As to the above....here is what really matters. Nearly half of American EV owners want to switch back to gas-powered vehicle, McKinsey data shows Major share of US EV owners have buyer's remorse https://www.foxbusiness.com/markets...-back-gas-powered-vehicle-mckinsey-data-shows (BOLD is my opinion OR what I consider important content) "A significant share of Americans who own an electric vehicle have buyer's remorse, according to new data. McKinsey & Co.'s Mobility Consumer Pulse for 2024, released this month, found that 46% of EV owners in the U.S. said they were "very" likely to switch back to owning a gas-powered vehicle in their next purchase. The high percentage of Americans who want to make a switch even surprised the consulting firm. "I didn't expect that," the head of McKinsey's Center for Future Mobility, Philipp Kampshoff, told Automotive News. "I thought, 'Once an EV buyer, always an EV buyer.'" In the poll of nearly 37,000 consumers worldwide, Australia was the only country with a greater percentage, 49%, of EV owners than the U.S. who said they were ready to return to owning an internal combustion engine. The other countries included in the survey were Brazil, China, France, Germany, Italy, Japan and Norway. Across all countries surveyed, the average share of respondents who want to ditch their EVs was 29%. The biggest reason EV owners cited for wanting to return to owning a gas-powered vehicle was the lack of available charging infrastructure (35%); the second-highest reason cited was that the total cost of owning an EV was too high (34%). Nearly 1 in 3, 32%, said their driving patterns on long-distance trips were affected too much due to having an EV. McKinsey found that consumers' satisfaction globally with charging availability has improved some since last year's survey but noted it "still has a long way to go." Of the EV owners across all countries, 11% said the infrastructure where they live is well set up in terms of charge points, 40% said there were not enough chargers along highways and main roads, and 38% said there were not enough chargers in close proximity to them. The findings come years into the Biden administration's push for U.S. consumers and automakers to embrace EVs and reinforce other recent polling that indicates a major chunk of Americans are still not sold on going all-electric. To further Biden's EV agenda, Democrats passed infrastructure legislation in 2021 that committed billions of taxpayer dollars to building a half million charging stations in the U.S. by the end of the decade. But three years later, only seven federally funded chargers have been built to date, and the slow progress has sparked condemnation from both sides of the political aisle." MY COMMENT Personally i have ZERO interest in an EV. I do like my HYBRID. The range of most EV vehicles is less than admitted. They suck in heat and cold conditions. When I go to a gas station like Buc-ee's I see the gas vehicles gas up and leave in just a few minutes. At the same time the poor EV owners are standing in line for a charger and once they get one are siting around for 20-30 minutes waiting for some level of charge. BUT HEY.....buy what you want.....just dont push it on me.
This seems so weird to me because anecdotally, all 3 EV owners I know said they would never go back. Obviously anecdotes are anecdotes though.
My portfolio is like the markets today....directionless and listless. No energy or excitement. A BORING day. I have five stocks Up and four stocks down....but....with NVDA being one of the down stocks there is no doubt that I am in the red at this moment. NOTHING to do but wait and see where we go. Perhaps it is time to pull out the old Magic eight-ball.
That does not surprise me T0rm3nted. Many EV owners are concerned with other issues than ease of use of their EV.....politics, social issues, climate, peer-pressure, etc, etc, etc. Also some EV owners......like one of my kids........ simply charge their car in the garage at night and use it as a little commuter/local vehicle. They continue to also own a gas vehicle for longer trips. I think much of the dissatisfaction comes when it is your only vehicle and you have to do more than just local driving......and....you have to use charging stations outside your own garage. The EV vehicles have certainly been a HUGE DISASTER for the rental car companies.
It is so nice today to finally be done with playing Realtor for my kid. Finally peace.....from the constant addendums, buyers requests, dealing with the buyers realtor, doing requested repair items, etc, etc, etc. The buyers of my kids home signed today at 10:00. It was nice to have a buyer pop up before the house was even listed....and...very nice to save the commission for an agent. Although......we did allow 2% to the buyers agent since they brought us a good, well qualified, very motivated, buyer and saved us paying a 5-6% commission, having to do staging, etc, etc, etc. My final act in the buying of a new house and selling of the old house.....for my kid....will be recording the Deed Of Trust on the new house. It closed 3 weeks ago.....and....I finally got around to drafting the note and deed of trust last week and we got them all signed and notarized yesterday. With family financing.....having the note and deed of trust done for the closing of the new house was not a big priority. I will get it recorded some time over the next week. The primary reason for the note and deed of trust is for taxes and the IRS. We want to document that this is legitimate financing for taxes........interest earned......and....interest deduction. We also want to document that this is a legitimate loan and NOT a gift.
