The Long Term Investor

Jobs report is telling us.....YES.....there will NOT be a recession.

 

I could not agree......MORE.

Bad news, remote workers: You need to return to the office for your employer to succeed
Disparate parts come together when workers genuinely look out for each other. But loyalty does not stem from 15-minute Zoom sessions, especially when 'Zoom fatigue' is endemic.

https://www.usatoday.com/story/opin...-telling-employees-return-office/11148534002/

(BOLD is my opinion OR what I consider important content)

"Pay raises. Bonuses. Benefits and perks. In an inflationary economy still recovering from COVID-19, employers are doing everything in their power to find and keep talent.

Post-pandemic, employee attraction and retention have never been more important, as working Americans juggle purchasing power and quality of life amid economic uncertainty.

But pay raises, bonuses and the like – while worthwhile in many cases – are only pieces in a larger attraction and retention puzzle. The big picture is workplace culture.

Workplace culture binds a company together

The secret behind motivation, satisfaction and productivity is the culture that binds a company together – what makes the business unique and why that matters to the people working day after day.

In recent years, Puritan Medical Products has gone through unprecedented growth, supplying hundreds of millions of COVID-19 testing swabs to the world while also expanding into forensics, genetics and other markets.

Before the pandemic, our swabs and collection devices were applied to industries like cosmetics, pharmaceuticals and food production, forcing us to be creative with hiring and promoting workers. We have worked to recruit and retain hundreds of new employees, while also assimilating and contributing to a culture that has been cultivated for over 100 years.

New recruits must fit seamlessly into a family-owned company that operates more like a small business than a large corporation, carrying on a tradition of innovation.

But for entrepreneurial businesses like Puritan, innovation is only the outcome; the process is empowerment. Employees need to feel unburdened, and even supported, to experiment, fail, receive constructive criticism, earn plaudits for their work and become valuable contributors to the company’s success.

Managers must allow workers to see the direct line between contribution and impact, in addition to eliminating unnecessary barriers between upper management and the rest of the workforce.

Puritan’s engineering department, for example, is led by Derek McKenney, who preaches “face time” with his fellow engineers. As some of our most important innovators, the company's engineers feel like they can interact regularly and directly with McKenney and upper management.

But real face-time is nonexistent if employees work remotely, as tens of millions of Americans now do. It is almost impossible to build a strong, cohesive workplace culture if most workers are not actually on-site. Hybrid work environments are more likely to succeed, given the face-to-face component, but fully remote situations are not nearly as conducive to corporate collaboration.

In the early days of the pandemic, most Americans reported feeling “less connected” to their organizational culture while working from home. Two years later, research showed that remote workers do not tend to replace in-person interactions with virtual ones; rather they’re more likely to just drop those interactions altogether.

A study of 60,000 Microsoft employees found that remote work caused them to “become more static and siloed, with fewer bridges between disparate parts.”

That’s a big deal. To maximize productivity, entrepreneurial-minded employers like Microsoft not only need to sing from the same sheet, but they also must believe that it’s worth singing in unison – that the company’s broader mission is worth the innovation in the first place.

Otherwise, according to Cornell University professor Chris Collins, “it’s just a job, it’s just a list of tasks, there’s no loyalty to the company.”

Creativity, collaboration suffer from remote work

Disparate parts come together when workers genuinely look out for each other. But loyalty does not stem from 15-minute Zoom sessions, especially when “Zoom fatigue” is endemic.

Disney CEO Bob Iger admitted as much recently, urging employees to work in the office at least four days a week. “In a creative business like ours, nothing can replace the ability to connect, observe and create with peers that comes from being physically together, nor the opportunity to grow professionally by learning from leaders and mentors,” he said, according to an email obtained by CNBC.

In the pandemic, the benefits of the in-person model were reinforced at Puritan while most other companies were obligated to go remote. The onslaught of COVID-19 resulted in an historic manufacturing ramp-up.

