The Long Term Investor

You and I are on the same track today Zukodany. I got a good gain in my ten stocks.......but....for once the SP500 beat me today by 0.44%.

I was negative in NVDA, NKE, and TSLA at the time of the close. Looks like they had a bit of profit taking in NVDA in the last hour of the day.

STILL.....A BANNER WEEK......with only a single day left. I have no idea where the gains stand for the week since I only look that up on Friday....but they have got to be pretty good. I would guess that the SP500 is somewhere between 3% and 4% for the week and if we can get another good day in tomorrow it could be between 4% and 5% for the week. That is AMAZING when you consider that the AVERAGE for an ENTIRE YEAR for the SP500 is about 10-11%.

 

Some of these ARE issues for long term investors that are TOO hands off.

Are You Making These 5 Common Portfolio Mistakes?
Problem spots in real-world portfolios—and how to fix them.

https://www.morningstar.com/portfolios/are-you-making-these-5-common-portfolio-mistakes

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

"My annual Portfolio Makeover series provides a bird’s-eye view of real people’s financial lives: their goals, their worries, and their pain points. It gives me the chance to interact with real people (my favorite part of the project) and it also affords me a close look at their holdings and their plans. In other words, I get to do a bit of snooping on the way to improving their portfolios. It definitely helps me figure out what topics I should work on in the future.

In my years of conducting these portfolio makeovers, I’ve observed that investors get a lot more right than they get wrong. They do their homework and they populate their portfolios with low-cost mutual funds and exchange-traded funds. They tend to be pretty hands-off, and if they delve into niche investments, they usually limit them to a small share of their portfolios. Of course, I wouldn’t rule out that Morningstar.com readers are more sophisticated than most investors, but I’d push back on the idea of the individual investors as dumb-money performance-chasers. It’s not just a caricature; I think it’s wrong.

At the same time, there are some issues that I see—and address—again and again in the course of these makeovers. Here are some of the most common ones.

Portfolio Sprawl

This is by far the biggest issue that I observe: too many accounts, too many holdings, too much redundancy. The unwieldy-portfolio problem isn’t just the domain of those who have been investing a long time and have amassed a lot of assets; I also see it with more-modest portfolios. (For the latter group, the armchair psychologist in me can’t help but wonder if holding a lot of securities—even if the amounts invested in them are quite small—provides people with a feeling of wealth.)

Tax-deferred retirement accounts are the most common source of account duplication, thanks to the fact that most people have multiple employers in their lifetimes so IRAs and 401(k)s stack up. Those can readily be collapsed into a single IRA (or one Roth and one traditional IRA, if Roth accounts are in the mix). For portfolios with more holdings than are truly necessary, I often find myself leaning on index funds as a simple way to clean everything up while achieving diversification and the desired asset-class exposures. (My Minimalist portfolios depict sensible asset-allocation mixes for retired and younger investors.) For smaller accounts—for example, the orphan spousal IRA with $15,000 in it—I often look to internally diversified all-in-one funds such as target-date or lifecycle funds.

A Redundant Individual-Stock Portfolio

A sub-problem I often see in cases of portfolio sprawl is a basket of large-cap individual stocks that all but duplicates what’s already in the mutual funds or ETFs in the portfolio. Mega-cap stocks like Apple AAPL, Amazon.com AMZN, and Microsoft MSFT are common holdings, and they’re also big positions in most U.S. stock funds; those three take up more than 16% of the S&P 500 and a bit less of total market indexes today. I suppose that some investors might have good reason to double down on the market’s biggest names, but I mostly see extra risk (the most highly valued stocks in the market usually don’t trade cheaply) and oversight responsibilities associated with monitoring the individual stocks. For those reasons, the “afterthought stock portfolio” usually goes on the cutting-room floor when I do makeovers.

Less common these days are the “individual investor/financial advisor as portfolio manager” portfolios—baskets of enough individual securities to populate a whole mutual fund. I know that plenty of longtime Morningstar.com readers build bespoke portfolios in this fashion, aiming to forgo the management fees that accompany funds and perhaps take advantage of the small investor’s biggest advantage: patience. But if you go this route, make sure you’re willing to put in the time to keep tabs on your holdings, and that you have a plan in place in case you’re no longer able to handle the management responsibilities. Also, do an honest accounting of your performance, comparing your long-run results to an inexpensive index mutual fund that’s focused on the same part of the market. (Everyone—not just individual-stock investors—should be using a custom benchmark to assess what value they’re adding with security selection.)