I will be playing a three hour show this weekend with some friends that need a fill-in. It will be good to do a real show....in spite of it being outside and the temperature probably in the high 80's or 90's. We have been playing together some lately. I also have a few other irons in the fire right now.
I have now improved to seven stocks in the green and two in the red......PLTR and NVDA. I see that the big averages are now all in the green. Now if I can just get NVDA into the green category by the end of the day....I will make some money. At least the markets now seem to be moving in the right direction.
OK....not a bad close considering that earlier in the day I was in the red. I ended up with a nice medium size gain today. I also beat the SP500 by 0.55%. My two stocks that ended in the red were....GOOGL, and PLTR
Money is starting to flow into my siblings brokerage account from the sale and pay off of my kids former house. So......at the open tomorrow....I will be buying $414,825 worth of stocks in my siblings account. The money will ALL go into the same nine stocks as I own in my acccounts. NONE will go into the SP500 Index fund or the Fidelity Contra fund......since.....the SP500 fund gets $6000 per month every month invested in it......so all this money will go to bolster the stock side of the account. As is my lifelong habit......there will be NO market timing. Not even for a day. All the trades will happen "at the market".......at the open tomorrow. When I have stock market money wanting to be invested....it goes.....all in all at once.
There will be another $110,000 coming into the account above.......in the next ten days......from my kid as the down payment on their new house. The new house is already bought and they have moved in. The down payment has been pending the closing of the old house....which was final today. The benefits of family financing.....you can delay and structure the payments, down payment, etc, etc, etc, as you wish. These funds will ALSO go into the nine stocks rather than the funds in the account.
The nice market close today. Stock market today: Nasdaq leads gains as Amazon crosses $2 trillion market cap https://finance.yahoo.com/news/stoc...-crosses-2-trillion-market-cap-114207325.html (BOLD is my opinion OR what I consider important content) "US stocks edged higher Wednesday as Amazon (AMZN) led a tech jump that saw the company cross $2 trillion in market cap for the first time ever. The benchmark S&P 500 (^GSPC) rose 0.2%, while the Dow Jones Industrial Average (^DJI) edged 0.04% higher. Meanwhile, the tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite (^IXIC) was up about 0.5%, leading the way higher. Treasury yields inched off their 3-month lows. The 10-year Treasury yield (^TNX) added about 8 basis points to climb back to 4.31%. A wobbly last handful of sessions has left investors wondering whether the drag on stocks is temporary or the start of a more solid retreat. The outsize impact of Nvidia (NVDA) stock on broader performance has underlined the question. On Wednesday, it was Amazon leading tech megacaps higher, as the stock rose nearly 4% on its way to becoming the fifth US company ever with a $2 trillion-plus value. At the same time, the market is looking to economic prints for cues ahead of the key PCE inflation release on Friday. Federal Reserve speakers this week have underlined their caution in deciding to make interest-rate cuts, dependent on the data. Elsewhere, Rivian (RIVN) shares surged more than 23% after the EV maker announced an alliance with Volkswagen (VWAGY) that could boost its coffers by up to $5 billion. FedEx (FDX) stock jumped more than 15% as its 2025 profit forecast topped Wall Street estimates. Investors also kept a close eye on Chipotle (CMG) as its 50-for-1 stock split took effect this morning — the largest in the history of the NYSE. Shares in the burrito seller were up a modest 0.3% on Wednesday. Amazon leads Nasdaq rally Amazon (AMZN) led the gains in tech on Wednesday, rising about 4% to cross a $2 trillion market cap for the first time ever. The e-commerce giant's surge was the largest among the megacap stocks on Wednesday. Notably, the 0.5% gain in the Nasdaq came with little help from Nvidia (NVDA), which was up a modest 0.25%. Below is a look at how megacap tech performed on Wednesday. MY COMMENT I am very happy with how we ended today. A good day.
