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
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
Mad Hedge Technology Letter
May 18, 2020
Fiat Lux
Featured Trade:
(CHINA’S BIG SEMICONDUCTOR PLAY),
(SMH), (SOXX), (DOCU), (AKAM), (NVDA), (AMD), (XLNX)
We received a convincing data point as to why we trade cloud companies and not the semiconductor chips.
The rift between blacklisted telecom equipment giant Huawei Technologies and the U.S. administration has had a dramatic side-effect on the business models of U.S. chip companies.
The U.S. commerce department now will require licenses for sales to Huawei of semiconductors made abroad with U.S. technology signaling more turbulent times ahead.
Huawei is the Chinese smartphone maker and telecom provider who has stolen intellectual property from the West and used mammoth subsidies funded by the Chinese communist party to build itself into one of the premier telecom equipment sellers and number two maker of smartphones in the world.
I seldom issue trade alerts on semiconductor chip companies because I'd rather not compete with the Chinese communist party and their capital funding capacity.
China is hellbent on subsidizing its own chip capacity as many Western chip companies are blocked from doing deals with them.
A recent example is the Chinese communist party injecting $2.25 billion into a Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corp. wafer plant to ramp up development in the sector.
To read about this, click here.
Exploiting the economic freedom and laws of the West has worked out perfectly for Chinese tech enabling them to develop juggernauts like Tencent and Baidu.
In fact, state-sponsored hacking of Western intellectual property is not considered a malicious activity in China.
There is the Chinese notion that everything is fair game in business and war and protecting company secrets falls on the shoulders of the cybersecurity sector.
To read more about the fallout in the West from China’s aggressive trade strategy, click here.
The concept that you should only blame yourself if you allow your secrets to get stolen prevails in China.
The consequences are impactful with U.S. chip companies suffering large drops in revenue without notice.
Leading up to the coronavirus, chip companies experienced a revenue slide of 12% in 2019 to $412 billion largely due to the trade war.
An example is Xilinx Inc. (XLNX) who will fire 7% of its workforce citing lower revenue from Huawei and delayed adoption of superfast 5G networks.
Along with the West getting smacked by the trade war, the ripple effect of increased uncertainty and guide-downs across the semiconductor supply stems from China’s economy being hit even worse than the U.S. economy.
There are no winners here and it will be a hard slog back from the nadir.
Either way, the sabre-rattling doesn’t stop here and each tweet and counterpunch will cause heightened volatility in chip shares.
Then consider that the existence of supply chains will most likely uproot, and we got indication of that type of activity with Taiwan Semiconductor’s (TSM) announcement to build a new chip factory in Phoenix.
To read more about this impactful deal then click here.
This would have never happened during prior administrations where all manufacturing was offshored to China.
As it stands, China has been circumventing existing U.S. law to clampdown chip sales by buying U.S. chips from 3rd party channels.
Once many of the supply chains come back, it will be almost impossible for Chinese to procure those same chips.
The Taiwan semiconductor manufacturing facility in Arizona will ultimately employ 1,600 high-tech workers.
Building is slated for 2021 with production targeted to begin in 2024.
Moving forward, the U.S. administration will make it implausible for many U.S. chip companies to offshore using the reasons of national security and domestic job demand to ensure that many factories are rerouted back to U.S. shores.
The boom and bust nature of chip companies make for treacherous spikes and drops in share prices.
The insane volatility is why I stay away from them as the Mad Hedge Technology Letter mainly opts for short-term options trades.
Nvidia (NVDA) and AMD (AMD) are great individual chip stocks that I would encourage readers to buy and hold.
Another option is to just park your money in the semi ETF VanEck Vectors Semiconductor ETF (SMH) or iShares PHLX Semiconductor ETF (SOXX).
On the flip side, cloud stock’s backbone of recurring monthly revenue is just too savory.
The constant cash flow with minimal international risk along with pristine balance sheets is what makes U.S. cloud companies top on the list of trade alert candidates.
That won’t stop anytime soon as the pandemic has offered us more conviction into the moat between cloud stocks and the rest of technology.
I apologize if I sound like a broken record, but I love my Akamai’s (AKAM) and DocuSign’s (DOCU), they have the growth portfolio that backs up my thesis.
Buy cloud stocks on the dip.
“If you are a big company, a big website, and lots of users come to your website, you will have attacks, and you have to deal with that.” – Said Founder and CEO of Baidu Robin Li
With the market popping this morning, IQ is trading to the upside.
I am going to suggest you book the profit on the stock.
This is primarily because they report this afternoon and I would prefer not to have an adverse earnings report work against the position.
Sell IQ at the market, which is $18.17.
The gain on the stock will be $219, if you traded the suggested 300 share lot.
If you add in the call premium collected, the overall return will be 6% for 10 days.
Global Market Comments
May 18, 2020
Fiat Lux
Featured Trade:
(MARKET OUTLOOK FOR THE WEEK AHEAD, or THE MARKET IS BRACKETED)
(SPY), (TLT), (VIX), (DIS)
We are all living the Bill Murray movie “Groundhog Day” over and over again. Every day seems to blend seamlessly into the next, ad infinitum.
I think it’s Monday, but I’m not sure. The stock market is open so that must mean it’s Monday to Friday. The trash goes out tomorrow, so it might be Tuesday. No, wait! CBS 60 Minutes was on last night, so it has to be Monday. Maybe.
When a Marine Corp 60mm mortar team zeros in on a target, it is said to be “bracketed.” No matter which way the enemy goes, he gets blown up.
