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☆ Robert E. Lucas Jr., Nobel-Winning Conservative Economist, Dies at 85
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-17 | by ( Sam Roberts | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

Robert E. Lucas Jr., a contrarian Nobel laureate in economics who undergirded conservative arguments that government intervention in fiscal policy is often self-defeating, died on Monday in Chicago. His death was announced by the University of Chicago, where he began teaching as a professor in 1975 and remained a professor emeritus until his death. The announcement did not cite a cause. In awarding the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences in 1995 to Professor Lucas, the fifth winner in economics from the University of Chicago in six years, the Swedish Royal Academy of Sciences described him as “the economist who has had the greatest influence on macroeconomic research since 1970.”While he propounded a number of groundbreaking if sometimes controversial theories, Professor Lucas was best known for his hypothesis of “rational expectations,” advanced in the early 1970s in a critique of macroeconomics.

☆ Sideways stock market is making traders crazy, but the pain trade is still up
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-17 | by ( Bob Pisani | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +5 min

Second quarter guidance is light, but guidance is unchanged for the year. Traders are "not sure they should be leaning into, or out of, the market," Craig Johnson at PiperSandler tells me. One of the favorite indicators traders like to use is the "pain trade." "The pain trade is up," Johnson, a chief market technician, tells me. "Everyone is negatively positioned; the real risk is they get caught offsides and the market moves higher."

☆ Investors lift equity allocations to 5-month high - BofA survey
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-16 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +1 min

LONDON, May 16 (Reuters) - Investors lifted equity allocations to a 5-month high but cash levels also increased to 5.6%, even as they remained worried about a possible credit crunch and inflation staying elevated, a Bank of America survey showed on Tuesday. Investors rotated portfolios into tech stocks, lifting allocations to the highest since December 2021, the euro area and equities, and cut exposure to commodities and utilities. "Long big tech", "short banks" and "short U.S. dollar" were the most crowded trades in May, while contrarian trades were "long REITs", "long banks", "long value stocks", "short bonds", "short tech" and "short growth", the survey found. A net 65% of respondents now expect a weaker economy, the most pessimistic in 2023, but most still expect the economy to experience a "soft landing". Reporting by Samuel Indyk; editing by Danilo MasoniOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

☆ 'Big Short' Michael Burry is long on China's Alibaba and JD.com — these stocks are now a fifth of his portfolio
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-16 | by ( Huileng Tan | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +3 min

"Big Short" investor Michael Burry has been accumulating Alibaba and JD.com shares. Scion held $10.2 million worth of Alibaba shares and $11 million worth of JD.com shares as of March 31. "Big Short" investor Michael Burry is long on China's Alibaba and JD.com. Scion Asset Management held 100,000 Alibaba shares worth $10.2 million and 250,000 JD.com shares worth nearly $11 million as of March 31. The hedge fund's holdings in both Chinese tech companies increased from December 31, when it held 50,000 Alibaba shares and 75,000 JD.com shares, according to the regulatory filing.

☆ Tech is the 'most crowded trade' as stock-market bearishness rises to the highest levels so far this year
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-16 | by ( Matthew Fox | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +3 min

Investors are loading up on mega-cap tech stocks as they turn more bearish, according to Bank of America. The bank said tech is the "most crowded trade" followed by shorting banks and shorting the US dollar. Sign up for our newsletter to get the inside scoop on what traders are talking about — delivered daily to your inbox. According to Bank of America's global fund manager survey, tech stocks are the "most crowded trade" on Wall Street as bearishness towards the broader stock market hits its highest level so far this year. Mega-cap tech stocks have a war chest of cash and a wide moat around their businesses that in the past have enabled steady growth during periods of economic weakness.

☆ The top commentators in markets say the bank crisis isn't anywhere close to over.
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-05 | by ( Phil Rosen | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +5 min

Today we're looking at what some of Wall Street's top investors and commentators say has to happen to curb the banking tumult. The shuttered bank had disclosed in its first-quarter earnings report that customers pulled over $100 billion of deposits in three-months. But even if the regulator did insure more money, former FDIC chair Jelena McWilliams said Thursday a move like that would only cost banks' customers more. A stock market portfolio created by ChatGPT is outperforming the top UK investment funds. Stock market investors should keep an eye out for five key indicators with volatility set to ramp up through the end of the year.

