When John identifies a strategic exit point, he will send you an alert with specific trade information as to what security to sell, when to sell it, and at what price. Most often, it will be to TAKE PROFITS, but, on rare occasions, it will be to exercise a STOP LOSS at a predetermined price to adhere to strict risk management discipline. Read more
Global Market Comments
June 19, 2018
Fiat Lux
Featured Trade:
(REPORT FROM AMERICA)
Mad Hedge Technology Letter
June 19, 2018
Fiat Lux
Featured Trade:
(TRAVIS IS BACK!),
(UBER), (RDFN), (Z), (LEN), (CRM), (MSFT), (AAPL)
The country is positive about the economy, nervous about the stock market, horrified about what's coming out of Washington, and universally opposed to a trade war. It is prospering, but most people are carefully looking over both shoulders, biting their nails over how soon it all will end.
That is my takeaway from the Mad Hedge Fund Trader 2018 Spring U.S. Road Show, where I traveled around the country listening to subscribers, individual investors, hedge fund managers, portfolio managers, and financial advisors.
My Global Strategy Luncheons gave guests a welcome respite from the week's never-ending freak show of the G7 meltdown, the Singapore photo ops, a Fed interest rate rise, and the latest immigration atrocity.
The markets cooperated nicely for the week, with the Mad Hedge Trade Alert Service up four out of five days. That took my trailing 12-month performance up to 61.12%, a new decade high. It was a week of listening to tales of mortgages and student loans paid off, second homes and third cars paid for, and life changes.
Fortunately, I take adulation well. In fact, I can take that all week long.
It is also looking like we'll get a good turnout this year at the Mad Hedge Lake Tahoe Conference on October 26-27 (click here for the link).
I visited Fort Worth, TX; New Orleans, LA; Washington, DC; Philadelphia, PA; New York, NY; and Denver, CO, and a lot of places in between. It all gave me a great 30,000-foot view on the state of the country in general and the risks posed to your retirement portfolio specifically.
What follows is not as anything as grand as a broad unified view nor as micro as a Trade Alert but a series of random observations, thoughts, and impressions.
When I first hitchhiked my way through downtown Fort Worth, TX, during the 1960s, it was nothing better than a deteriorating slum. Today, it is an art deco architectural masterpiece, reborn through billions of dollars' worth of Bass Brothers investment.
When I visited the Kimbell Art Museum I found a van Gogh worth at least $50 million donated by a Bass spouse. I thought "Damn, if only had done that trade that would be my name on that donation, not theirs."
At my New Orleans luncheon I dined with one of the most knowledgeable oil players I ever have met. Venezuela is the next failed state, and 1.5 million barrels a day of Texas tea isn't coming back to the market anytime soon. That is a headache for the many south coast refineries built specifically to process their heavy crude.
Of course, Bourbon Street at night is always an eye-opener, with strippers casually flaunting their wares and the tourists eating it all up. It seems to be getting bigger, more neon lights, and more gaudy every year. The crawfish gumbo at Antoine's is to die for as usual, the city's oldest restaurant.
During my free hour, I ran through The National WWII museum, which my uncle helped open 15 years ago. I spent the most time in the "Solomon Victory Theater" section, where both my father and my uncle fought on Guadalcanal and took the photo below of the plaque describing Mitch's Medal of Honor citation.
In fact, many visitors were there honoring long dead fathers, grandfathers, and uncles, and great aunts who served. It was all very inspirational, showing the greatness the country can achieve when we all pull together.
I landed late in Washington DC and decided to drive past the White House, which is beautiful at night bathed in light. After circling the block several times, Google Maps said it was right in front of me, but I couldn't see it.
It was only when I stopped the car that I realized that while every other government building was brightly illuminated, the White House was totally blacked out. This hasn't happened since 9/11. I guess I have to believe the Secret Service when they tell me that death threats are up 400%.
After a fabulous Chesapeake Bay crab chowder, I visited the Naval Academy at Annapolis where I had to make a brief stop for some government work. Seeing the young midshipmen walking briskly to classes in their starched white uniforms wistfully reminded me of my youth.
