March 5, 2020 @ 7:29 pm | Breaking News |
Shares of MGM resorts International (MGM) fell 11.59% today, Thursday March 5, to close last $20.60. The shares closed at $31.21 at their 2020 high on January 17. The impetus for the latest big drop in the stock was the announcement of the first reported case of the...
March 4, 2020 @ 7:30 pm | Breaking News |
The “explanation” for today’s 4.22% gain in the S&P 500 and the 4.53% gain in the Dow Jones Industrial Average is that it’s a reaction to the surprising victories by former Vice-President Joe Biden over Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders in...
March 4, 2020 @ 7:26 pm | Breaking News |
I ran the prices and the performance of the 15 Dip-o-Meter stocks last night to see if any were yet in Buy-on-the-dip category. Of course all those numbers have been left needing big revisions after today’s rally. (I’ll wait a day on that revision to see...
March 3, 2020 @ 7:54 pm | Breaking News, Dividend Income Portfolio, VGSH |
I’d wager that almost nobody today is buying U.S. Treasuries for their yield. The yield on the 10-year Treasury broke below 1% to 0.9043% for the first time EVER. The 10-year finished the day with a yield of 1.01%. The yield on the 2-year Treasury fell to a low...
March 3, 2020 @ 7:50 pm | Breaking News |
The U.S. Federal Reserve announced an “emergency” 50 basis point cut to its benchmark interest rate. The cut left the Fed benchmark with a range of 1% to 1.25%. The move comes ahead of the Fed’s regular meeting on March 18. The interest rate cut,...
March 2, 2020 @ 7:53 pm | Breaking News |
The Institute for Supply Management’s Purchasing Managers’ Index for manufacturing fell to 50.1 in February, down from 50.9 in January. In this survey anything above 50 signals an expansion. The report was good news of a sort since U.S. manufacturing in...
March 2, 2020 @ 7:48 pm | Breaking News |
Financial markets moved higher on news that finance ministers and central bankers from the Group of Seven economies will hold a teleconference tomorrow, Tuesday, on how to respond to the coronavirus pandemic. The expectation is that central banks in Japan, England,...
February 28, 2020 @ 7:41 pm | Breaking News, Dividend Income Portfolio, GM |
I don’t think the coronavirus stock market rout is over, but I do believe you have to be opportunistic about snapping up dividend yield during this correction. Today shares of General Motor (GM) were down another 2.12% as of 2:40 p.m. New York time. That brings...
February 28, 2020 @ 7:15 pm | Breaking News |
It was just four sentences–“The fundamentals of the U.S. economy remain strong. However, the coronavirus poses evolving risks to economic activity. The Federal Reserve is closely monitoring developments and their implications for the economic outlook. We will...
February 27, 2020 @ 7:35 pm | Breaking News |
This morning it sure looked like U.S. stocks were going to bounce back from yesterday’s beating and from a deeply negative open. After opening down 2.28% at 9:31 a.m. New York time and then sinking even lower to down 3.54% by 10:35, the Standard &...
February 26, 2020 @ 7:49 pm | Breaking News |
It was less obvious today when there were other splashes of green among global stocks. But on Monday and Tuesday, the trend was readily apparent since so few stocks moved up on those days and so much of the market was colored a bright red. Oddly enough some China...
February 26, 2020 @ 7:43 pm | Breaking News |
This morning it looked like U.S. stocks would bounce from the drop of Monday and Tuesday–about 6% on the Standard & Poor’s 500. As of 10:51 a.m. New York time the index was up 1.64% to 3182.08. But that has turned out to be the high of the day. By...
February 26, 2020 @ 7:36 pm | Breaking News, Jubak Picks Portfolio, SEDG, Sell |
As I was prowling through the wreckage of momentum stocks in the last few days for my post on Tuesday, “They shoot momentum stocks, don’t they” I noticed one very lonely spot of green. While stocks such as Nvidia (NVDA) and Twilio (TWLO) were down...
February 25, 2020 @ 7:55 pm | Breaking News, Volatility, You May Have Missed |
The last two days of a plunging stock market on fears that the outbreak of coronavirus will last longer and spread farther than previously imagined have taken a huge chunk out of some momentum stocks. Just today shares of Nvidia (NVDA) fell another 4.11%, Twilio...
February 25, 2020 @ 7:44 pm | Breaking News |
The Standard & Poor’s 500 opened higher today–by 0.65%–a typical reaction the day after a big drop. But stocks quickly reversed direction and by 11:20 a.m. New York time on Tuesday morning, the S&P 500 was down 1.33%. One of the big...