Also-Ran Mutual Funds

I mentioned earlier that investors generally do a good job of being hands-off with their investments, and that kind of patience usually redounds to the benefit of their long-run returns. But I’ve also observed cases when investors were too patient and hands-off: They purchased mutual funds and set up their portfolios a number of years ago and apparently never looked at or touched them again. The telltale signs are when a fund has had multiple manager changes, extended runs of poor returns, and huge asset outflows—sometimes all at once—and yet it still sits in the portfolio. I’m not talking about short-term underperformance, which can actually be a buying opportunity if the underlying management team and strategy remain solid; I’m talking about lemons that earn Negative ratings. The lesson is that even very hands-off investors should take a look at their portfolios once in a while to assess their overall asset allocations, make sure the savings or spending plan are on track, and yes, prune losers.

Asset Allocation Not Informed by the Plan

Another issue that I see frequently—but one that’s a bit harder to fix—is when a portfolio’s asset allocation doesn’t connect with the investor’s actual plans. The most frequent example is when an individual is getting close to or in retirement yet the portfolio doesn’t contain enough safe(r) assets to address the anticipated portfolio spending. Many such investors have enjoyed wonderful gains in stocks for decades, so they’re hesitant to derisk their portfolios in favor of assets with lower return potential. (And let’s be honest, bonds didn’t make a great case for themselves in 2022′s rising-rate environment.)

sequence risk is a big issue for the soon-to-retire and newly retired, in that overspending from a portfolio that’s simultaneously declining reduces the probability that the assets will last through the whole of someone’s retirement time horizon. That’s why I like the idea of aligning the portfolio with anticipated spending needs, creating a runway of safe assets that the retiree could “spend through” if a bear market for stocks materialized early on in their retirements. That’s the Bucket approach to retirement portfolio construction that I often write and talk about, where I organize the portfolio from very safe (cash) assets for short-term spending needs to bonds for intermediate-term expenditures to volatile equity assets for long-term growth and inflation protection. In a similar vein, Morningstar’s new Role in Portfolio framework can help you think about your holdings through the lens of the purpose they serve in your portfolio.

Suboptimal Asset Location

In addition to issues with asset allocation, I also frequently spot asset location problems. That means that investors have housed tax-efficient assets (say, municipal bonds) in tax-sheltered accounts and, more commonly, tax-inefficient assets in taxable ones. The obvious example in the latter category is when investors store high-income-producing assets, especially those whose income is taxed at ordinary income tax rates, like high-yield bonds and REITs, in their taxable accounts.

It’s simple enough to adjust tax-sheltered accounts on an as-needed basis, because there are no tax consequences for any changes as long as the assets stay inside the account. Addressing asset-location problems with taxable accounts can be more tricky, though. That’s because the tax-inefficient assets may have appreciated since purchase, so switching to a more tax-efficient mix may trigger a tax bill in and of itself. Before embarking on any sales from a taxable account—to address tax issues or fix any other trouble spots—it’s important to gauge the current and future tax implications of doing so."

MY COMMENT

Some good GENERAL issues above to look for in your investing.

BUT.....some people like myself INTENTIONALLY do some of the above. I INTENTIONALLY double and triple up in my BIG CAP TECH stocks and those in the two funds that I also own. I INTENTIONALLY have a very concentrated portfolio with ONLY ten stocks. I do not want any more diversification that 10-15 stocks.

The above becomes an issue when they happen simply as a function of time and NOT as a result of the investors intentional strategy. Bottom line.....HAVE AN INVESTMENT PLAN.....and be sure to stick to it.

Of course.......having an investment plan that SUCKS.......is never going to work. It MUST be rational, reasonable, and in line with the common investing probabilities.

 

Good news for holders of MSFT....myself included.

Microsoft notches record high valuation of nearly $2.6 trillion as stock surges

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/microsoft-shares-pace-notch-record-194918338.html

MY COMMENT

I put this company and NVDA in the category of the best managed companies in the world. Superb management teams.

 

The market close today.......pretty obvious.

S&P 500, Nasdaq rally for sixth straight day as traders hope Fed’s rate-hiking cycle is nearly over

https://www.cnbc.com/2023/06/14/stock-market-today-live-updates.html

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

"The Dow Jones Industrial Average on Thursday rallied more than 400 points and the S&P 500 touched a fresh 13-month high, as investors bet the Federal Reserve was close to done raising rates after the central bank this week skipped a hike.