I made the biggest mistake of my life when I was accepted here (my dad was politically very well connected) but didn't attend because it was politically unpopular during the Vietnam War.
It was a battle getting to my Philadelphia lunch on time since the rural Maryland speed limit is only 55 miles per hour. Still, it was a joy seeing all those bright red barns and sagging farmhouses.
At one point, Google Maps humorously had me on a freeway that wasn't built yet, it still clogged with earth movers and Caterpillar tractors. Once across the state line into Pennsylvania, the speed limit rose to 65, but the traffic slowed to 30.
The Union League Club in the City of Brotherly Love is a spectacular Victorian red brick edifice run by an ebullient retired Marine master sergeant. I was gratified to learn that everyone around the table had earned 50% a year from my Trade Alerts, some for many years.
One guest was the chief scientist for The Seeing Eye, the chief provider of guide dogs for the blind, who said he had been bitten 2,000 times during his career.
Driving out of town I paused at the Barnes Foundation to visit the world's largest private collection of Renoir's. I reckoned the massive collection of early blue period Picasso's, van Gogh's, Matisse's, Gauguin's, and Monet's was worth at least $1 billion a room, and there were a lot of rooms. I have been trying to get into this private collection for 45 years, and it only recently opened to the public.
Coming in from New Jersey, the Big Apple still looks incomplete to me missing its Twin Towers, even though it's been 17 years.
New York City is more crowded than ever, and it is now almost impossible to get cross town during the day. I had to jump out of cabs and run the last few blocks to make appointments with the big hedge funds. Hamilton has mercifully run its course, with ticket prices finally under $1,000, and a revival of Hello Dolly now taking the Great White Way by storm.
Leaving town was a headache. The Uber cab took 1 1/2 hours to JFK. Then after we left the terminal, the captain announced there were 30 planes ahead of us awaiting takeoff. We didn't leave the ground for 90 minutes.
I couldn't understand why I had such great difficulty getting a hotel reservation in Denver two months in advance. When I arrived, I found out why. The Mile High City was hosting both Gay Pride Week and Comecon on the same weekend attracting 200,000 visitors.
The lobby of the Sheraton was packed with groups of women holding hands with women and men holding hands with men, mixing with groups of lightsaber wielding Wookiee's, Darth Vader's, and Princess Leia's.
Only in America.
My Uber driver told me that the bloom was off the rose for the marijuana boom, legalized only in 2012. Wages for retail pot sellers had made the round trip from $8 an hour to $80, then back to $8.
Big money from out of town has turned it into a low-margin high-volume business with market share going to the lowest cost provider. Prices are collapsing. Companies don't bother to drug test anymore since no one can pass, but drunk driving convictions are down 25%.
Getting out of town was yet another nightmare. The Sheraton promised to buy me a new suitcase after the bell desk broke the handle off mine. Traffic was horrendous. United Airlines (UAL) threatened to bump me off an overbooked flight unless I upgraded my seat, a sympathetic Marine infantryman's wife in customer support making sure I made the flight.
I made it back home in time for Father's Day where I received my breakfast in bed "Best Dad in the Galaxy T-Shirt." With five kids versus the national average of 1.7, I am doing my part to save America.
I can't wait for the 2018 European Road Show to start in two weeks. Is anyone from a city I missed interested in a Mad Hedge Fund Trader 2018 FALL U.S. Road Show?
Travis Kalanick is back in full force after his Uber fiasco.
His creation kicked him to the curb preferring a more rigid approach to corporate governance as the 2019 IPO draws closer.
It didn't take much time for him to take stock of his piggy bank.
Yes, the $1.4 billion payout he received means he has nothing to do with Uber anymore.
Some piggy bank.
Travis intends to wield this wad aggressively using his new fund "10100" as his finance vehicle to pounce on hot, new tech names.
Travis doesn't know any other way, and investors should be alert to where he turns to find his new Uber and his new baby.
Future foes should understand Kalanick is one of the most feared disruptors on the face of the earth.
He co-founded Uber in 2009 growing it into the premier transportation platform.
The whirlwind few years launched him from a nobody to one of the premier tech names in Silicon Valley.
