Stock Pick of the Day: Acadia Pharmaceuticals (ACAD)
As I wrote in my previous post this morning, I like the upward momentum in the biotech sector resulting from the race for a coronavirus vaccine and treatment and the cash flows into the sector from investors and big drug companies such as Pfizer (PFE.) That has pushed...
More headroom for biotech sector–and heads up on a coming pick
On May 29 the iShares NASDAQ Biotechnology ETF (IBB) hit an all-time high of $134.85, breaking the record of $133 set in 2015. Not surprising with money flooding into the sector as everyone and their Aunt Sally looks to find the stock that will rocket to the moon on...
Anticipating more rally for the end of this week: slower growth in new claims for unemployment (Thursday) and in job cuts (Friday) likely to be seen as signs of a bottom for economy
Tomorrow it’s Thursday and time for another weekly report on initial claims for unemployment. In absolute terms the numbers are likely to be grim. Economists project that tomorrow’s report will show another 1.8 million workers have filed new claims for...
Wall Street starts to watch something called the market price/liquidity ratio to justify this rally
The Standard & Poor’s 500 stock index may be closing in on the February 19 record closing high of 3386.15–about 11.2% from the Friday, May 29, close at 3044.31, but some Wall Street strategists see more rally ahead–with a close at the end of...
China orders state-owned companies to halt purchases of U.S. pork and soybeans, putting trade deal in further jeopardy
China has told state-owned companies to halt purchases of soybeans and pork from the United States in response to President Donald Trump’s announcement that his administration would begin the process of eliminating Hong Kong’s special trade status. Chinese...
Can stocks now count on a Trump Put?
I think we witnessed the birth of a Trump Put on the stock market in today’s Rose Garden press event that investors and traders can pin beside their terminals along with the Powell Put from the Federal Reserve. Ahead of what had been billed as an announcement...
New claims for unemployment 2.12 million for week ended May 23
The stock market is seeing the glass as half full this morning. This morning the Labor Department reported that 2.12 million Americans filed new claims for unemployment in the week that ended on May 23. That is down from 2.45 million initial claims in the prior week...
My Stock Pick of the Day: Xylem (XYL)
Xylem (XYL) is that rare coin on raw market–a pure play water stock at a time when foresighted investors are looking for water stocks and realizing how few of them exist. (The basic water story is that Mother Nature isn’t making more of it. Rising global...
S&P 500 becomes untethered from earnings growth
Yesterday’s rally in the Standard & Poor’s 500, which pushed the index back over 3,000, sent the forward price to earnings ratio–that is the PE based on projected earnings per share for the stocks in the index–to 23.36. That’s the...
Do you see what I see?
This morning what I saw in photos and videos from this past Memorial Day weekend was a country rushing pell mell toward re-opening the economy without a thought for safety amidst a still uncontrolled coronavirus outbreak. I saw photos of crowds at beaches, on board...
China is the big wild card this week
China isn’t the only story out there with market moving potential but it is the “ripest.” We won’t have anything but anecdotal accounts of the collapse of social distancing at events across the country this weekend and we won’t know how...
Mortgage delinquencies soar in April
The number of borrowers who stopped paying their home loans jumped by 1.6 million last month, according to data from Black Knight, a real estate analytics company. The national mortgage delinquency rate rose to 6.45% in April, up from 3.06% in March. That’s...
Another 2.4 million workers filed initial claims for unemployment last week–but take the data with a grain of statistical salt
According to the Department of Labor another 2.4 million Americans filed initial claims for unemployment in the week that ended May 16. That puts the total from this report at 38.6 million initial claims for unemployment filed in the last 9 weeks. The two-month total...
Stock Pick of the Day: Barrick Gold (GOLD)
I can think of two reasons to buy shares of Barrick Gold (GOLD) now. Either one alone would be enough to justify a “buy.” First, sentiment is shifting among investors toward the idea of buying gold as protraction against currency depreciation. The U.S....
Stock Pick of the Day: Taiwan Semiconductor (TSM)
Announcing a new feature–my stock pick of the day. With Taiwan Semiconductor as my first pick. The hoo ha at the end of last week over restrictions on the sale of U.S. semiconductors to China’s Huawei Technologies, high-lighted the central role that Taiwan...