The 30-stock Dow added 428.73 points, or 1.26%, to close at 34,408.06. The S&P 500 climbed 1.22% to finish the session at 4,425.84, while the Nasdaq Composite gained 1.15% to close at 13,782.82. Bond yields were lower, while tech stocks continued to lead the market upswing — in line with the trend on Wall Street in 2023.

Thursday’s gains brought the S&P 500 and Nasdaq to their highest intraday levels since April 2022.



CNBC

“The key question for the market [now] is, can value and cyclical stocks catch up to growth and tech?” said Dylan Kremer, co-chief investment officer at Certuity. “If it does, then that momentum has the ability to help grind the market higher.”

The S&P 500 is also riding its longest winning streak since November 2021 and is headed for its strongest weekly gain since March. From its October closing low, the broader market index is up 23%. It’s also risen 15% year to date. As for the Nasdaq, the tech-heavy benchmark is up more than 31% in 2023.

In tech, shares of Microsoft and Oracle were higher with gains of about 3.2% and 3.5%. Alibaba
stock climbed close to 3.2%.

On Wednesday, Fed Chair Jerome Powell said during a post-meeting press conference that the Federal Open Market Committee would use the six weeks until its next meeting to “take into account the cumulative tightening of monetary policy.” He added that a decision on July’s policy move has not yet been made. The upswing on Thursday shows investors remain willing to place bets on the overhang of uncertainty heading into the July FOMC meeting.

Still, Powell insisted that the central bank will likely raise rates further this year, and said the Fed will remain data dependent on a month-by-month basis. Stocks whipsawed throughout Powell’s comments on Wednesday.

Additional economic data releases Thursday morning gave investors and policymakers better insight on the strength of the labor market and consumer spending. Weekly jobless claims numbers were slightly above estimates at 262,000 compared to a Dow Jones estimate of 245,000, while retail sales ticked up 0.3%.

Friday’s market will at least see high trading volume thanks to expirations and rebalancings

As if the first half of the year hasn’t been unexpected enough, moves in Friday’s trading could be exacerbated further by “quadruple witching” in derivatives — the quarterly expiration of options on individual stocks, stock index futures contracts, options on stock indexes and options on stock-index futures — plus the quarterly rebalancing of some of the underlying indexes themselves.

If nothing else, trading volume is exceptionally high on expiration days. TradeStation, which owns online securities and futures brokerages and trading technology companies, says the single busiest trading day of the second half of 2022 came on Dec. 16, 2022, the fourth quarter’s witching day.

Meanwhile, S&P Dow Jones and some other providers rebalance their indexes on the third Friday of each quarter’s final month, changing the weightings of individual stocks, higher or lower. June’s third Friday is tomorrow, so both the S&P 500 and the Nasdaq-100 indexes are rebalanced, which will affect demand for some stocks.

For perspective, the Stock Trader’s Almanac says that the expiration week is often higher in bull markets and down in bear markets — the S&P 500 is up about 3% so far this week and the Nasdaq Composite by about 4% — but that the Dow Jones Industrial Average has fallen on six of the last seven June expiration days.

Stocks are smashing historical averages for June

The Dow
and S&P 500 are running circles around historical averages for June about halfway into the month, according to data from the Stock Trader’s Almanac.

In a typical June, the Dow has shed 0.2% on average. But so far this month, the 30-stock average is up 4.4%. That also puts it ahead of the overall average, with a typical month bringing a relatively modest 0.7% advance.

Similarly, the S&P 500 has rallied 5.5% this month, blowing past the historical June average of just 0.1% gained. When averaging the historical performance of all months for the S&P 500, the index typical adds 0.7%.

That performance means both have defied conventional wisdom, with June historically considered a weak month. On average, it has brought the second worst historical performance for the Dow and fourth worse for the S&P 500."

MY COMMENT

Another blow out day today. It will be nice to see a high volume day tomorrow. We have had too many low, lingering, volume days lately.

I may as well JINX tomorrow right now......we should have a good chance for yet another big day tomorrow. I would put it as a......"PROBABILITY". We will also have a shot at a weekly gain of +5% in the SP500 if we get another big day.

It is fun to be making money again.

 

YEP.......and more. NVDA is up by 2.14% or $9.11 at this moment. The stock is at $435 and change.

