May 6, 2022 | Daily JAM, Videos, Volatility |
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.
May 3, 2022 | AMD, Daily JAM, Volatility |
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.
April 26, 2022 | Daily JAM, EQNR, LNG, Volatility |
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
March 31, 2022 | Daily JAM, DNNGY, EQNR, Jubak Picks, Volatility, VWDRY |
A couple of days doesn’t a trend make, but the trading action in European wind stocks has caught my eye in the last week or so. Yesterday, Wednesday, March 30, wind turbine maker Vestas Wind Systems (VWDRY) gained 5.80%. That took the stock to a gain of 4.60% in the past week. The stock is down 2.26% for 2022 to date as of the March 30 close. Wind developer Orsted (DNNGY) was up 3.27% to bring its gain in the last week to 7.71%. The stock is down 3.88% for 2022 to date. With Europe looking to reduce its reliance on imports of Russian natural gas, increasing the region’s wind power capacity is one solution.
March 23, 2022 | Daily JAM, DJP, Jubak Picks, Morning Briefing, Volatility |
How does the lyric go (as sung by Albert King)? “If it wasn’t for bad luck, I would have no luck at all.” Maybe that song should be the theme song for the global food market right now. This month China’s agriculture minister Tang Renjian told colleagues at a high-profile government meeting in Beijing this month: “China faces big difficulties in food production because of the unusual floods last autumn. Many faming experts and technicians told us that crop conditions this year could be the worst in history.”
March 18, 2022 | Daily JAM, EQNR, Volatility |
Norwegian oil and natural gas producer Equinor (EQNR) said Wednesday, March 16, that adjusted permits from the Norwegian government will allow higher natural gas production over summer from the North Sea Troll and Oseberg fields as well as the Heidrun fields in the Norwegian Sea. With European countries looking for alternatives to Russian natural gas Equinor can basically sell all the gas it can produce even at higher prices. Natural gas futures closed at $4.81 per million BTUs today in New York. That’s up from $3.80 on January 20. That’s a 26.6% increase. I added Equinor to my Volatility Portfolio back on January 21 as hedge against a Russian invasion of Ukraine and wide-reaching sanctions. That position is up 23.14% as of the close on March 18.
March 9, 2022 | Daily JAM, Millennial, OTLY, Volatility |
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.
March 1, 2022 | DAC, Daily JAM, NMM, Volatility |
Back in October 2021 (on October 7 to be exact) I added shares of Danaos (DAC) and Navios Maritime Partners (NMM) to my Volatility Portfolio. Disruptions in the global supply chain had produced a bidding war by companies willing to pay almost anything to get their goods, components, and raw materials from Point A to Point B. And these two shipping giants were positioned to reap the rewards of that chaos. Today, though, the chaos is on the other foot (so to speak).
February 7, 2022 | Daily JAM, Morning Briefing |
The Independent Commodity Intelligence Services published its supply/demand outlook for liquified natural gas today, Monday, February 7. The conclusion: Higher supply deficits for 2022 despite the addition of 24 million tons of LNG capacity in 2021. ICIS projects that supplies will increase by just 5.3 million tons in 2022. Demand is forecast to increase by 13.8 million tons.
February 3, 2022 | COP, Daily JAM, EQNR, Jubak Picks, LNG, PXD, Volatility, XLE |
U.S. crude benchmark West Texas Intermediate rose above $90 a barrel–it closed at $90.87, up 0.60% for the day, for the first time since 2014. International benchmark Brent crude gained 0.42% to close at $91.53 a barrel. Of course, it took a wild confluence of events to push prices above $90.
February 1, 2022 | COP, Daily JAM, EQNR, Jubak Picks, LNG, PXD, Stock Alerts, Volatility |
OPEC+ meets tomorrow and the oil cartel and friends like Russia is expected to approve an increase in production that will reduce last year’s cuts in production. But the odds are that the decision won’t matter.
January 21, 2022 | Daily JAM, VIX, Volatility, You Might Have Missed |
The CBOE S&P 500 Volatility Index (VIX) is up another 8.87% today to 27.83 on another drop in stocks and continued worry about the effect of looming Federal Reserve interest rate increases. Today I’m going to sell the February 16 VIX Call Options with a strike of 20 (VIX220216C00020000) that I bought on December 31, 2021 in my Volatility Portfolio. I bought those Call Options for $380 a contract and I’m selling today, January 21 with those options trading at $710 a contract as of 2:45 New York time. That’s a gain of 86.8% on this position in roughly four weeks.