So, what's the deal?
What I can tell you is that house prices are about to get a whole lot pricier and there is nothing you can do about it.
Travis Kalanick's investment into house flipping app Opendoor will be the first stage of a torrential stampede of tech capital flowing into this sector.
More importantly, it's a sign of intent by Kalanick.
The real estate industry is the unequivocal prehistoric dinosaur that hasn't changed for decades.
It's almost a matter of time before the process of buying a house becomes digitized, either partially or fully.
Remember, Uber functions as a broker app matching drivers and passengers through a platform built on algorithmic software.
It would make logical sense for tech companies to attack the low-hanging fruit - meaning every industry that places brokers at the heart of business.
The broker app software is tried and tested with a gold stamp of approval. It works, and tech executives understand how to monetize the data.
Traditional brokers would get pummeled in this scenario, as the data applied to a new real estate broker app would eclipse anything a real human would be able to accomplish removing human error.
Real estate is next on disruption pecking order, and tech is coming for its bacon because of the huge sums of money associated with American real estate.
The real estate industry is not a scooter sharing business and requires boat loads of money to get ahead.
Tech has the cash but needs to figure out execution and its future road map.
The bulk of tech capital has been funneled into M&A that has seen tech companies pay multiples above what were guessed as fair value.
Share buybacks have been another hot source of investment.
Opendoor is a house-flipping firm intent on changing the status quo.
The business model entails snapping up distress properties, fixing them up, and selling them for a profit.
Opendoor receives a 6% commission for facilitating this whole process.
Opendoor has already served 20,000 customers saving more than 400,000 of prep time.
It is already on the hook for $1.5 billion in loans. SoftBank's vision fund is knocking on the door eager to become the next investor.
In 2016, this company was valued at $1 billion and after the latest round of financing giving Opendoor another $325 million, that number has crept up to $2 billion.
I have heard from solid sources that the SoftBank capital could be delivered in the next few months, likely paying another solid premium boosting tech valuations across the board.
Paying up has been a universal theme in 2018.
Microsoft's (MSFT) purchase of GitHub and Salesforce's (CRM) purchase of MuleSoft seem like overpaying but appear cheap in hindsight.
With the new cash ready to deploy, Opendoor seeks to expand to 50 cities by 2020, a swift upward jolt from its current 10 cities.
Not only will tier 1 cities feel the brunt of this new development, Opendoor plans to go into the lesser known cities and plans to double its staff from 650 to 1,300 in the upcoming year.
Kalanick caught onto this investment opportunity after one of his former Uber minions, Gautam Gupta, made the jump to Opendoor as COO and liaised CEO Eric Wu with Kalanick to hash out a deal.
It's nice to have friends in high places as Kalanick knows very well.
Even traditional home builders are getting in on the venture capitalist act.
Lennar was one of the investors in the latest round of Opendoor investment, underscoring the existential threat these traditional companies face.
It makes more sense to partner now and form a budding relationship than get utterly wiped out down the road.
Uber hopes to deploy this strategy with Waymo as Kalanick's former company knows it will never possess superior self-driving technology over Waymo.
The Lennar investment also gave Jon Jaffe, the COO of home builder Lennar, a seat on Opendoor's board.
Opendoor is the first serious tech foray into the housing business. It is initiating business on the periphery by focusing on fixer uppers.
This will allow Opendoor to cut its teeth and learn more about the industry before it migrates into higher margin business such as downtown condos that Millennials love.
A swift migration of other tech names will briskly follow into this undisrupted industry if Opendoor can pry open its floodgates.
Fixing up distressed houses is the gateway into brokering and the holy grail of constructing.
Tech could eventually wipe out everyone and control the whole process just like what investors have seen in the transportation industry.
I can imagine a future where tech companies will be the best firms to construct smart houses, which all houses will eventually become.
One massive aftereffect is that the average quality of housing will rise dramatically in all metropolitan areas.
Once the data amasses, Opendoor will be able to identify every property from where it can extract value allowing America to transform into a nation of pristine, smart houses.
Renovating a house and selling it will boost the prices of current houses.