☆ Contrarian investor Mike Dever shared with us 2 vital lessons he learned from his highly profitable association with legendary trader Paul Tudor Jones
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-04 | by ( Marley Jay | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +4 min

Starting in the 1980s, he crossed paths with leading investors, including Paul Tudor Jones. Dever says Jones delivered huge returns for Dever's clients, and explains what he learned from Jones. He also invested for several years in the 1980s with Paul Tudor Jones, now a billionaire hedge fund manager. While Dever remembers being very impressed by the returns Jones delivered, he also recalls what he learned from the approach that went into them. Shortly after Dever invested with Jones, Jones had a bad run in the bond market.

☆ Sallie Krawcheck says a single decision was almost ‘the end of my career’—instead it launched her to Wall Street stardom
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-03 | by ( Tom Huddleston Jr. | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +6 min

Sallie Krawcheck's legendary Wall Street career almost ended soon after it began. The move was slammed by her Wall Street peers. On Wall Street, the consensus is often seen as the safest bet. You were among the first female CEOs on Wall Street. The upside to running one of these storied Wall Street firms is [that] I'm going to get to turn it around, I'm going to learn a tremendous amount, I'm going to do something no one else has done.

☆ Individual investors are so bearish it’s a contrarian buy signal that should mean a 15% gain, RBC says
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-01 | by ( Yun Li | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +1 min

Sentiment among retail investors has been almost as bad as it was during the Great Financial Crisis, and that has triggered a reliable contrarian buy signal that points to a double-digit rally ahead, according to RBC. The weekly American Association of Individual Investor survey, which polled individual investors of their thoughts on where the market is heading in the next six months, has indicated a level of bearishness that's close to the level during 2008, RBC said. "Depressed levels of retail investor sentiment are sending a strong buy signal for US equities again," Lori Calvasina, head of U.S. equity strategy at RBC, said in a note. Retail investors have been dumping equities in the face of raging recession fears that have been stoked by rate hikes and a banking crisis. The selling among individual investors reached a new milestone as of late.

☆ Opinion | We Will Never Be Rid of Tucker Carlson
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-28 | by ( Jason Zengerle | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +3 min

Enter Mr. Carlson. “It’s true you have better hair than I do,” Mr. Carlson recalled Mr. Trump telling his answering machine. Mr. Carlson, who’d never met or spoken to Mr. Trump, was amused. Mr. Carlson had two motivations for not joining in the chorus denouncing Mr. Trump. Mr. Carlson’s openness to Mr. Trump also had something to do with his own ideological journey.

☆ Columbia Threadneedle launches real estate ETF even in the face of a potential recession
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-26 | by ( Jesse Pound | In Jesse-Pound | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +4 min

Columbia Threadneedle is launching the Columbia Research Enhanced Real Estate ETF (CRED) on Wednesday, focused on real estate investment trusts. The private Blackstone Real Estate Investment Trust has repeatedly halted redemptions in recent months because investors have hit the fund's stated withdrawal limits. Columbia Threadneedle does not appear to be alone in thinking the bottom is near for real estate. Jeffrey Gundlach's DoubleLine launched a fixed income ETF focused on commercial real estate ( DCMB ) that began trading earlier this month, and iShares debuted an environmentally focused ETF in February ( ERET ). The University of California also invested $4.5 billion into BREIT, the non-listed Blackstone Real Estate Income Trust , in January.

☆ Ron DeSantis, facing challenges at home, will test presidential ambitions overseas
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-23 | by ( Steve Contorno | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +8 min

While in Israel, DeSantis will also keynote an event hosted by The Jerusalem Post and the Museum of Tolerance Jerusalem. The trip will spotlight DeSantis’ foreign policy credentials as he inches toward a White House bid. DeSantis’ predecessor, now-US Sen. Rick Scott, embarked on more than a dozen trade missions during his tenure as governor. Eleven Florida Republicans have endorsed Trump over DeSantis so far – including seven last week. State lawmakers have also balked at a provision in DeSantis’ immigration package that would eliminate in-state tuition for undocumented residents.