Many of Puritan’s employees made personal sacrifices to remain on-site and produce the testing swabs that people desperately needed. And while their sacrifices were immense, our workplace culture benefited from the face-time associated with in-person work. Adversity brought people together in the same place (emphasis on place) for a common cause.

From a growth perspective, Puritan would not be in nearly as strong a financial position today if remote work had run rampant at our Maine and Tennessee locations. Nor would our culture have been strengthened further. While our mission to improve employee engagement continues, working together – in-person and aligned in purpose – fosters a far more cohesive, empowered and productive workforce.

Fail at empowerment, and employers will fail at innovation and productivity, too. There are no exceptions."

MY COMMENT

For some reason we seem to have a real movement going on with self destructive behavior toward our culture, society, education system, and everything else. Everyone is an expert.....and....everything must change from the old way of doing things.

Well.....have at it. But when everything changes for the worse........as it constantly does.....have the guts to look in the mirror and recognize the real cause. Unfortunately at that point it will be too late to put Humpty Dumpty back together again.

 

AMAZINGLY strong market today .....considering the.....just ok..... BIG CAP TECH reports yesterday. The positive drive in the markets right now is very strong. YES.....the force.....is very strong in that one.

All I can do and need to do is......RIDE THE WAVE.

 

I assume that this sort of thinking and analysis is the reason. I happen to agree.

Apple’s long-term positives outweigh rare earnings miss, Morgan Stanley says

https://www.cnbc.com/2023/02/03/app...es-outweigh-earnings-miss-morgan-stanley.html

(BOLD is my opinion OR what I consider important content)

"Key Points

• Morgan Stanley analysts think Apple remains a buy, even after a top and bottom line miss.
• Apple’s first year-over-year sales decline since 2019 owes much more to macro headwinds than underlying issues at the company, an analyst note observed.
• Growth in user spend and installation are positive signs, according to the analysts.

Shorter-term macro issues don’t detract from the long-term value at Apple

, Morgan Stanley analysts wrote in a Friday morning note that reiterated an overweight rating and a $175 price target.

“Taking a step back, it’s rare to see Apple miss and guide down in a quarter, but we believe the long-term positives from tonight’s report outweigh the short-term negatives,” Morgan Stanley’s Erik Woodring wrote. Apple’s Thursday night earnings report cited a strong dollar, continued production issues in China, and the broader macroeconomic environment as three reasons for Apple’s first year-over-year sales decline since 2019.

“On the third factor, I would say was just the challenging macroeconomic environment, and you’re hearing that from, I would think, everybody,” CEO Tim Cook told CNBC’s Steve Kovach.

But Morgan Stanley assesses those headwinds as transitory, noting both accelerated growth in iPhone installed base and a continued upward margin trajectory as longer-term upside which will ensure “the Apple flywheel keeps spinning.”

Morgan Stanley reiterated its Top Pick rating for Apple. The company has managed to navigate a broader tech downturn with considerable success and is one of the few tech companies that has staved off layoffs and maintained a level of operational expense (opex) discipline.

It’s that same discipline that helps Morgan Stanley analysts maintain a bullish outlook on Apple, which guided to a Mar. 2023 gross margin ranging from 43.5 to 44.5%, according to the note.

“We believe Apple’s ability to post the highest gross margin in a decade despite seeing revenue decline Y/Y is impressive, and moving forward, we expect gross margins to improve as mix, FX, commodities, and logistics all work in Apple’s favor through the rest of 2023 and into FY24,” Morgan Stanley’s note said.

Apple’s user spend levels are also keeping Morgan Stanley bullish, proof that “the underlying drivers of Apple’s model remain robust.”

Investors have apparently embraced Morgan Stanley’s appraisal of Apple’s durability as a long-term investment. Apple shares were up around 1% at the open Friday, despite the sales miss, recouping losses from a 4% drop Thursday night. The company also reported misses on the top and bottom lines, beating analyst expectations only in iPad and services revenue."

MY COMMENT

These BIG CAP TECH companies are raking in BILLIONS. They will continue to do so. They have a license to mint money. I am fully in agreement and will continue to triple up on these companies in my INTENTIONAL portfolio design.