This stock reminds me of the position in MSFT that I owned between 1990 and about 2001. During those years Microsoft went on a massive stock run up. BUT....one difference....the number of splits that MSFT did during those years.

1990 2 for 1
1991 3 for 2
1992 3 for 2
1994 2 for 1
1996 2 for 1
1998 2 for 1
1999 2 for 1

We dont see those sorts of splits happening in the markets today. I dont know why.....it is actually a shame. I dont think the tendency of HIGH stock prices that we we today is a good thing for companies or shareholders.

If you want to do the math......I bought 1000 shares of MSFT for about $80,000 in 1990 and held the stock till about 2001-2002. If my math is right over that span an initial 1000 shares would have grown to over 70,000 shares. Of course I did not just hold all those shares from start to finish. As time went by and the balance got higher and higher I did diversify some of those shares into other holdings.......and we bought "things" at times. BUT....it was a historic run for shareholders.....and we did very well.

I bought the stock based on a SINGLE REVELATION. In my work life I was seeing the computer BOOM happening all around me. In addition the Personal computer was BOOMING with regular people and in schools. My revelation.....Microsoft had a virtual monopoly to supply the operating system to nearly every computer sold IN THE WORLD. This....single thought...... is what spurred my early investment in the company.

This is how share splits create shareholder value for investors. UNFORTUNATELY......company management is missing the boat on using share splits to drive company BUZZ and value for the company and for shareholders today.

 

You are so right TireSmoke.

Many 401K options are horrible. It has been a while...but in the past I looked at the holdings of most of the BIG popular Target Date Funds. I was SHOCKED at the percentage of bonds that they held even in people's young years. Some of them were as high as 25% bonds for people that were extremely young ages. it was RIDICULOUS and a total waste of the early years when most investors for retirement should be 100% in stocks.

In addition as you mention the fees in many 401K plans are crazy....although I do think they are better now then in the past.

 

I have been siting and reading and listening to the business TV in the background. We had some red at the open but over the last hour or so we moved forward to all green for the averages.....and now.....we are back to the NASDAQ being slightly red while the DOW and SP500 are still green.

In other words the markets are STILL in the process of opening today and deciding on a direction. I expect that by the close all the averages will once again be GREEN. BUT if not....who cares....it has been an EPIC WEEK for stocks and investors.

 

As an early BABY BOOMER....I like this little article.

Boomers’ Retirement Doesn’t Spell Bust

https://www.fisherinvestments.com/e...mmentary/boomers-retirement-doesnt-spell-bust

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

"New research shows retirees aren’t slowing down.

What happened to America’s demographic timebomb? With more and more Baby Boomers retiring every day and the birth rate declining in recent decades, many sweat the US economy will soon run out of consumer fuel. With this large generation allegedly no longer working, investing and spending, some fear boomers are about to morph from an economic contributor to a drain … and drain stock market returns while they are at it, a view so common there have been books written on it. That has long been the (incorrect and arguably ageist) narrative, and we have long taken issue with it. After all, retired folks spend money, too! A fun new report backs this up, defusing demographic worries. We think it is a prime reminder that an ageing population isn’t a stock market sinkhole.

Conventional wisdom holds that when folks retire, their spending drops. For one, they will no longer have to splash out for professional wardrobes or daily commutes, and they won’t be socializing with coworkers over coffee, lunch or happy hour. Two, once they are living off savings and Social Security, people will cut discretionary spending and focus only on the basics in order to stretch their resources over their entire retirement.

To us, this never matched a basic eyeball test. When we look around our communities and families, we see retirees seizing life with gusto—traveling, spoiling grandchildren, taking up new hobbies, organizing charity drives, hosting dinners and parties, planting gardens, enjoying their favorite local café, and so much more. Many “retirees” do so in name only, too, choosing to work in other professions they favor more. But observations like this are often unquantifiable, which is where the new research comes in.

As featured in a Washington Post article this week, Bank of America’s (BofA’s) analysis of its account holders finds: “Baby boomers (roughly ages 59 to 77) and traditionalists (ages 78 to 95) in every income group are outspending their younger counterparts, the bank found. Many of those gains were concentrated in leisure spending, such as travel and hotels. … Among younger adults, spending on airlines and hotels fell 5 percent in April from a year ago, according to Bank of America credit card data. But for older adults, spending in those categories ticked up, as they became more comfortable venturing out. In all, baby boomers spent 2 percent more in May than they did a year ago, while traditionalists spent 5 percent more — although a pullback among younger generations helped drag down overall spending by 0.2 percent.”