Effectively, tech with gentrify housing creating higher quality but higher priced properties.
Millennials, who have had an awful time jumping on the property ladder, will have an even more difficult task finding a starter home if every starter house turns into a beautiful Tuscan-styled villa from a shabby shed.
Vice-versa, beautiful Tuscan-styled villas that cannot be "flipped" will become smart homes creating even more demand for IoT smart products and higher prices per square foot.
Andreessen Horowitz, a venture capitalist firm based in Menlo Park, California, has been one of the avant-garde tech investors seizing stakes in Twitter, Facebook, Skype, Coinbase, and Lyft.
And these were just some of its investments before 2014!
An industry where Travis Kalanick, SoftBank, and Andreesen Horowitz are piling in must have real estate agents shivering in their wake.
If the general trend keeps up, the Oracle of Omaha Warren Buffett could be next on this powerful list.
He usually likes to buy things he understands with healthy cash flow. I am sure he understands real estate more than Apple (AAPL), in which he had no problem investing.
Traditional home builders and real estate agents aren't the only players that could be left in the dust.
Zillow (Z), the online real estate database company, reacting from the Opendoor threat launched its new business to buy and sell homes.
It was only three years ago that Zillow CEO Spencer Rascoff determinedly hunkered down telling investors "we sell ads, not houses."
Innovation, tech disruption, and competition changes everything.
The stock sold off hard due to the exorbitant costs related to buying homes on the announcement of buying and selling houses.
Margins will get massacred in this scenario, but I applaud the decision to move up higher on the value chain diminishing the existential threat.
This whole industry is about to be flipped on its head, and the winners will be the most innovative companies that incorporate data best.
Rascoff further expanded saying, "I can say without exaggeration, that no company understands the American homebuyer and home seller better than Zillow Group."
Zillow is 12 years old and the12-year treasury trove of data will give it an optimal chance to pivot from selling ads to buying and selling houses.
Seattle-based Redfin (RDFN), Zillow's arch nemesis competitor founded in 2004, has an even larger treasure trove of data dating back 14-plus years and has moved in the same direction.
Redfin was anointed the top tech company to work for in Seattle in 2017 by Hired.com.
There is enormous potential to add another monstrous business to Redfin and Zillow's top line.
The real estate industry is next in line to be digitized, and the Mad Hedge Technology Letter will be the first to know when it's time to dip your toe in.
_________________________________________________________________________________________________
Quote of the Day
"As a tech entrepreneur, I try to push the limits. Pedal to the metal," - said former cofounder of Uber Travis Kalanick.
"Luck helped me every day of my life. And I'd rather be lucky than smart 'cause a lot of smart people ain't eatin' regular," said wildcatting oil pioneer Sid Richardson about his success in business.
Global Market Comments
June 18, 2018
Fiat Lux
Featured Trade:
(TEN REASONS WHY APPLE IS STILL GOING TO $220),
(AAPL)
Here it is mid-June, and Apple is already closing in on my 2018 target of $200. Indeed, with a market capitalization today of $930 billion, Apple is on the verge of becoming the world's first $1 trillion publicly traded company.
And here's the really great thing about this year for Apple bulls. If you had the right cajones you had a chance to load the boat just above $150 only five weeks ago.
Now for the good news. The best is yet to come. In fact, there are 10 reasons why Apple shares should hit my lofty target sometime this year.
1) Share buybacks are first and foremost. With $280 billion worth of cash in the bank abroad, and two thirds of that committed to buy back Apple stock, shareholders essentially have a free put option.
Indeed, you could see the company's invisible hand in the marketplace during the recent correction, soaking up shares at every opportunity. We won't learn the true numbers until the next quarterly earnings report in August.
2) Valuation is still the overwhelming factor driving institutions into Apple stock. With a price earnings multiple of 18X and a dividend yield of 1.40%, Apple is trading not only at a discount to the main market, but a discount to most of tech as well. No one ever got fired for buying Apple, at least not recently.
3) Apple's sales are as good as ever. The expected draw down in between new phone launches is proving less than expected. All of the channel checks suggesting a bigger drop have proved unfounded.