Well my trades in my siblings account......over $414,000......are complete and on the books. Now I will wait for the next round of money....about $111,000.....that will go back into the account. At that point her account will be "whole" again.....after the pay-off of my kids home that was sold and the funds that went to buy my kids new house. It is nice to have all this....."high finance"...over with soon and the account can rest and move forward for the long term.
Seems like we have seen this story before......the open today. It very much reminded me of the opens of the last 3 or 4 days. We started with a mixed open and a market searching for direction. NOW......a little over an hour in.....we are ALL green for the averages. A good start to the day......that we can build on.
I like this little article. The Bullish Middle The S&P 500 isn’t a one-trick pony. https://www.fisherinvestments.com/en-us/insights/market-commentary/the-bullish-middle (BOLD is my opinion OR what I consider important content) "Halftime is nearly here for 2024, and the S&P 500 has already trounced analysts’ consensus expectations for its full-year return. This is one reason headlines are pounding the this party won’t last drum. Another reason: the perpetual claim that one or two big companies are responsible for the whole shebang, hiding a weak market. Yet a quick look at market breadth shows this isn’t the case. Through yesterday’s close, the S&P 500’s year-to-date return clocked in at 15.5%. This is ahead of both the median professional forecast entering the year (1.4%) and the average election-year return (11.4%).[ii] Given election years are usually back-end-loaded as markets get a boost from falling uncertainty and simply having a winner, we see a high likelihood of more positivity in store. And breadth shouldn’t be an impediment. Of the 500 S&P 500 constituents that have been in the index all year, 132 are beating the index’s year-to-date return.[iii] This is pretty close to the situation a year ago, when 143 were beating the index.[iv] There turned out to be plenty more gas left in the tank at that point, and we see little suggesting now would be so very different. If we slice the data another way, breadth has actually widened this year. Exhibit 1 compares the S&P 500’s stats for this year and last at the same mile marker. More companies have positive returns now than at the same point last year. There are also more with double-digit returns. Exhibit 1: Bull Market Participation at a Glance Source: FactSet, as of 6/26/2024. S&P 500 and constituent companies’ total returns, 12/31/2022 – 6/25/2023 and 12/31/2023 – 6/25/2024. None of this is predictive, of course. But it lays bare the fallacy of a one-trick-pony market. So does this: The combined weight of all negative S&P 500 constituents year to date is 18.3%, which exceeds the combined weight of the two giant companies that are supposedly responsible for the index’s returns.[v] In the S&P 500—just as in a typical diversified personal portfolio—the outliers mostly cancel one another out, leaving the broad middle to do the heavy lifting. Big positions and big movers get all the attention. But it is the daily grind in the vast swath of the market’s middle that chiefly drives returns over time. That swath is clawing out some nice returns this year. Volatility and a correction (sharp, sentiment-fueled move of -10% to -20%) are always possible, of course. But with corporate fundamentals looking bright and election tailwinds looming, they should have plenty of room to run." MY COMMENT As usual all the "experts" and professionals have been totally WRONG regarding the first half of this year. Remember all the stories about how the first half wold suck but the second half would be good? Well they were TOTALLY wrong as usual. AND.....now every day we see fear-mongering stories about the narrow market and the bad market breadth and how only a couple of tech stocks are driving the whole thing. I agree with the above....WRONG, WRONG, WRONG. The experts that spout this BALONEY and the media that thrives off the negativity is full of BS. BUT......even if they were actually right......which they are not.....I would not be doing anything, anyway. I am a long term investor. I am fully invested all the time. There is nothing I would be doing except for siting and watching the day to day circus.
