Market 2017-12-12 (Rate Hike, Financial, and more)

Market is mixed today. Financial Sector is strong, which lifts Dow Jones, as Yellen holds her last 2-day FED meeting ---- interest rate hike is expected to be announced tomorrow. On the other hand, Utilities and Tech under-perform. Nasdaq finishes red.

Crude -1.31% to $57.23, UNG -3.6% (new low).

Political news: it is special election day in Alabama. If Dem wins, it will cast shadow on Tax Reform.


Winners

Financial: GS +3%, MS +2.1%, WFC +2.5%, JPM +1.2%, BAC +1.3%, C +0.4%. LC (+8.2%) continues its recovery. Financial Sector is expected to perform strongly in 2018.

Telecommunications: CMCSA +2.8%, T 3.3%, VZ 2.6%, S 4.2%.

TSLA jumped another 3.7% as GM continues to slide. In the past 5 trade sessions: TSLA +12.3%, GM -2.9%, F flat. I have no comments.

Redfin (RDFN +9.8%), reason is unclear to me.

Losers

QD -6.4%. Glad I sold yesterday.

GNC -8.4%. Poor balance sheet to blame?

MAT -4.9%. Free-fall cannot stop.

Tech: NVDA -2%, AMD -2.6%, MU -2.7%, FB -1.2%, BABA -2.6%, WUBA -3.4%, LRCX -2.2% ... Up one day, down the other, enjoy the ride.


My Trades Today

Bought TELL @ $9.4
Bought QD @ $13.2 (sold @ $14.5 yesterday)
Added more FB @ $176.8

Comments

  1. UnknownDecember 12, 2017 at 8:02 PM

    Breaking News: Doug Jones wins Senate seat in Alabama., narrows the GOP advantage in the U.S. Senate to 51-49. It is the first time since 1992 that a Democrat has won a Senate seat in Alabama and it’s the party’s first statewide win in any election since 2008.

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Wanna Retire Early, Start Planning Now!

Image
It is very important to plan your retirement  as early as possible.  Why? It is because the money you put into investment will grow fast. If you put $1k into your retirement account at age 20, it will grow into $15k when you reach age 60, assuming 7% annual return rate. As comparison, if you put $1k at age 30, it will only grow into only $7.6k, about half of the former case! One popular topic these days is to get retired early, for instance, at the age 50. Assuming the average yearly expense (including medical cost) is $100k and you live to age 90, you need at least $4M by age 50. Of course if you plan to get retired at age 60, then the retirement fund will be smaller ( $3M ). There is a new phrase " Million Dollar Poor "  ---- $1M may only support you from age 70 to 80 --- retire @ age 70 and decease @ age 80. In this article, I would like to introduce the possible stable income sources for retirement. (This is a brief introduction, for more details, p...
Read more

Impacts of Tax Reform --- My First Thoughts

Senate passed the messy tax reform bill last night. The new tax code will start in 2019 (not 2018). The next step will be negotiation between Senate and the House to put together the final bill for Trump to sign. Put aside how the tax reform will affect personal finance, one thing is for sure --- corporate tax rate will drop from 35% to 20% . Multinational companies will also bring cash back to US. Corperate Tax Rate Drop Well, many big companies have already managed to pay low tax rate, for instance, IBM pays only ~10%. You can find tax rate information in companies' ER. Therefore, not everyone benefits from the 20% tax rate. Following are a few companies who are paying tax rate > 35% (most in retailers and restaurants). Restaurant: CMG, DENN... Retailers: CVS, LVS, GPS, JWN, M... Auto retailers: AN, KMX... Healthcare: Anthem, HUM, DGX, DVA... Transportation: JBHT, LUV... Energy: COP, PSX... Industrial: GWW... Financial: SCHW, PAYX... Utility: WEC... ...
Read more

Market 2018-02-05 (WOW.... Bloody)

The quick bounce in the morning turned out to be a trap. The selloff is so violent that there are almost no survivors. The deep dip  around 3pm is especially evil. The market is definitely in panic mode. Dow -4.6% to 24,343. S&P -4.1% to 2,649. Nasdaq -3.8% to 6,967. And the selloff continues in AH. The money floods into Treasuries : 30-year +1.12%. 10-yr +0.74%. 5-yr +0.51% . 10-yr note drops from above 2.85% to 2.7% (about last Tuesday/Wednesday level). This may calm some nerve. Currently it is hard to predict how much lower indices will go. I would suggest to prepare your own shopping list and start to add positions. I am fully positioned myself. I plan to hold and wait. Commodities: Crude -2.73% to $63.66 . Gold +0.28% to $1,341.00 . Bitcoin is also facing another run of selloff as major US & UK banks ban Bitcoin credit card purchases . The lowest price today is below $6600 from coindesk. To be honest, there is no particular bad economic news today. Ins...
Read more

US Treasuries and Yields

Image
Rising Treasury Yields have been a hot topic in the past few weeks, which is blamed to be the reason behind recent  market correction. Some people are totally panicked as 10-year yield approaches 3%. I would suggest to " Keep Calm and Carry On ". In this article, I would like to give you some background, and possible trend. US Treasuries Basically US treasuries, including short-term and long-term, are the national debt of United States (国债). US currently have debt of $20T . Debt/GDP ratio is 104% in 2017 , as shown in the chart below (grey bars represent recessions). As comparison, China Debt/GDP ratio is 46% in 2016; Japan is 238% . The debt falls into two broad categories: Intragovernmental Holdings and Debt Held by the Public. Intragovernmental Holdings $5.6T, 30% of total. This is the portion of the federal debt owed to 230 other federal agencies, such as the Social Security Trust Fund. This part is not affected by market. Debt Held by the Public $1...
Read more

Market 2018-02-06 (XIV, MU, MOH, and more)

It is a choppy day. The early tradings are similar to yesterday --- opened low followed by a quick bounce. However, indices hung around afterwards and marched north around 2:30 pm. Dow +2.3% , S&P +1.7% & Nasdaq +2.1% . I think the -10% correction is over. The indices retreated back to pre-TAX-Reform level in the intraday low. However, it could remain the choppy way for near-term. Utilities has the worst performance, XLU -1.5% despite the broad market rally in late hours. Treasurys: 30-year -0.9%. 10-yr -0.6%. 5-yr -0.4% . 10-yr note stays @ 2.8%. Commodities: Crude -1.1% to $63.45. Gold -0.9% to $1,324 . The American Petroleum Institute (API) reportedly shows -1.05M barrels of crude oil for the week ending Feb. 1 vs. last week's build of +3.23M barrels. Gasoline reportedly shows -227K barrels and distillates show a build of +4.52M barrels. I think refiners face margin challenges. Yesterday, many analysts called for buying dip instead of being panic. Goldman's D...
Read more