February 24, 2020 @ 7:37 pm | Breaking News |
What’s different this week? Why is the market plunging today on coronavirus fears when last week it shook off the news? Because the last few days have brought news that the coronavirus isn’t limited to China anymore. From Italy comes a report that the...
February 20, 2020 @ 7:54 pm | Breaking News |
Today Japan reported the first two deaths from coronavirus among passengers quarantined on the Diamond Princess cruise liner, South Korea reported its first fatality, and new cases in Iran sparked fears that the disease is spreading in the Middle East. China tallied a...
February 19, 2020 @ 6:11 pm | Breaking News, Jubak Picks Portfolio, SEDG |
SolarEdge Technologies (SEDG) closed up 17.94% today ahead of fourth quarter earnings due after the close. Cascend Securities raised its target price on the shares by 17% during today’s session. Today’s jump will, of course, make it harder for the company...
February 19, 2020 @ 6:06 pm | Breaking News |
U.S. stocks were up strongly today on news that the central banks of the United States and China were likely to continue to provide cheap–and cheaper–liquidity to financial markets and economies. In minutes of its January 29 Open Market Committee meeting...
February 17, 2020 @ 7:24 pm | Breaking News |
We still don’t know if the coronavirus epidemic is slowing in China–the latest report shows deaths in China up 105 to 1,770 and the official number of cases climbing in mainland China to 70,548. Hubei province has reported 1,933 new cases, up from 1,843...
February 17, 2020 @ 7:17 pm | Breaking News, Dividend Income Portfolio, GOLD, Jubak Picks Portfolio |
Barrick Gold (GOLD) reported fourth quarter earnings of 17 cents a share on Wednesday, February 12. That beat the 14 cents a share estimate from Wall Street analysts for the quarter. A year ago the company earned 6 cents a share in the fourth quarter of 2018. But that...
February 13, 2020 @ 6:47 pm | Breaking News |
The calming words from the World Health Organization after Chinese health officials added 13,3000 cases to the total in Hubei province is that this is just a change in how cases are reported and NOT an indication that the epidemic, which has looked to be slowing over...
February 11, 2020 @ 6:58 pm | Breaking News |
Nobody wants to hear that U.S. government and consumer debt aren’t sustainable. Not President Donald Trump. Not the financial markets. Today, February 11, Federal Reserve Board Chair Jerome Powell told the House Financial Services Committee that it was important...
February 11, 2020 @ 6:53 pm | ABBV, Breaking News, Dividend Income Portfolio |
Shares of AbbVie (ABBV) tacked on another 1.32% today to a close at $96 continuing a run that began back on January 31 at $81.02. The trend picked up momentum on February 7 after the company reported fourth quarter earnings with better than expected sales for its...
February 10, 2020 @ 7:14 pm | Breaking News |
Pickings look rather slim for investors over the next decade, according to the results of Morningstar’s annual survey of financial market forecasts. Certainly much slimmer than the extremely strong returns for U.S. stocks for the last decade. During that period...
February 10, 2020 @ 7:06 pm | Breaking News |
Workers at Hon Hai Precision Industry (also known as FoxConn) were originally to be back at work at Apple’s (AAPL) largest manufacturing partner for iPhones today February 10. Then last week the company told workers to stay away from its Shenzhen headquarters...
February 7, 2020 @ 7:53 pm | Breaking News |
The U.S. economy added 225,000 jobs in January, well above the average 175,000 jobs added per month in 2019. And still markets fell. The Standard & Poor’s 500 dropped 0.54% and the Dow Jones Industrial Average closed down 0.94%. The NASADAQ Composite...
February 6, 2020 @ 10:21 pm | Breaking News, GLD, GOLD |
Gold is supposed to go up when investors and traders are looking for safe havens and hedges against market volatility. So it makes sense the gold and gold mining stocks are gaining as coronavirus stalks through the land. Gold closed up 0.99% today to $1570.50 an...
February 6, 2020 @ 7:11 pm | Breaking News |
This was the summary of the coronavirus emergency at this morning’s World Health Organization press conference: As of this morning there are 28,060 confirmed cases of the coronavirus in China and 564 deaths. Outside China, there are 225 cases in 24 countries and...
February 6, 2020 @ 7:07 pm | Breaking News |
The ADP Research Institute report on private payrolls, released yesterday, showed a gain of 291,000 jobs in January. That blew away economist forecasts for 157,000 net new jobs in the month, according to Bloomberg’s survey of economists. The January gain would...