☆ Analysis: Bearish fundamentals, buoyant charts complicate outlook for US stocks
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-21 | by ( Saqib Iqbal Ahmed | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +5 min

Technical indicators such as equity price movement largely show stocks are poised to continue a rally that has seen the S&P 500 climb 8% year-to-date, analysts who track them said. TECHNICALLY SPEAKINGThe S&P 500 (.SPX) has traded in a 9.7 percentage point range year-to-date, its narrowest range for comparable periods since 2017. Johnson, who has a year-end S&P 500 target of 4,625, is encouraged by the reversals in downtrends for many U.S. stock indexes. The S&P 500 has traded higher 83% of the time for the full year, returning an average 13.73%, when it hasn't dropped below the preceding year’s December low in the first quarter, a Piper Sandler analysis showed. The S&P 500 is trading at about 18 times 12-month forward earnings estimates compared to its long-term average P/E of 15.6 times, according to Refinitiv Datastream.

☆ Legendary Female Artists on the Younger Women Who Inspire Them
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-20 | by ( ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +20 min

The Artist’s Mind What it feels like for female artists to wrestle with ambition, ego, ambivalence and inheritance. That isolation has, historically, been especially true for women artists, some of the most celebrated of whom have seen “writer” or “painter” or “filmmaker” treated as a secondary part of their identity. For this issue, we asked legendary female artists to tell us about a younger woman whose work excites them and gives them hope. But for the current generation of women artists, who have come of age with models who more closely resemble them, identity seems more like a source of community than a trap. Women artists, born into a Babylon of exclusion and possibility, reveal that creative inheritance is as promiscuous as legal inheritance is strict.

☆ A Fidelity fund manager who's beaten 93% of competitors in the past 5 years shares his strategy for delivering upside while avoiding painful selloffs — and explains how he finds 'mispriced growth' sto
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-16 | by ( James Faris | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +5 min

The Fidelity Puritan Fund has dominated in the past five years under Dan Kelley. Here's how the portfolio manager finds underpriced growth stocks that are still high quality. Meanwhile, about half of the fund's bonds are US Treasuries, and just 11.5% are high-yield. How to find mispriced growth in marketsWhen looking for stocks, Kelley said his focus is on finding "mispriced growth" companies, which is similar to what many fund managers call "growth at a reasonable price," or GARP. That's the same mindset that's kept the Fidelity Puritan Fund going for nearly eight decades.

Mohawk Industries — Shares of the flooring manufacturer gained 5% after Loop Capital upgraded the company to buy from its previous hold rating. WisdomTree — Shares of the financial firm gained 3% after the company said it had $1.9 billion of net flows in March. New York Community Bancorp — Shares of the regional bank gained 2.7% after Jefferies upgraded the stock to buy from hold. LendingClub — The lending stock gained 5% after JPMorgan initiated coverage of the stock at overweight. Murphy Oil — The natural gas company's shares gained 2.6% after Truist upgraded shares to buy from hold.

☆ Bank of America gives its best investing plays for the start of a recession
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-10 | by ( Jeff Cox | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +2 min

Investors need to prepare as signs build that a recession is coming, according to Bank of America strategist Michael Hartnett. The "drumbeat of recession [is] getting ever louder," the investment strategist said in his weekly "Flow Show" note that looks at where money is moving. Hartnett's "best plays for start of recession" include Treasury bills, which he said outperform until the Federal Reserve starts cutting rates. In this case, Hartnett likes that play in anticipation that the Federal Reserve likely will have to begin easing as unemployment rises later in the year. And, of course, nothing lasts forever, so Hartnett advises investors to prepare a "shopping list" of things to buy when conditions change.

☆ Analysis: Gloomy U.S. bank sector could yield payoff for contrarian options bets
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-10 | by ( Saqib Iqbal Ahmed | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +4 min

While the S&P 500 index (.SPX) has advanced 6% since mid-March, when the failure of Silicon Valley Bank (SVB) sparked tumult in the banking sector, investors have been more wary of financial stocks. The S&P 500 Banks Group (.SPXBK) is up just 3% from its March low and remains down 14% for the year. The pervasive gloom around financial stocks has increased the cost for investors betting on more downside while making it relatively inexpensive to bet on a rebound. For investors who believe financial earnings and guidance will come in better than expected, Elevation Securities recommended buying Financial Select Sector SPDR Fund (XLF.P) call options at the 33 strike. "Given how beaten up bank stocks are, buying calls into earnings can make sense," said Michael Purves, chief executive officer at Tallbacken Capital Advisors.

☆ A stock trader who's returned 2,700% in the last 3 years shares the 3 indicators he uses as his guides to buy and sell
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-08 | by ( Laila Maidan | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +9 min

He notes the price points on limit orders from the level 2 data table. But all of the education couldn't have prepared him for the stress of being a stock trader who couldn't afford to lose on his bets. It shows limit orders that have been placed at certain price points. Price points with large order sizes on the "bids" could indicate that there is potential support in that area. Since other traders also review this table, it could become a self-fulfilling prophecy by which many traders act on these price points.

