Despite expectations for weak-to-negative returns in 2024 because of an anticipated recession that never happened, 2024 has been a very strong year for the market and its major benchmark ETFs. The S&P 500 has been in a relentless uptrend since rebounding from the lows of the bear market of 2022. The Nasdaq-100 has been even … Read more
The Nasdaq-100 Trust ETF, ticker symbol QQQ, is both one of the most loved and most hated ETFs in the US market. Investors who bought and held $10,000 worth 15 years ago on September 10, 2009 have every reason to love it. They now have seen that investment grow to $126,000, an annualized gain … Read more
Targeting Tech Stocks Below The Magnificent Seven Although the rise of the largest technology stocks known as “The Magnificent Seven” has not yet reached return levels experienced midway through 2023, they are off to another relatively strong start as a group. One stock that has stood out in particular is Nvidia (Ticker: NVDA) which has … Read more
Farewell and thank you to 2023 which exceeded almost everybody’s expectations after a dismal 2022 and predictions of a dire recession. This blog was more positive than most, projecting a 5% to 10% gain for the S&P 500 vs. the actual price gain of 23.9%. Now it’s on to 2024. Let’s start with our quarterly … Read more
Despite all the negative-to-flat market expectations from Wall Street specialists and other pundits that frequent CNBC for 2023, the recession they feared did not manifest itself, soft landing or otherwise. The economy continued to be strong enough to avoid negative GDP growth. S&P 500 Index ETFs, including SPLG, continue to outperform other broad-based benchmark ETFs … Read more
The “Magnificent Seven” has now replaced “FAMANGs” as the nickname for current market leadership. It is also a somewhat deridingly used term for the “overpriced” stocks hated by value managers. Holdovers include Apple, Amazon, Microsoft and Google. Gone is Netflix. New are Nvidia and Tesla while Facebook had a facelift to be renamed Meta. As … Read more
The third quarter of 2023 is now history. The September effect overwhelmed mildly positive returns in July and August to submerge all six benchmark indexes we monitor quarterly into the red. Although the order of best to worst varies among the six indexes, one commonality is having September as the worst historical month, both in … Read more
Cambria Advisors recently sent out a mailing that was somewhat self-congratulatory noting the 10-year anniversary of the launch of its first ETF. As we will explore shortly, I contend that the congratulations are well-deserved from a number of perspectives. The email missive piqued my interest for a specific reason. The main comparisons made in the … Read more
Artificial Intelligence related stocks led the way robustly in the first half of 2023 with Nvidia (NVDA) leading the way. The general consensus among major strategists cautions that the steep price increases of such stocks is characteristic of a market bubble. Furthermore, for those who must be invested in equity, they suggest using growth stocks … Read more
Approaching 2023, the experts were in near unanimity that the fourth quarter of 2022 was little more than a dead cat bounce and that once the inevitable recession hit, the bear market would quickly take the S&P 500 Index to new lows. Instead, the first six months have seen the Nasdaq-100 ETF, Invesco QQQ rise … Read more