64-year record of paying and raising its dividend payout, is as close to a dividend sure thing as exists. Which is why it’s not surprising that AbbVie (ABBV), which owns a 50-year record of paying and raising its dividend, announced that it would raise its dividend in 2023 to $1.48 a quarter with the February 2023 payout. That would bring the annual dividend yield to 3.5% But…
December 7, 2022 | Daily JAM, Dividend Income, DOW |
The November rally was kind to Dow (DOW) with the stock up 10.4% from November 1 through December 1. The shares have given back some of that lately, but I’d still like to book any gains here ahead of a possible recession or at least a further economic slowdown in 2023.
December 2, 2022 | Daily JAM, FREY, Jubak Picks |
Yesterday, shares of clean energy battery startup Freyr Battery (FREY) rumbled 12.01% on news that the company would sell 20 million new shares to raise capital for its planned battery factories in Norway and (newly announced) Georgia. Today, December 2, traders and investors have done a bit of rethinking and bid the stock up 3.91% as of the close.
November 30, 2022 | Daily JAM, GWH, Millennial, Special Reports |
Call this bookkeeping. I recommended ESS Tech (GWH) in my November 11 Quick Pick video on Youtube. Today I’m adding it to my Special Report: Own the Future for Pennies with my 10 Best Penny Stock Picks as pick #8. And to my Millennial Portfolio–For Investors With More Time Than Money. The stock is down $6.44% today November 30 to $3.0386, so this seems a good time to buy for patient, very long-term investors. Here’s what I said in that YouTube video.
