A Normal Breather
As the market pushed sharply higher following its early-October low (10% or so in the S&P 500, 12%-plus in the Nasdaq), rising seven out of eight weeks, the worries of the world (trade wars, slowing economic growth, even impeachment) were slowly As...
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Mostly Sunny, Chance of Passing Showers
Seven weeks ago, the market was getting hit and growth stocks were looking awful. We were definitely cautious, but on this page we also wrote the following:
“We don’t want to sound too negative. It’s still a bull market, we...
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Market: Great. Growth Stocks: Just OK
Ever since the indexes turned on a dime at the beginning of this year, we’ve been leaning bullish on the general market, and in recent months, even as things have chopped around and there’s been an avalanche of we’ve...
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Less Remains More
Way back in the day the late, great Joe Granville once said that “the market is the train, and I’m the caboose,” which is a good summation of our general philosophy over the years. At heart, we’re trend followers, getting heavily when...
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Patience Precedes Profits
We regularly write about practicing patience with your winning stocks, and that will always be a key factor in making big money—unless you’re a savant, you’ll find that many of your trades will offset over time (small losses, break-evens, small wins, with...
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Aggravation-to-Profit Ratio: High
Everybody loves a persistent uptrend in growth stocks, especially us; we know how to find the winners and ride them for the majority of their advance. That’s where the real money is! And while we don’t ever root for a big we...
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Mixed Messages
The market is never easy to read, but the past week has been about as confusing as you’ll ever see. On one hand, leading stocks have been taken to the woodshed. Software and cybersecurity, which were two of the best performers this have...
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Lots of Drama, But the Evidence is Unchanged
August is winding to a close, and we say good riddance—this month has packed in as many dramatic market-moving headlines as any we can remember due to developments in the U.S.-China trade battle, speeches from the Reserve...
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Play Some Defense
Usually, when the market is doing well, stocks aren’t affected much by the news of the day. That’s not to say individual stocks don’t get pushed around, but for the market as a whole, worrisome headline news usually goes the way water...
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Passing T-Storms—or Something More?
On this page of the last issue, we wrote “we think the near-term is a toss-up, at least when it comes to individual growth stocks— earnings season is always tricky, and let’s face it, many leaders have had great runs the...
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Mostly Sunny—with Possible T-Storms Along the Way
Ever since January 9, when the 2-to-1 Blastoff Indicator gave a rare buy signal just two weeks after the market’s major bottom, our greatest conviction has been that the overall market had likely entered a new bull that...
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The Odds Still Favor Higher Prices Ahead
It was a solid first half of 2019 for most major indexes and growth stocks. Despite a few knocks upside the head last week, our Model Portfolio finished June up nearly 22% on the year. In fact, the...
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Still Going According to Script
Back on January 31, we wrote that the market was basically following a perfect Hollywood-type script for a major market bottom—you had a three-month bear phase that produced huge oversold readings and massive pessimism near the low, followed by turn...
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Pieces are in Place
We’re about five weeks into this market correction, and it’s been a pretty nasty one when looking at the major indexes—from high to low, the S&P 500 has fallen as much as 7.6% and the Nasdaq by 10.8%, with small- mid-cap...
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Time Likely Needed
In The Perfect Speculator (written by Brad Koteshwar), fictional trader Boyd Hunt said, “Everything in the market takes time. Learning takes time. Making gains takes time. Even losing big takes time because the market will occasionally offer small crumbs to remove (We...
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Tariff Grenade
In last week’s update, we wrote, “We are seeing some short-term things to keep an eye on … earnings season has [shown] plenty of poor reactions and few solid gaps higher … sentiment has turned complacent … upside momentum has been waning and...
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Growth Stocks Perking Up
Back in our younger days when we were first learning the market’s inner workings, we viewed the stock market as relatively uniform, even on a short-term basis. Obviously, there were times when divergences popped up (usually near market tops), but the...
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The Perfect Isn’t the Enemy of the Good
One reason the market is such an interesting place is that there are always differing opinions even among the smartest and most thorough investors. The late Martin Zweig once said that, if you had 100 market it...
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Short Term Remains Murky
Last week on this page we wrote that, while the longer-term outlook remained positive, we were starting to pick up on some cracks in the foundation—the broad market had stopped going up in late February and, despite a push to highs...
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Higher Prices Ahead
It’s mid-March in New England, which means we’re starting to see signs of spring—birds are flocking back, the gang of wild turkeys in our town are flirting and gobbling, the days are getting longer in a hurry and work boats are moving...
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