Taking Things on a Stock-by-Stock Basis
We believe one of the main reasons our system has proved durable is that it doesn’t focus on just one or two factors, but incorporates things from different angles. For instance, when selecting stocks, we’re not only looking charts...
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Happy New Year
It’s been a long, strange 12 months, but it’s also been a very prosperous period, at least for growth investors—with one day left in the year, the Model Portfolio is up around 60%, easily besting most major indexes. Happily, that builds our...
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Into the Homestretch
We’re past the halfway point in December, which means many of us have other things on our minds, be it getting out the snow shovel (a foot of snow hit the ground here last night), buying last-minute gifts or perfecting your eggnog-based...
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Mostly Sunny, Chance of Showers
In the last issue, we wrote about the myriad crosscurrents that were still being seen—while the major indexes looked good, the day-to-day rotation was wild among sectors and themes, with news-driven moves the norm for a few weeks. But also...
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Wild—but Positive—Action
The healthiest market environment is generally one where most participants are rowing in the same direction—the vast majority of stocks and sectors glide higher (with the occasional pullback or shakeout, of course) as investor perception of the future steadily improves. Even if broad...
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Believe What You See
There are usually a couple of times each year where the market really messes with people, catching the vast majority of investors off-guard. (Remember the old saw: The market does what it has to do to fool the most investors One...
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Riding the Bucking Bronco
Investing in general, and growth stock investing in particular, tends to be very streaky—while many would love for a steady, low-stress increase in their portfolios, that’s not how the world usually works. Instead you get periods of time when the gushes...
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Steady Improvement
By the letter of the law, the big-cap indexes remain in the midst of a correction—the S&P 500 sits about 4% off its high, while the Nasdaq is more than 5% below its early-September peak, and many stocks and sectors are being around...
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Bad News, Good News
Our last issue was titled “Burden of Proof is on the Bulls,” and since then, the buyers have failed to step up to the plate, leading to a worsening of the overall evidence—earlier this week, our Cabot Tides flipped to bearish...
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Burden of Proof is On the Bulls
At heart, we’re students of the market, which means one of the key tools we use is spotting the difference between normal, run-of-the-mill action and abnormal, noteworthy action, the latter of which is what usually causes us make...
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Has the “Re-Rotation” Begun?
When our last issue went to press, growth stocks were under pressure. It wasn’t an epic disaster, but there had clearly been a change in character, with the initial market leaders (those that burst to new highs in April or May)...
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Growth Stocks Under Pressure
We saw signs growth stocks were ready for a “real” correction in June, but the buyers showed up. And again in July, it appeared the red-hot growth titles were ready to rest—and some of them did—but most enjoyed yet another to...
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Positive, but Less Powerful
One of the big reasons the market has always attracted us is that it’s a contrary beast, requiring investors to think and perceive things differently than in their day-to-day view of the real world. To the average person who turns the...
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The Music Changes
When I first arrived at Cabot, I spent a lot of time in the summer of 1999 reading through all (yes, all) of the old issues of the Growth Investor (or Cabot Market Letter for you long-time subscribers). One of my stories...
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Still the Same Story
Most times, the market environment is in a constant state of change, so when we report to you our latest thoughts on this page, there’s plenty to discuss—rotation among sectors, major moves in the indexes, earnings season or some big-picture that...
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Much More Good than Bad
We believe it was the late, great Marty Zweig who once wrote that, in the world of the market, you’re never going to get everything lined up in one direction—if you had 100 market timing indicators, to get 85 90...
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Believe What You See
Most of the time, the stock market and U.S. economy are in gear—there are always fits and starts, but as the economy expands, earnings generally grow and that contributes to a bull market. But it’s the times when the two moving...
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The Perfect isn’t the Enemy of the (Very) Good
In a perfect world, everything would be lined up on the bull side of the fence. Market timing-wise, not only would our Cabot Trend Lines and Cabot Tides be bullish, but investor sentiment would be the...
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Growth Stocks vs. Everything Else
When stocks were falling apart in late February and early March, the market was obviously very uniform—that is, everything was moving together, in this case straight through the floor. Near the lows, for instance, less than 4% of stocks the...
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So Far, So Good
It was exactly one month ago that the S&P hit its crash lows, down more than 35% from its highs five weeks prior. Given the selling extremes, it was normal to expect a bounce, which began right away. But during past...
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