 

DOW and NASDAQ are now both green for the day. The SP500 is right on the edge of green. An amazing confirmation of the current BULL MARKET RALLY.

Meanwhile back at the old market timing desk.......many are still waiting to see if he bear market is over and wondering if it is time to get back in yet. AND....even when they decide to get back in....they will continue to wait for a good entry point. This is how you miss out on historic market gains when the transition from a bear market to a bull market happens.

Of course this is all just my personal opinion.....everyone has to decide for themselves how to manage their own money. I dont have to decide anything since.....

I remain fully invested for the long term as usual.

 

I have been out running around all day...so I just looked at my day end result. I had a good size loss in my ten stocks today....but.....not as big as the gain yesterday. My largest loser by far was AMAZON....down 8.43% for the day. My two positive holdings were.....AAPL and TSLA.

Of course I did not beat the SP500 today.....I was down by 1.00% compared to the index.

 

REGARDLESS....it was a killer week for the markets and for my account. Here is the info.

DOW year to date +2.35%
DOW for the week (-0.15%)

SP500 year to date +7.73%
SP500 for the week +1.62%

NASDAQ 100 year to date +14.98%
NASDAQ 100 for the week +3.35%

NASDAQ year to date +14.72%
NASDAQ for the week +3.31%

RUSSELL year to date +12.73%
RUSSELL for the week +3.88%

I dont care about the DOW...it is not relevant to my investing approach with the limited number of stocks in the index. BUT.....the rest of the averages had a BIG WEEK.....as did my account.

I am now at.....+12.70% year to date. I like this a lot better than where I was at this time last year.

 

I like this little article.

Tech giants are pivoting to a 'Year of Efficiency'

https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/com...iciency/ar-AA175ewj?ocid=finance-verthp-feeds

(BOLD is my opinion OR what I consider important content)

"If this earnings season is teaching us anything, it’s that the tech giants are shifting focus from profligate spending and unrestrained expansion to streamlining operations and cutting costs wherever they can.

The past year’s market downturn has been especially hard on Silicon Valley’s behemoths, with the tech-heavy Nasdaq index down 15% since the beginning of 2022. The likes of Apple, Amazon, and Facebook parent Meta saw their valuations surge by billions throughout the 2010s, and their rapid growth was bookended in 2020 and 2021, when many tech companies became “pandemic darlings”—their product sales were boosted by stay-at-home orders, and several companies embarked on unprecedented hiring sprees.

But the real world has since come crashing down on tech giants, and there have been more than 200,000 layoffs in the sector since the beginning of 2022. As Google parent Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai told employees last month as the company cut 12,000 jobs: “We hired for a different economic reality than the one we face today.”

In 2023, tech’s traditional big spenders are refocusing their priorities and staffing choices. Meta founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg may have officially rang in the new era during his company’s earnings call on Wednesday, where he announced 2023 will be the company’s “year of efficiency.”

Meta’s decision to cut around 11,000 jobs last November was the “beginning of our focus on efficiency and not the end,” Zuckerbeg said during the call, adding that while Meta is planning to double down on some key areas including artificial intelligence, the company’s free-wheeling exploits may be a thing of the past.

“We’re going to be more proactive about cutting projects that aren't performing or may no longer be as crucial, but my main focus is on increasing the efficiency of how we execute our top priorities,” Zuckerberg said.

Zuckerberg and Meta aren’t the only giants to signal a paradigm change in the tech world this week, as 2023 promises to be a year of efficiency, cost-cutting, and consolidation for the entire sector, including fellow heavyweights Amazon and Google parent Alphabet.

Amazon CEO Andy Jassy doubled down on efficiency talk during his earnings call on Thursday, as the company seeks to harness the potential of the massive transportation network it has been investing in for the past few years. Jassy said the network was “roughly the size of UPS” during the call, adding that a big priority over the next year is to “figure out how to be really efficient across all those links and have them be highly utilized and to get the flows in those facilities work in the right way.”