The article hypothesizes that the divide might stem partly from a phenomenon known as revenge spending—people making up for lost time during COVID lockdowns, doing all the activities they were restricted from. We don’t doubt it, but that doesn’t answer why older folks would be the big spenders, considering lockdowns and travel restrictions affected all ages. Yes, older folks were more vulnerable to COVID itself, but fear and care responsibilities kept many, many working-age folks indoors, too.

BofA’s analysis sheds more light on the why behind the spending divide. Not only have retirees enjoyed a Social Security bump that outstrips wage growth over the preceding 12 months, but their overhead is typically a lot lower than their younger peers, freeing up more cash for discretionary purposes. They aren’t commuting long distances, they are less likely to have big tuition bills, and many have either paid off their mortgages or their payments are tied to the low rates and lower home prices of yesteryear. Accordingly, they are much less exposed to today’s high housing costs than younger folks who are renting or covering larger mortgage payments.

The article goes on to argue this is a sign of a vulnerable economy, as overly burdened younger generations will be less able to support growth, especially as student loan payments resume. However, we don’t think any of this is new. There is a long, long, long history of economists and sociologists arguing younger generations won’t have the same economic prospects as their forebears. In their relative youth, many of their forebears posited Baby Boomers were a bunch of flower children who rejected the hard work of their parents’ generation. Reality turned out very different from that caricature, as it did for subsequent generations. Remember when Generation X were a bunch of chain-smoking, flannel-wearing, coffee-chugging slackers who would never contribute? Now they are the ones making all those high tuition payments and paying down suburban mortgages. Remember when Millennials weren’t forming families, buying houses or joining the adult world in general? Now they are entering their prime earning years and, perhaps outside of high-priced coastal metropolises, in their home-buying prime. Now that it is Gen Z’s turn in the “they can’t amount to anything” spotlight, we are quite certain the stereotypes of cash-strapped TikTokers whose pay goes entirely to rent and debt will prove equally unfounded.

To us, this is all just playing out as generational trends usually do. New grads enter the workforce in entry-level jobs, typically with low salaries, less job security and less interesting work. As they gain experience and hone their skills, the work gets more engaging, the pay gets higher, and their skills become more highly sought after. Their prime earning years arrive in middle age, just in time to fund college educations and catch-up retirement savings. Retirement itself, far from being small, is increasingly the time people do all the things they never had time for when working—things they can afford through diligent saving and budgeting while they were still working. Their spending helps keep national demand high, fueling growth.

Stocks know demographics. They know what people say about different age brackets, and they see the size of those populations. They have seen decades’ worth of commentary arguing retiring Boomers will drag on spending and growth. If it were true, markets would have priced it eons ago, resetting to permanently lower levels to account for the lack of growth potential. Instead, they keep rising—albeit with bear markets like last year’s along the way—showing us that rumors of consumer spending’s retirement were greatly exaggerated. Stocks do an excellent job seeing and weighing reality, and they are well aware that retired people are an economic force, not a hindrance.

MY COMMENT

This article contains MANY examples of the so called "experts" predictions and observations being FLAT OUT WRONG.

The FACT that the people that are seen as experts are really nothing of the sort...is reason number one that NO ONE that "I" will NEVER invest in any way based on what the "experts" say or predict.

It is much more simple for any investor. Invest based on company fundamentals and proven investing probabilities.

 

I see that we are NOW back to all green in the big averages. Today is a battle between the short term traders and profit takers....and the long term investors and stock buyers.

 

HERE is the market today.

Stocks rise as rally continues with economy in focus

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/stoc...-focus-stock-market-news-today-133402378.html

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

"US stocks rose at Friday's open, after rallying the previous day amid signs of a resilient economy that boosted hopes the Federal Reserve could end its rate-hike campaign soon.

The S&P 500 (^GSPC) and the Dow Jones Industrial Average (^DJI) both ticked up around 0.4%, while the technology-heavy Nasdaq (^IXIC) was up slightly less.

The University of Michigan Consumer Sentiment Index showed consumers are slightly more confident about the state of the economy, a data point that could help tilt a "hawkish" Fed closer to a July rate hike.