Here is a perfect companion article for the one above. There's something odd about the stock market's concentration: Morning Brief https://finance.yahoo.com/news/ther...ts-concentration-morning-brief-110707168.html (BOLD is my opinion OR what I consider important content) "The major indexes may have only chalked small gains Wednesday, but while the generals were sleeping, the soldiers were on the march. At the vanguard, moderate losses in large-cap energy and financials were offset by outsized gains in the consumer discretionary sector — thanks principally to Amazon (AMZN) and Tesla (TSLA). This seesaw theme has become a subtle but important market narrative. On days when AI isn't leading the charge, select pockets of strength keep the S&P 500 from more pronounced sell-offs — which itself is holding index volatility near multiyear lows. The recent "plunge" in Nvidia is instructive. Only Monday, the AI poster child closed down 13% from its record high. Surveying social media, you would think Wall Street was burning. But during that harrowing three-day slump, a funny thing happened: The Dow Jones Industrial Average (^DJI) — up only 3% this year versus 14% for the S&P 500 — staged a comeback. Energy perked up, and biotech jumped as forgotten pockets of the market showed signs of life. This seesaw-offsetting behavior is everywhere right now in lieu of correlations between even stocks in similar sectors. Stocks simply do not want to move in the same direction. "This is a generationally weird US stock market," wrote Luke Kawa, a former director of investment solutions at UBS Asset Management Americas now at Sherwood Media. Kawa was specifically referencing Tuesday's price action, in which the S&P 500 managed a 0.4% gain despite 384 of its components closing in the red — a new feat for a data set that goes back to 1996. Similar "firsts" have been dotting the market statistics recently. But none of this detracts from the argument — supported by ample research and history — that it's perfectly normal in a bull market to have gains concentrated in a few stocks. Winning stocks that enjoy a secular-themed rally get bigger and bigger until the move runs its course. In a bull market, when leading stocks falter, other parts of the market that may not be generating hype-filled headlines can rise to the occasion. Sector rotation keeps volatility at the index level low as new winners offset losers. And then, at some point, the music stops and all sectors start selling off in unison, kicking off a new bear market. Kawa tied this to the current market, writing that "different major groups within the US stock market have been marching to the beat of their own drummers recently, and this dynamic has helped keep the stock market from lurching violently to the downside." We're not only currently seeing disparate returns among sectors and industries, but also inside them — even in the megacap tech stocks. In the past six months, if some of them, say Microsoft and Alphabet, are up, Nvidia and Apple might be down. The correlation between directional moves between pairs in this cohort is a scant 43%, Kawa noted. All of this zigging and zagging keeps index-level volatility at bay, but Kawa lays out the major risk in this environment: a "correlated shock" that is distributed "among these companies that control so much of US as well as global equity indices." Though the "big drop" remains the focal risk, divergences can persist longer than arbitrage investors can remain solvent (to turn an old Wall Street trope). In fact, research by the data analytics team at BofA suggests that the current regime of low inter- and intra-sector correlation can persist for years. Stock correlations within the S&P 500 are at historic lows. "Multiple years of decorrelation in the 90s as the internet bubble developed suggests that persistence of today's regime remains a risk," wrote BofA. Accordingly, the outsized bifurcation in returns between the chosen AI few and the rest of the market needn't end with a bang. "Just because we’re in uncharted waters doesn’t mean we’re heading for a waterfall. It could end up being a lazy river," wrote Kawa." MY COMMENT I love a good lazy river.....riding along in the refreshing cold water on a tube. AND.....I dont see anything "ODD" about the current markets at all. It all strikes me as a perfectly normal BULL MARKET run. In any bull market there are always some stocks out in front leading the way. In spite of the sensationalism in the headline above.....the little article eventually gets to the bottom line: "But none of this detracts from the argument — supported by ample research and history — that it's perfectly normal in a bull market to have gains concentrated in a few stocks. Winning stocks that enjoy a secular-themed rally get bigger and bigger until the move runs its course. In a bull market, when leading stocks falter, other parts of the market that may not be generating hype-filled headlines can rise to the occasion. Sector rotation keeps volatility at the index level low as new winners offset losers. And then, at some point, the music stops and all sectors start selling off in unison, kicking off a new bear market." This is EXACTLY what I see happening right now and it is.......GASP......."NORMAL".
BUT dont worry.....the fear mongers are alive and well..... out in force as usual. I saw this headline a minute ago....although I can not read the article. "S&P 500 to tumble 30% as recession hits later this year, says BCA Research"
I have not looked but I am probably in the red so far today. Same as early yesterday. NVDA is currently down and it is such a large holding in my portfolio if is probably pulling me into the red.