It all amounts to a tech sector that may be less exciting than it’s been in years past, but being boring may be necessary for traditional giants to stay competitive as their darling status wanes.

Time to cut back

In addition to layoffs, tech giants are trimming entire projects and reorganizing their spending in an effort to reduce expenses.

“We’re on an important journey to re-engineer our cost structure in a durable way and to build financially sustainable, vibrant, growing businesses across Alphabet,” Pichai said in a statement Thursday accompanying Alphabet’s earnings announcement, which reported missed sales targets largely due to a drop in Google’s advertising profits, a crucial source of revenue for the company.

Pichai said belt-tightening is well underway at Alphabet during the company’s earnings call, and the process will include a “careful focus on our hiring needs.” Alphabet CFO Ruth Porat later said the company will be “meaningfully slowing the pace of hiring in 2023,” adding that fewer hires would be the “starting point” for cutbacks, to be followed by more attentive product prioritization. Alphabet is also working to “optimize our real estate footprint,” Porat said, reducing office space expenses worldwide after shrinking the company’s headcount.

Like Alphabet, Meta’s financials this week revealed significant downsizing plans. The company reported racking up $4.2 billion in restructuring charges during the last quarter of 2022 as it handed out severance paychecks, canceled office space leases, and redesigned its data centers in a push to optimize its A.I. capabilities.

Amazon, possibly the biggest pandemic-era darling on the back of an online shopping boom in 2020 and 2021, joined the cutback club when it reported earnings. “We're working really hard to streamline our costs,” Amazon’s Jassy said during the company’s earnings call. Amazon announced layoff plans last month involving around 18,000 workers.

Amazon’s earnings on Thursday revealed ongoing slowdowns in its main revenue arms: E-commerce and cloud business. The company closed down several bookstores and other physical locations last year in an effort to cut costs, and delayed or abandoned plans to develop several new warehouses.

Shift to efficiency

While tech giants reported losses and significant cutbacks this week, the other driving story was how companies are angling to stay competitive in their biggest priority areas.

With OpenAI’s wildly popular ChatGPT becoming a resounding success late last year, and Microsoft announcing a $10 billion investment that effectively puts it in charge of the artificial intelligence startup for the foreseeable future, A.I. is one area competitors don’t intend to cut back on, with Alphabet’s Pichai calling it a key “long-term investment” for the company in his statement.

Meta has also signaled a prioritization of A.I. to boost some of its features, while Amazon seeks to consolidate its huge transportation and infrastructure network. But in the name of efficiency and streamlining, further cutbacks and potentially even more layoffs are likely still on the table for tech companies this year."

MY COMMENT

It is definately time to tighten up in all these companies. The early go-go years are over....these are now semi-mature companies. They need to get lean and stay lean for the long term and refine their operations.

I think they are all in good shape....except....poor Amazon. they are part tech and part retail. The greatest problem they have is unproven management. ALTHOUGH.....the new management in my view is showing signs of being a failure. It is ok for them to give the current management perhaps another year or at the very most two....after that.....they need to reevaluate and make changes as needed.

 

The end to the markets today....which means....the start to the markets on Monday.

Stock market news live updates: Stocks slide after jobs report shocks, Big Tech results disappoint

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/stock-market-news-live-updates-february-3-2023-122332716.html

(BOLD is my opinion OR what I consider important content)

"U.S. stocks tumbled Friday after government employment data showed more than half a million jobs were added in January — throwing a wrench in hopes for a pause on rate increases — while subpar earnings results from Big Tech giants weighed on investor sentiment.

The U.S. economy added 517,000 jobs last month, far more than payroll gain of 188,000 expected by economists. The unemployment rate fell to 3.4%, the lowest since 1969.

The S&P 500 (^GSPC) dropped 1%, while the Dow Jones Industrial Average (^DJI) shed abut 130 points, or 0.4%. The technology-heavy Nasdaq Composite (^IXIC) finished lower by 1.6%

Continued resilience in the labor market likely takes the pressure off the Federal Reserve to reverse course on its rate hiking campaign, an outcome markets have been betting on happening later this year, which in part helped fuel the stock market rally to start the year.