☆ Goldman Sachs loves these stocks, but the rest of Wall Street hates them
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-06 | by ( Yun Li | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +1 min

Finding opportunities in this tricky stock market is no easy task, and Goldman Sachs thinks it might be worth looking at these unloved gems with great potential. The Wall Street bank identified a slew of stocks where its analysts are bullish but most of the Street gave either a neutral or sell rating. These stocks with buy ratings from Goldman analysts have at least 10% upside, based on their price target, and the firm's earnings estimates for these companies are at least 2% above consensus. "These names appear underappreciated by the market and could generate alpha for investors with a contrarian view," Goldman said. Ride sharing giant Lyft is also widely hated by Wall Street, except for Goldman.

☆ This low volatility ETF is ripe for a rebound, UBS says
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-29 | by ( Jesse Pound | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +2 min

David Perlman, an ETF strategist at the bank, said in a note to clients that UBS added the Invesco S & P 500 Low Volatility ETF (SPLV) to its list of favorite exchange traded funds. The SPLV, which holds the 100 stocks in the S & P 500 with the lowest realized volatility over the past 12 months, was rebalanced in February and now holds sizeable positions in some of UBS's favorite sectors. Notably, this suggestion means that UBS is calling for investors to ignore what has worked in 2023 so far. The fund has outperformed the S & P 500 over the past year, with a loss of 6% on a total return basis versus down 10.9% for the SPDR S & P 500 ETF, even when accounting for SPLV's 0.25% expense ratio and its poor first quarter. UBS removed several energy funds from its list of preferred ETFs, including the iShares U.S. Oil & Gas Exploration & Production ETF (XOP) .

☆ ConocoPhillips CEO Doubles Down on Alaska Oil as Competitors Leave Arctic
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-26 | by ( Benoît Morenne | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

ConocoPhillips CEO Ryan Lance has a contrarian strategy of drilling wells that will yield oil for decades. ConocoPhillips Chief Executive Ryan Lance was only a budding oilman when he first set foot in Alaska. Nearly four decades later, his company reigns supreme over the U.S. Arctic. With most of its competitors abandoning the state, ConocoPhillips is forging ahead with drilling there, emboldened by President Biden’s approval this month of a robust, new project.

☆ Investor pessimism is reaching extremes, and that may be good for markets
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-21 | by ( Bob Pisani | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +2 min

The monthly Bank of America Global Fund Manager Survey shows "investor sentiment close to levels of pessimism seen at lows of past 20 years," according to the survey. This pessimism is consistent with other investor sentiment surveys. The weekly AAII Investor Sentiment Survey, out last Thursday, was at a 6-month low for bullish sentiment and close to the levels of last September, which were near historic lows. Two rules about sentiment indicators: 1) they are contrarian indicators, and 2) they are most useful when the readings are at extremes (as they are now). The firm also noted that other sentiment indicators (money flows, private clients' asset allocation) are not yet in "capitulation" territory.

☆ A day trader who returned 380% in 2022 explains why he's keeping his portfolio entirely in cash right now — and how shorting crypto in the face of a recession could lead to another big windfall
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-17 | by ( Lisa Kailai Han | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +4 min

Mark Szemeszki returned 380% last year by getting into the oil trade and by shorting bitcoin. On a recent podcast, Szemeszki shared the macroeconomic indicators he tracks for his trades. He also explained why he's currently 100% in cash — but why shorting altcoins could soon make sense. But whenever an occasion arises where this correlation inverts, he'll short altcoins as their prices begin to relatively increase. "I always try to position it so even though in the short term I may not be right, in the long term I will be right eventually," he explained.

☆ N.C.A.A. Bracket Picks: Where Fans and Experts Diverge
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-15 | by ( Josh Katz | Alice Fang | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +8 min

One avenue is examining the differences between the forecasts of mathematical models and the collective choices of fans. For example, fans are much more likely to have Kansas and Alabama in the Final Four than the experts. The table below shows an aggregate view of the difference between the public’s picks and those of forecasting models. But if you pick the same teams as everyone else, your bracket will look the same, too, something you should consider. There is no guarantee that this approach will work, of course, and part of the draw of the N.C.A.A.

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