The S&P 500 is now “bracketed”.
If it falls, the support of the free Fed put option kicks in to limit the damage via QE infinity. If the market tries to rally, it is capped by the worst economic data in history, last week joined by a new trade war with China.
Who is the enemy that gets destroyed in this military metaphor? Anyone betting on an imminent upside or downside breakout, especially those who are long the Volatility Index (VIX).
That means the thousands who follow the Mad Hedge Fund Trader have just been given a money-printing machine, a new rich uncle.
For every time the market rallies, you simply buy a vertical bear put option spread in the front month with strikes prices well outside the bracketed area as I did last week with (DIS). When it dives, you strap on vertical bull call spreads, as I did last week with the (DIS) and the (SPY). Then you laugh all the way to the bank.
We could be bracketed a long time. The early data from opening-up states is that consumers returning to stores only amounts to a ruinous 7% of pre-pandemic levels. That suggests the Unemployment Rate will soar to 30% or more before it peaks, exceeding the Great Depression apex. There are easily another 10 million that haven’t been counted yet because the state benefit processors are so slow.
However, as long as we are bracketed, I reckon I can make 10% a month, as I already have done from the Middle of April and in May.
It is not a riskless strategy.
The day an actual vaccine is announced, the market Dow Average could soar by 3,000 points in a day, wiping out the shorts. The White House has been declaring this on a daily basis. But until we get a vaccine the market believes, we will remain bracketed. That could take years, if ever.
Dr. Fauci triggered a 1,000-point market dive with his sobering analysis of the course of the pandemic in the coming months. Don’t count on going back to school in the fall.
No “V” for the economy, said the Fed. The job losses are a complete economic disaster that will take years to recover from. That’s the opinion of Minneapolis Federal Reserve Bank President Neel Kashkari. The president just said Corona deaths will reach 100,000. Buzzkill. Do you think the stock market will notice?
Fed funds futures are discounting negative interest rates in a year. They say they don’t want negative rates but may not have a choice. The markets may go there without them. The disruptions to the financial service will be enormous. Do you really want to pay the bank to deposit your hard-earned money?
Fed Governor Powell warns the worst is yet to come, and the need for more stimulus is paramount. However, negative interest rates which failed in Europe and Japan won’t work here either. The problem is rampant fear, not the overnight cost of funds.
Weekly Jobless Claims are still soaring, up 3 million on the week to 36.5 million. It’s going to get worse before it gets better. The Fed is targeting a peak of 36.5 million. Connecticut is the worst-performing state, California the best.
Stan Druckenmiller says stocks are the most overvalued in his career, says my former client, one of the best traders in the market. My friend David Tepper says they’re the most expensive since 1999. It may be splitting hairs, but how much do you want to own here? Keep those shorts!
Another death knell for US Treasury bonds (TLT) as the April budget deficit soars to $738 billion. That is an $8.85 trillion annual rate. Overissuance is about to destroy deflation big time.
Retail Sales collapse by 16.4%, the worst on record in another Great Depressionary data release. The stock market is starting to lean towards a view that the economy will take years to recover, not months. I’m somewhere in the middle.
A new trade war with China heats up, with the president banning more export items, especially chips for telecom giant Huawei. I guess our economy isn’t bad enough. Knock another few thousand off the Dow.
When we come out on the other side of this, we will be perfectly poised to launch into my new American Golden Age, or the next Roaring Twenties. With interest rates at zero, oil at $0 a barrel, and many stocks down by three quarters, there will be no reason not to. The Dow Average will rise by 400% or more in the coming decade.
My Global Trading Dispatch performance had another fabulous week, up an awesome +11.26%, and blasting us up to a new eleven-year all-time high of 20%. It has been one of the most heroic performance comebacks of all time.
My aggressive short bond positions gave back some money on the ‘RISK OFF” posture for the week. However, we offset those losses and a lot more on longs in bonds and shorts in the (SPY) and Walt Disney (DIS).
That takes my 2020 YTD return up to +7.29%. That compares to a loss for the Dow Average of -16.89%. My trailing one-year return exploded to 48.47%. My eleven-year average annualized profit returned to +34.59%.
The only numbers that count for the market are the number of US Coronavirus cases and deaths, which you can find here.
On Monday, May 18 at 10:00 AM, the NAHB Housing Market Index for May is released.
On Tuesday, May 19 at 8:30 AM, US Housing Starts for April are printed. Home Depot (HD) and Walmart (WMT) report.
On Wednesday, May 20, at 10:30 AM, weekly EIA Crude Oil Stocks are published. Target (TGT) and Lowes (LOW) report.
On Thursday, May 21 at 8:30 AM, Weekly Jobless Claims are announced. NVIDIA (NVDA) reports.
On Friday, May 22, the Baker Hughes Rig Count follows at 2:00 PM. Alibaba (BABA) reports.
As for me, I am headed back up to Incline Village, NV, a town completely free of Covid-19. The village is thinking of barring entry to all non-residents. Maybe it’s the fresh air.
Stay healthy.
John Thomas
CEO & Publisher
The Diary of a Mad Hedge Fund Trader
While the Diary of a Mad Hedge Fund Trader focuses on investment over a one week to a six-month time frame, Mad Day Trader, provided by Bill Davis, will exploit money-making opportunities over a brief ten minute to three-day window. It is ideally suited for day traders, but can also be used by long-term investors to improve market timing for entry and exit points. Read more
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