“Assuming there is no irregularity in the data, today’s employment report was unexpected as it showed outsized strength in labor markets across the board," Goldman Sachs Asset Management head of multi-asset retail investing Alexandra Wilson-Elizondo said in a note.

"The report will make insurance cuts less likely as there are no material signs of stress to force a rate cut," Wilson-Elizondo added. "In other words, this print gives the Fed more room to allow for stagnation in the macro economy and risk remains skewed to over-tightening causing a recession.”

On the earnings side, Apple (AAPL), Amazon (AMZN), and Google parent Alphabet (GOOG, GOOGL) — the market's most heavily weighted companies — all posted quarterly results that underwhelmed Wall Street. Shares of Apple reversed losses, gaining 2.4% on Friday, while Amazon and Alphabet plunged 8.4% and 2.7%, respectively.

Apple said revenue fell 5% as headwinds from COVID lockdowns in China and worker protests at manufacturer Foxconn’s facility in the nation weighed on shipments during the period. iPhone sales, a key metric for the company, dropped 8% year-over-year to $65.8 billion, a meaningful miss from estimates of $68.3 billion.

Amazon, meanwhile, unveiled better-than-expected sales growth in the fourth quarter but disappointed on profit — largely the result of big losses from its stake in electric vehicle maker Rivian Automotive. Amazon's AWS cloud unit grew more than 20% compared to the same period in 2022 but fell short of expectations.

Alphabet's results also missed forecasts on revenue and earnings per share, as advertising declined year-over-year. The numbers come after the company laid off about 12,000 employees in January, a move CEO Sundar Pichai blamed on Alphabet overhiring during the pandemic boom.

"We have significant work underway to improve all aspects of our cost structure, in support of our investments in our highest growth priorities to deliver long-term, profitable growth," Alphabet CFO Ruth Porat said in a statement.

Elsewhere outside of technology companies, investors were watching Nordstrom (JWN) following reports investor Ryan Cohen has built a big stake in the department store. The move was confirmed to Yahoo Finance by a person familiar with the matter. Shares surged more than 24% on Friday.

Stocks have been on a tear to start 2023 as investors bet that weakening economic data will prompt the Federal Reserve to end its rate hiking cycle sooner than expected.

That view was bolstered by remarks from Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell on Wednesday that suggested signs of "disinflation" are building in the economy as the U.S. central bank raised interest rates by a smaller hike of 0.25% — even as he asserted more increases were ahead.

Still, many strategists have been skeptical of the market's uptrend and Wall Street's anticipations the Fed will pause its interest rate hiking campaign this year.

"Now is not the time for nuance. Aggressive tightening in 2022 has led to signs of decelerating inflation but from levels that remain unacceptably high," Lazard chief market strategist Ron Temple said in a note. "Falling bond yields and higher equity prices have complicated the task by easing the financial conditions that the Fed is trying to tighten, necessitating forceful messaging from the FOMC this week."

"The Fed won’t be able to rest until labor market conditions ease significantly from current levels, and that is unlikely without higher rates for longer than the markets currently expect."

At an investment conference in Miami, Florida, earlier this week, Morgan Stanley's top market strategist Mike Wilson attributed the rally to the January effect — a market theory that securities' prices increase in the month of January more than in any other month after a year-end sell-off for tax purposes."

MY COMMENT

I hate to see the EXTREMELY FOOLISH comments in here about a pause by the FED. Anyone that thought or thinks the FED is done with rate increases is a total fool. it is OBVIOUS that they are not done yet.....we are looking at 2-3 more 0.25% increases.

I dont know why the obsessive media focus on this FED stuff that is obviously NOT true. In reality......the point where we are now....within 0.50% to 0.75% of the end of the FED increases.....is GREAT NEWS. BUT the media has to create drama by HYPING the line that the FED might be done.