Nothing going on today.....so.....I will go and do some charting of songs for my show on Friday. The markets dont need any help from me today.
The research tells me that when I have money to invest the ......"probabilities"....are in my favor to simply go all in at once rather than market time or dollar cost average. Many years ago I discovered this data and I have followed the probability ever since. I try to ALLAYS follow PROBABILITIES in my investing. As posted above I invested over $400,000 today at the open........all in all at once. The money went into my NINE stocks in my siblings account. I just did a crude look at how it all panned out today at mid-day. What I see is that in FIVE of the nine stocks....I currently have a GAIN for the day in the new purchase shares. In FOUR of the nine stocks....I currently have a LOSS in the new purchase shares. So.....I am currently hitting what would be expected by the research and the probabilities. I also have a NET GAIN in those nine new shares in terms of dollars.
MORE good news for FED CUTS. Although I am in the camp that does not expect any cut till after the election. Jobless claims data show 'warning sign' for the US labor market https://finance.yahoo.com/news/jobl...g-sign-for-the-us-labor-market-155410636.html (BOLD is my opinion OR what I consider important content) "The number of continuing applications for unemployment benefits hit its highest level since November 2021 last week, furthering signs the labor market is cooling as unemployed workers struggle to find new jobs. New data from the Department of Labor showed nearly 1.84 million claims were filed in the week ending June 22, up from 1.82 million the week prior. Meanwhile, the 4-week moving average of weekly jobless claims ticked higher by 3,000 to 236,000, the highest rate since September 2023. LPL Financial chief economist Jeffrey Roach reasoned the data is "sending a warning sign that the labor market could be softening." The key question for the Federal Reserve is whether this softening is yet another sign of normalization in the labor market or an indicator that higher interest rates could seriously harm the US economy. An increasing number of economists believe that the risks lean toward a painful outcome. Oxford Economics lead US economist Nancy Vanden Houten cautioned on reading too far into claims data, which can be volatile from week to week, but noted that a further move higher in the trend of weekly jobless claims would undoubtedly be a point of concern. "A persistent rise in initial claims would signal more weakness in the labor market and a larger rise in the unemployment rate than we currently expect and would add more support to our case for the Fed to start lowering rates in September," Vanden Houten wrote in a note on Thursday. The Fed has largely remained steadfast in its argument that it must gain "greater confidence" in inflation's path lower before cutting interest rates. In his most recent press conference on June 12, Fed Chair Jerome Powell noted the labor market continues to normalize and, from the Fed's perspective, hasn't shown true signs of concern yet. "We see gradual cooling — gradual moving toward better balance. We’re monitoring it carefully for signs of...something more than that, but we really don’t see that," Powell said. But some economists argue the trends in the labor market aren't promising. "[Taken] together, hiring and firing indicators point to a sub-100K trend in private payrolls growth over the next three months, which would give a further boost to the unemployment rate and leave the Fed looking seriously behind the curve," Pantheon Macroeconomics chief economist Ian Shepherdson wrote in a note to clients on Thursday. Renaissance Macro head of economics Neil Dutta recently told Yahoo Finance that with inflation falling and the labor market weakening, the Fed should be cutting rates soon. Investors currently expect the Fed to cut rates twice this year, according to Bloomberg data. Forecasts from the Fed released earlier this month suggested the central bank would cut rates just once this year. With the job openings rate back to its pre-pandemic rate, Dutta is concerned that any further declines in job openings will come with a rise in unemployment. "I just don't think the Fed wants to really push the weakening in labor demand that much more," Dutta said. He added, "It's not like the risk at this point is for the unemployment rate to unexpectedly go down. The most likely distribution of outcomes is that it's stable or it goes higher." From a markets perspective, this has strategists telling Yahoo Finance they believe the labor market might be the most important economic indicator to watch right now, not inflation. "The labor market for us is the key to the markets," Cit's head of equity trading strategy Stuart Kaiser told Yahoo Finance. "Our general view is you want to run long your US equity portfolio unless or until you get a significant slowdown in payrolls."" MY COMMENT As usual....when it comes to the FED and rate cuts...... BAD economic news is GOOD news for investors. Not that I trust any of this data anyway....especially weekly data. There is no way the government economic data is accurate.