4) The rest of technology is on fire. Even if Apple was stumbling now, which it isn't, it would get dragged up by the meteoric moves seen in the rest of the FANGs.
5) The administration's nixing of the Broadcom (AVGO) takeover of QUALCOMM (QCOM), protects the principal supply of propriety chips for Apple phones safe from foreign interference. Broadcom could have chopped the research budget or transferred crucial technology to foreign competitors.
6) Apple is broadening its product lines, shifting to a new business model that delivers multiple new phones at the same time. This will include low-priced models that will compete in new markets such as India, as well as go head to head with the market share leaders, Samsung. This will increase market share and profitability.
7) While Apple possesses only 8% of the global cell phone market, it accounts for a staggering 92% of cell phone profits. Apple effectively has a monopoly on cell phone profits.
8) Its new lease program promises to deliver a faster upgrade cycle that will allow higher premium prices for its products and demand more phones. That will bring larger profits.
9) Apple continues to inexorably move into new products and services. While the company was late with the HomePod to compete against Amazon's (AMZN) Alexa and Alphabet's (GOOGL) Google Home, integration with the rest of the Apple ecosystem will enable the company to have the last laugh. Watch out for Apple Pay. Health care is another big target area.
10) Standards of living are rising worldwide. And guess what the first thing a newly enriched middle class does around the planet? They dump their Samsung Galaxies and Google Androids and join the iPhone club for the enhanced status alone.
I Hear Apple is Diversifying
Mad Hedge Technology Letter
June 18, 2018
Fiat Lux
Featured Trade:
(DON'T WORRY ABOUT THE BATS),
(BIDU), (BABA), (AMZN), (AAPL), (MGI), (NVDA), (AMD), (GOOGL), (FB)
The Chinese BATs (Baidu, Alibaba, and Tencent) are China's response to the American FANG group.
It's one of few sectors outperforming the vigorous American tech sector, and valuations have soared in the past year.
Former English teacher Jack Ma founded the Amazon (AMZN) of China named Alibaba in April 1999, which has grown to become one of the biggest websites on the Internet.
This company even has a massive cloud division that acts in the same way as Amazon Web Services (AWS).
Alibaba also has Alipay on its roster, the fintech and digital payments subsidiary of Alibaba.
Baidu, led by Robin Li, is the de-facto Google search of China and is entirely tailored for the Chinese market without English language support.
Tencent, created by Ma Huateng, has an assortment of businesses from social media, instant messaging, online gaming, and digital payments.
Tencent's WeChat platform is the lynchpin acting as the gateway to the robust Tencent eco-system.
The BATs have heavily invested in autonomous vehicle technology set to roll out in the coming years.
These companies are some of the biggest venture capitalists in the world throwing around capital like Masayoshi Son's SoftBank.
Alibaba has seen its share price rocket from $135 in June 2017 to $206.
Baidu has also seen huge gyrations in its share price elevating from $174 in June 2017 to $270.
Tencent, public on the Hong Kong Hang Seng Index, has gone from $273 HKD (Hong Kong dollars) to $412 HKD.
And this is all just the beginning!
An economy growing a stable 6.5% per year with companies able to scale to a mind-boggling 1.3 billion people is something of which to take notice.
China hopes to wean itself from its industrial heritage betting the ranch on a rapidly expanding tech sector.
Does this put China on a collision course steamrolling toward the American FANGs?
Highly possible but not yet.
Even though the BATs modus operandi has been to follow in the footsteps of the FANG's business model, they do not directly compete.
Ant Financial, the fintech arm of Alibaba, was blocked from purchasing MoneyGram International (MGI), effectively, closing any doors leading to the lucrative American digital payments industry.
This also meant curtains for WeChat, the multi-functional app that half of the Chinese use as a digital wallet, in the digital payments space.
The Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS) has made it crystal clear that BAT's capital will be scrutinized more than ever before because of China's open policy of transferring Western technology expertise to the mainland for the purpose of leading the world in technology.
China cannot have its cake and eat it.
The first stumbling block is that the American market does not suit the BAT's FANG business model with Chinese characteristics.
For example, the only other market Baidu search operates in is Brazil.