THERE ARE NO EXPECTATIONS THAT THE FED IS READY TO PAUSE......I dont think anyone with brain thinks this in the financial world. If anything this is simply rope-a-dope put out by day traders and shorts to drive the markets down in favor of short term trading. This is NOT REALITY.

 

Our little neighborhood of 4200 homes looks like a bomb went off....trees and tree limbs laying everywhere. I hate ice storms. My dishwasher is toast compliments of a power surge when the power went down. Siting and doing nothing while there is a weather disaster happening is exhausting.....I am worn out today.

BUT....tomorrow is a new day. I was very lucky....we had no trees down and not even a single limb. Most of our trees are Live Oaks....which are green year round.

Part of my edginess is the fact that we will not have any shows from January 23 till February 17. We left that 3.5 weeks blank in order to do some recording. We got some done last week and will pick up again tomorrow. It will all be happening at the Band Leaders place where he has a private studio. Since we are not paying a studio by the day.....we will take our time.

So far we have been doing tracks......instrument by instrument. It is working fine....but that is not my preferred way to record. It is just too sterile. I prefer to isolate all the amps and vocals and record the entire band and all tracks at once.....than go back.....and do re-takes, punch-in, punch-out, and additional tracks as needed from there.

BUT....those sorts of executive decisions are not up to me.

 

Elon Musk........wins again.

Tesla's Elon Musk found not liable in trial over 2018 'funding secured' tweets

https://www.reuters.com/legal/secur...lon-musks-2018-tweets-draws-close-2023-02-03/

(BOLD is my opinion OR what I consider important content)


"SAN FRANCISCO, Feb 3 (Reuters) - A U.S. jury on Friday found Tesla Inc (TSLA.O) CEO Elon Musk and his company were not liable for misleading investors when Musk tweeted in 2018 that he had "funding secured" to take the electric car company private.

Plaintiffs had claimed billions in damages and the decision also had been seen as important for Musk himself, who often takes to Twitter to air his views.

The jury came back with a unanimous verdict roughly two hours after beginning deliberations.

Musk was not present in court when the verdict was read but soon tweeted that he was "deeply appreciative" of the jury's decision.

"Thank goodness, the wisdom of the people has prevailed," he said.

Nicholas Porritt, a lawyer for the investors, said in a statement, "We are disappointed with the verdict and are considering next steps."

Shares of Tesla rose 1.6% in after-hours trading following the verdict.

"A dark chapter is now closed for Musk and Tesla," Wedbush analyst Dan Ives said. Ives added that some Tesla investors feared Musk might have to sell more Tesla stock if he lost.

The world's second-richest person has previously created legal and regulatory headaches through his sometimes impulsive use of Twitter, the social media company he bought for $44 billion in October.

Minor Myers, who teaches corporate law at the University of Connecticut and who had previously called the investors' case strong, called the outcome "astounding."

The U.S. anti-securities fraud law "has always been thought to be this great bulwark against misstatements and falsehoods," he said. "This outcome makes you wonder if it is up to the job in modern markets," he said, adding that Musk himself was likely to "double down" on his communication tactics after the verdict.

Musk's attention has been divided in recent months between Tesla, his rocket company SpaceX and now Twitter. Tesla investors have expressed concerns that running the social media company has taken up too much of his focus.

'BAD WORD CHOICE'

Tesla shareholders claimed Musk misled them when he tweeted on Aug. 7, 2018, that he was considering taking the company private at $420 per share, a premium of about 23% to the prior day's close, and had "funding secured."

They say Musk lied when he tweeted later that day that "investor support is confirmed."

The stock price soared after the tweets and then fell again after Aug. 17, 2018, as it became clear the buyout would not happen.

Porritt during closing arguments said the billionaire CEO is not above the law, and should be held be liable for the tweets.

"This case ultimately is about whether rules that apply to everyone else should also apply to Elon Musk," he said.

Musk's lawyer Alex Spiro countered that Musk's "funding secured" tweet was "technically inaccurate" but that investors only cared that Musk was considering a buyout.