The June preliminary number came in at 63.9, compared to expectations of 60.5, according to estimates from Bloomberg. The index had dipped to 59.2 last month in its first dip since February.

Global stocks were getting a lift from growing expectations that China will have to bump up stimulus as its recovery stutters.

But the US bull market could face a test as $4.2 trillion in options expire Friday. That typically leads to portfolio reshuffles, which have led to sudden price swings in the past."

MY COMMENT

That is about it for today. There is NOTHING happening....other than.....a huge MOMENTUM based stock RALLY.

 

This is DEFINITELY good news for this young BULL MARKET.

The S&P 493 is finally joining the S&P 500's rally

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/the-...he-sp-500s-rally-morning-brief-125651854.html

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

"The Nasdaq (^IXIC) tacked on another 1.2% Thursday, notching a sixth straight day of gains.

With AI hype capturing investor attention, tech is in focus. But the broader S&P 500 (^GSPC), which managed to outperform the Nasdaq Thursday, shows that the 2023 rally is finally showing signs of broadening to the less techy sectors, like retail, materials, and industrials.

A motley "reopening" mix of cruise lines, car manufacturers, and industrial names are now joining the newly minted bull market, surging since the last jobs report two weeks ago.

The top winner since the jobs report is Carnival (CCL), up 35%, which can be seen in this chart below at the far right edge.

United Rentals (URI), an industrial rental and leasing stalwart, was in the red by 5% prior to June and has surged 20% since then. Caterpillar (CAT), which had been down 13% before the jobs report, is up nearly 20% since then, bringing its year-to-date return into the green.

Feel free to throw Etsy (ETSY), Southwest Airlines (LUV), Deer (DE), and General Motors (GM) into a similar boat, though not all have turned positive on the year.

Now, close on the heels of Carnival are shares of Norwegian Cruise Line (NCLH) and Tesla (TSLA), both returning 20% or more over this short period. And to be fair, these particular stocks were already sitting on material 2023 gains.

But the key point is that other beaten-down names have joined the rally.

The big catalyst for this surge higher was the May jobs report, whose headline payrolls beat Wall Street expectations for the 14th time in a row — seemingly at odds with the Fed's blistering rate-hiking campaign.

Stocks surged on the announcement, showing little concern the Fed would be forced to ramp up its hawkish tone once again. And after a relatively tame Consumer Price Index report on Tuesday, the Fed delivered a pause to investors Wednesday, standing pat on interest rates — even if it all but promised more hikes to come.

It seems that good news is once again good news — which is what everyone fretting about the year's gains being concentrated in a handful of the largest stocks have been desperate to hear.

So what's not working? Many defensive health care and consumer staples names are dropping. Humana (HUM), Campbell Soup (CPB), UnitedHealth (UNH), Kraft Heinz (KHC), and General Mills (GIS) are among those sitting on the biggest losses this month.

The losses aren't huge (Humana is the worst, down 12% in June). But they are significant, given the broader markets have been ripping hard.

All told, stocks are signaling a return to normalcy after a decidedly uncharacteristic and narrow start to this bull market. Myriad headwinds remain for stocks in 2023, but investors can finally take the "concentration" risk off their list of worries."

MY COMMENT

YES....this is what happens in every BULL MARKET. The rally starts out as a stealth rally in a handful of stocks or areas of the markets. Over time as the rally is recognized and gains steam reflecting growth in the economy.....the market rally broadens out. We are at the start of that process right now. The STEALTH bull market has been happening since the end of last June......NOW....the awareness is happening very quickly.

 

LOL.....NASDAQ now back red. It is going to be a very BOUNCY day in the averages especially the NASDAQ. I suspect this reflects the higher volume today that we are supposed to see due to the QUADRUPLE WITCHING DAY. If you want to know more...here you go:

Quadruple Witching Dates for 2023: How Can They Impact Stock and Futures Trading?

https://www.tradestation.com/insights/2023/01/18/quadruple-witching-dates-2023-trading/

 

I just looked and I have a nice gain so far today. My expectation was that I would have a loss. SO......a nice surprise early in the day for me. That gain is compliments of ONLY four stocks that are up for me today......NKE, NVDA, HD, and TSLA. Three of the four are carrying me today......NKE +1.92%, NVDA +2.13%, and TSLA +1.82%.

 

You are doing great....TireSmoke. You found and bought a house......and now your account is nearly back to an all time high. You must have good......FENG SHUI.......money is flowing to you.