It has leveraged itself to the Chinese consumer whose purchasing power has spiked from its burgeoning middle class.
Another headwind is the lack of innovation caused by a rigid education system punishing freedom of thought in favor of rote memorization.
Innovation is American tech's bread and butter and investors pay up for this ingenuity that cannot be found elsewhere in the world.
This is also the reason why the BATs need to buy American technology and not the other way around.
Original concepts such as Uber and Airbnb were made in America first and Didi Chuxing and Tujia are rip-offs of these American companies.
The list is endless.
The BATs understand they cannot go head to head with American talent, but that does not mean they won't win out in the end.
To make matters worse, global tech talents do not want to work in China if they are reliant on America to develop something and copy it.
Why not just go work in Silicon Valley for a higher salary?
This was highlighted when the only tech talent to cross over to the other side quit in a blaze of glory.
Hugo Barra was poached from Alphabet in 2013, where he worked as vice present for the Android mobile operating system.
He was installed as the vice president of international development for smartphone maker Xiaomi, the Apple (AAPL) of China.
Barra suddenly threw in the towel at Xiaomi in 2017, offering a harsh critique stating, "What I've realized is that the last few years of living in such a singular environment have taken a huge toll on my life and started affecting my health."
Not exactly the stamp of approval the Mandarins were looking for.
In turn, China has focused its effort on recruiting Chinese-Americans who understand the working environment better and have roots or even family on the mainland.
The dire tech talent shortage is worse in China than Silicon Valley because Chinese tech companies have zero access to non-Chinese talent.
Even with a reverse in immigration policies by the administration, America continues to be the holy grail of tech jobs.
That is why you see hoards of Chinese, Indians, Russians, and every other country's best and brightest waiting in line to make the move.
Taiwanese American CEOs lead some of Silicon Valley's best companies such as the CEO for Nvidia (NVDA), Jensen Huang, and the CEO of Advanced Micro Devices (AMD), Dr. Lisa Su.
Only 1% of Baidu's revenues is extracted from American soil underscoring the BAT's China-first business model. Tencent isn't much better at 5%, and Alibaba heads the list at 11%.
Compare these statistics with Alphabet (GOOGL) making 53% and Facebook (FB) earning 56% of revenue from international sales.
Amazon is still very much an American business but 32% of revenue comes from international sales.
The bulk of this revenue is mainly from Europe where American large-cap tech companies are staunch mainstays.
China has focused on building out its business in Southeast Asia instead.
Those governments are cozy with Beijing and are willing to relinquish some sovereign influence to develop its poor digital infrastructure.
The nail in the coffin for potential BAT companies doing business in America is the total lack of data protection in China.
If you think what Facebook is doing doesn't make you sleep at night, the BATs are running riot with personal data in China.
Expect multiple attempts of hackers breaking into your email while your phone number is constantly harassed by spam messages and robo-calls galore.
This is a normal day in the life of a Chinese national and they are used to it.
China understands they are not ready to eclipse the juggernaut that is Silicon Valley.
The BATs are biding their time organically growing by investing into American tech firms helping their overall products and services.
The past five years have seen a gorge of American investment amounting to 95 deals totaling $27.6 billion.
However, this smash-and-grab investment party is effectively over because CFIUS has clamped down on exporting local technology.
Consequently, the BATs will continue to focus on what they know best - the Chinese market.
Southeast Asia is also ripe to become the next stomping ground for the BATs. Expect them to dominate in this region for years to come.
The runway is long in domestic China. The 6.5% annual growth is entirely biased toward these three companies to prolong their hearty growth trajectories.
The communist party even has a seat on the board at each of these companies highlighting another area of conflict if these companies dive head into the American market.
Let's just say corporate governance in China is a shell of what it is in America.
One day there could be an all-out battle for tech supremacy, but these Chinese companies would need some assurances they would likely come out on top.
That is hardly the case yet and they make way too much money by copying Silicon Valley.
_________________________________________________________________________________________________
Quote of the Day
"The leader of the market today may not necessarily be the leader tomorrow," - said Tencent founder and CEO Ma Huateng.