"The whole case is built on bad word choice," he said. "Who cares about bad word choice?"

"Just because it's a bad tweet doesn't make it fraud," Spiro said during closing arguments.

An economist hired by the shareholders had calculated investor losses as high as $12 billion.

During the three-week trial, Musk spent nearly nine hours on the witness stand, telling jurors he believed the tweets were truthful. He said he had lined up the necessary financing, including a verbal commitment from Saudi Arabia's sovereign wealth fund, the Public Investment Fund. The fund later backpedaled on its commitment, Musk said.

Musk later testified that he believed he could have sold enough shares of his rocket company SpaceX to fund a buyout, and "felt funding was secured" with SpaceX stock alone.

Musk testified that he made the tweets in order to put small shareholders on the same footing as large investors who knew about the deal. But he acknowledged he lacked formal commitments from the Saudi fund and other potential backers.

He said his tweets in general did not always affect Tesla stock the way he expects.

"Just because I tweet something does not mean people believe it or will act accordingly," Musk told the jury."

MY COMMENT

A unanimous jury verdict.....in just two hours......is a total.......SLAM DUNK...IN YOUR FACE... verdict.

One thing about Musk....the man is a winner. I have know various people over my lifetime in business that are like this......they just somehow always win.

 

He also knows how to work EXTREMELY HARD......and have fun at the same time.

Elon Musk says he's stuck with his new Twitter name — 'Mr. Tweet'

https://www.businessinsider.com/elon-musk-twitter-name-stuck-mr-tweet-2023-1

"Elon Musk says he's stuck with his new Twitter display name — "Mr. Tweet."

The billionaire's recently updated name is a reference to a lawyer's error during a trial over Musk's "funding secured" Tesla tweets.

Nicholas Porritt, an attorney representing a group of shareholders who are suing Musk over his 2018 tweets, accidentally called Musk "Mr. Tweet" during the trial on Monday.

Porritt called the mistake a "Freudian slip," but Musk joked it was "probably an accurate description."

Now Musk says he can't get his old display name back.

"Changed my name to Mr. Tweet, now Twitter won't let me change it back," he tweeted on Wednesday, along with a laughing emoji.

Twitter users have complained of having their names locked by the platform before.

In November, pop star Doja Cat turned to Musk for help after she accidentally locked her display name as "christmas."

"i don't wanna be christmas forever @elonmusk please help i've made a mistake," she tweeted at the time.

According to a November report in The Verge, users who were verified under Twitter's legacy policy weren't able to change their display names on the app. The rule was aimed at preventing impersonation after Twitter's paid verification caused havoc for some brands and public figures.

Representatives for Musk did not immediately respond to Insider's request for comment made outside of normal working hours."

 

I have a pretty good idea what the future looks like....but I will not say it on here.

What is INSANE...is that we did this to ourselves.....and....we continue to do it. Our government, our business leaders, our companies, our politicians.....ALL......are responsible.

 

I like this little article....and....I say "DUH".

Wall Street Week Ahead: Signs of market strength emerge

https://www.reuters.com/markets/us/...et-strength-cheer-us-stocks-bulls-2023-02-04/

(BOLD is my opinion OR what I consider important content)

"NEW YORK, Feb 3 (Reuters) - U.S. stock bulls are taking heart from a range of market signals pointing to an upbeat year for Wall Street, as equities sit on impressive gains despite worries that the Federal Reserve’s monetary policy tightening may plunge the economy into a recession.

Among these are equities’ positive January performance, a "golden cross" chart pattern on the S&P 500 and more stocks making new highs rather than new lows.

Such signals are far from the only indicators market participants use to make investment decisions, and they are not foolproof. Weak outlooks for corporate heavyweights such as Amazon and Microsoft and a blowout employment number that heightened expectations for Fed hawkishness injected a fresh note of uncertainty into markets on Friday, though the S&P 500 remains up 7.7% year-to-date.