Oil keeps on rallying–and takes market with it
Remember how back on April 20 West Texas Intermediate traded at a negative $40.32 a barrel on the futures market? Then the fears were that anyone who owned a forward future and who was forced to accept delivery of that oil would not be able to find a place to store...
Even after yesterday’s rip-roaring gains, the S&P 500 is stuck–so what comes next?
Yesterday, May 18, the Standard & Poor’s 500 closed at 2953. We’ve been here before. Several times, in fact. On May 8, the index closed at 2929.80. On April 29, the close was 2939. With the 200-day moving average at 2998.,56, even yesterday’s...
Selling Illinois Tool Works out of my Dividend Portfolio to make room for new dividend strategy and new picks
My second sell of the day. Way back in November 2019–if you remember a period when projected earnings growth was strong and before the coronavirus recession–I argued for a dividend strategy that focused on companies with fast growing and solidly...
Selling Visa out of Dividend Portfolio to make room for new dividend strategy and picks
Way back in November 2019–if you remember a period when projected earnings growth was strong and before the coronavirus recession–I argued for a dividend strategy that focused on companies with fast growing and solidly predictable earnings that were, in my...
Stocks roar ahead on perfect storm of good news
As of 1 p.m. New York time today, May 18, the Standard & Poor’s 500 is up 3.17% and the Dow Jones Industrial Average is higher by 3.60%. The NASDAQ Composite has climbed 2.47% and the Russell 2000 small cap index is ahead 5.29%. The iShares Emerging Markets...
The U.S.-China trade war looks to move beyond words–and again it involves Huawei Technologies
China is ready to put U.S. technology companies such as Apple, (AAPL), Cisco Systems (CSCO), and Qualcomm (QCOM) on its “unreliable entity list.” That would likely result in investigations and economic restrictions on those U.S. companies, according to the...
Retail sales plunge 16.4% in April
U.S. retail sales fell 16.4% in April from March levels, the Commerce Department reported today. March itself had seen an 8.3% month to month drop. Economists surveyed by Bloomberg were looking for a 12% decline. In a separate report from the Federal Reserve today...
Weekly new claims for unemployment near 3 million again, above projections from economists
Initial jobless claims totaled 2.98 million for the week ended May 9, the Labor Department reported today. That’s down from last week’s 3.18 million claims and marks a sixth straight week of declines. But the figure was higher than the 2.5 million claims...
Two negative views of the oil market–and one’s from OPEC
It will take more than a year, and perhaps several years, for oil demand to recover to what it was before the coronavirus pandemic, said Fatih Birol, executive director of the International Energy Agency ahead of Thursday’s update on energy markets. Crude demand...
Now it’s the Fed’s Powell’s turn to push stocks lower, urge Congress to provide more coronavirus money
Yesterday, I argued that the barrage of cautionary comments from Federal Reserve officials seemed designed to talk stock prices lower and to push Congress toward a new bigger coronavirus rescue package. (Why might the Fed want to slow the current rally? The only...
Has the market broken it’s upward trend? I’m watching the big tech stocks as indicators
As of 12:30 p.m. New York time today, U.S. stocks had continued their downward move of yesterday. The Standard & Poor’s 500 was lower by 2.23% and the Dow Jones Industrial Average had tumbled 2.35%. The NASDAQ Composite was off 2.44% and the Russell 2000...
Federal Reserve puts its corporate-bond-buying vehicle in motion
On March 23, the Federal Reserve announced that it would create a facility to buy corporate bunds and ETFs tracking the corporate bond market. That facility remained an all-talk/no-action vehicle until today when the New York Federal Reserve Bank announced that its...
People’s Bank says it will resort to “more powerful” policies to stimulate China’s economy but leaves details vague
Think of it as a first step toward a policy move and not as an actual plan for action. In its quarterly monetary policy report released Sunday, the People’s Bank of China said it will resort to “more powerful” policies to counter unprecedented economic challenges from...
And the earnings estimates are tumbling down: stocks get more expensive on forward earnings
On March 31 Wall Street analysts were projecting a decline in first quarter earnings of 6.9% for the stocks in the Standard & Poor’s 500, according to Factset. As of May 8, with 86% of the S&P 500 reporting, the consensus projection for the quarter was...Jim’s Daily Email Alerts:
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