However, steady improvements in gauges of momentum and sentiment in recent weeks reinforced the view among some investors that asset prices may be heading for a more benign period, after last year saw the S&P 500 lose 19.4% in its biggest annual percentage drop since 2008.

“We think this is a healthy picture that is being painted here,” said Ryan Detrick, chief market strategist at the Carson Group, referring to signals such as January’s gains and the broad range of sectors participating in the rally.

JANUARY JUMP

The S&P 500 rose 6.2% in January, driven in part by hopes that the Fed will be able to contain surging inflation without badly damaging the economy.

When the S&P 500 has advanced in January, the market has gone on to rise in the subsequent February-December period 83% of the time, with an average 11-month gain of over 11%, according to an analysis of data going back to World War II by CFRA Research.

An up January after a down year, however, was followed by a gain of 23.1% from February to December with a 92% success rate.

Despite a recent rally that may have made stocks comparatively expensive, “the track record implies that maybe we do have some upside potential," said Sam Stovall, chief investment strategist at CFRA Research.

GOLDEN CROSS

Meanwhile, chart watchers noted that the S&P 500’s 50-day moving average rose above its 200-day moving average on Thursday, a pattern known as a golden cross.

Since 1950, the S&P 500 has produced an average 12-month return of 10.5% after a golden cross formed, while the overall average annual return since 1950 is 9.1%, according to Adam Turnquist, chief technical strategist at LPL Research.

However, when a golden cross has appeared as the 200-day moving average is declining - as it is now - the average 12-month return for the S&P 500 jumps to 16.8%.

"The recent golden cross adds to the growing technical evidence of a trend change for the S&P 500 and further raises the probabilities of the bear market low being set in October," Turnquist said in a post.

IMPROVING INTERNALS

Willie Delwiche, an investment strategist at All Star Charts, said all five indicators on his bull market checklist were fulfilled in January, including upside volume and risk appetite metrics, something that did not occur once in 2022.

One of those indicators showed more stocks on the New York Stock Exchange and Nasdaq making new 52-week highs than lows -- -- a sign that the rally is being led by a broad range of stocks, rather than a cluster of heavyweights. That happened as many times in January as it did during all of 2022, Delwiche said.

However, some investors believe stocks may have gotten ahead of themselves.

Friday's data showing U.S. employment growth accelerating sharply in January renewed the inflation concerns that hammered stocks last year and ignited bets on a more hawkish Fed.

"The January employment report was unambiguously strong and should be the start of a series of data points showing stronger activity and inflation in early 2023," analysts at Citi wrote. "We expect this emerging trend should push back on too-dovish market pricing.""

MY COMMENT

Of course....I agree with the above.

I DO NOT use or believe in Technical Analysis....so to me the "Golden Cross" portion of this little article is NOT relevant or informative.

I have been an advocate on here for some time now....well before people starting to jump on the bandwagon now.....that the bottom was in June 2022 and that the SP500 have been generally POSITIVE since than. Over the next six months you are going to see most of the so called......experts.....subtly moving to the bull market side....and....as usual, claiming that they called it. These people are geniuses at claiming credit and playing both sides. Of course in reality they are IDIOTS.....but when it comes to claiming credit....they are savants.

I tend to jump early on market positivity....so I might be wrong....time will tell. But since I am fully invested al the time anyway......I dont really care.

 

One thing about Technical Analysis compared to Fundamental Analysis.....they have all the cool names:

Golden Cross
Descending Triangles
Cup And Handle
Falling Wedge
Triple Top Reversal
Bullish Engulfing Candle
Bull Flag

I suggest some new names to make Fundamental Analysis more sexy:

Earnings Beat should now be......Brain Spike Dunk.

Earnings Miss should now be......Brain Freeze.

Of course we already have the following market terms:

Ankle biter
Bagel Land
Bear Hug
Big Uglies
Cockroach Theory
Dead Cat Bounce
Eat Your Own Dog Food
Killer Bee
Shark Watcher
Smurf
Zombie Debt

To be a real market insider you need to know and use all the cool insider terms. You dont need to actually be right or know anything....you just have to sound good.