Global Market Comments
April 11, 2022
Fiat Lux
Featured Trade:
(MARKET OUTLOOK FOR THE WEEK AHEAD,
or WATCH OUT FOR THE RECESSION WARNINGS)
(TLT), (TSLA), (FB), (CRSP), (TDOC), (GILD), (EDIT), (SQ), (INDU), (NVDA), (GS)
Global Market Comments
April 11, 2022
Fiat Lux
Featured Trade:
(MARKET OUTLOOK FOR THE WEEK AHEAD,
or WATCH OUT FOR THE RECESSION WARNINGS)
(TLT), (TSLA), (FB), (CRSP), (TDOC), (GILD), (EDIT), (SQ), (INDU), (NVDA), (GS)
Global Market Comments
January 24, 2022
Fiat Lux
Featured Trades:
(MARKET OUTLOOK FOR THE WEEK AHEAD,
or PARACHUTING WITHOUT A PARACHUTE),
(AAPL), (SPY), (MSFT), (TLT), (TBT), (TDOC), (NFLX), (DIS), (VALE), (FCX), (USO), (JPM), (WFC), (BAC), (TSLA), (AMZN), (NVDA)
Mad Hedge Biotech and Healthcare Letter
December 30, 2021
Fiat Lux
Featured Trade:
(“WHOLE-PERSON CARE” IS THE FUTURE OF HEALTHCARE)
(TDOC), (PFE), (BNTX), (MRNA)
Mad Hedge Biotech & Healthcare Letter
March 11, 2021
Fiat Lux
FEATURED TRADE:
(THE TESLA STOCK OF GENETIC TESTING)
(NVTA), (CRSP), (TDOC), (RHHBY), (ILMN), (ABT), (DGX), (ROKU), (SQ), (SHOP), (TSLA)
One of the key things to remember in choosing companies to invest in is their long-term prospects. With these firmly in place, compounding can practically do most of the heavy lifting in the years to come.
Sure. It’s easy to be blinded by hot growth businesses these days—ones that seemingly promise unabated growth forever or those with cheap valuations but with no definitive growth prospects.
That is, you need to find businesses with not only promising prospects but are also trading at reasonable valuations. This requires a delicate balancing act.
With that balance in mind, one of the most obvious trends that fits the bill is to capitalize on the aging populations across the world.
As people age, it will drive higher demand for a myriad of healthcare services and the sector that responds most to this trend is the medical insurance segment.
Among the companies in this industry, I find Anthem (ANTM), UnitedHealth (UNH), and CVS Health (CVS) to bring the most bang for your buck.
While these companies are as fun to talk about as an actuarial table, they offer predictable cash flows and long-term prospects at reasonably priced valuations.
Let’s take Anthem for example.
From a valuation point of view, Anthem has traded hands at roughly 11.5 times its trailing earnings. More impressively, those earnings are estimated to increase by approximately 14.5% clip over the next five years.
That’s a reasonable, if not really cheap, price to pay for a company that’s well-positioned for what the future is expected to bring.
The aging population will also swell the ranks of UnitedHealth, being the largest health insurer in the country with over 14 million members in its Medicare programs.
Among the three, I find CVS the most intriguing.
The problem with this business is that people generally believe it’s only a pharmacy company. The truth is, it’s only one facet of CVS’ business, and, surprisingly, that’s its least profitable sector to date.
During the first six months of 2020, the total revenues of CVS went up 5% year over year to $132 billion.
Meanwhile, revenues of its pharmacy services sector grew by 2% compared to the same period in 2019 while its retails segment increased by 3%.
Notably, the biggest gainer is its healthcare benefits segment with a 6% jump year over year in revenues.
During these six months, CVS increased its medical memberships by 134,000 individuals to add Medicare and Medicaid insurance products.
On top of these, CVS reported that it had administered almost 2 million tests for COVID-19 in July—a number that continued to grow as the pandemic progressed throughout 2020.
Taking cue from the success of companies like Teladoc (TDOC), CVS also invested heavily in telehealth services.
In its second quarter earnings report, the company recorded a 15% increase in the number of its HealthHUB visits for regular members and Aetna cardholders.
This 2021, CVS plans to boost its digital health services by adding more segments like a behavioral support unit.
Overall, CVS has been performing better than its peers despite the pandemic thanks to its efforts on transforming itself into a more affordable healthcare benefits provider.
In fact, the company raked in $4.9 billion in profits in July 2020 alone—a whopping 48% jump from its performance in the previous year over the same period.
Most importantly, CVS is offering a dividend of $0.50 per share. Although the company hasn’t exactly raised this since 2017, it remains a preferable yield of 3.54%. This is way better than the average 1.8% payout from the S&P 500.
Despite all these, CVS is still one of the unpopular stocks among investors today.
All three companies have managed to still make a notable profit and fared relatively well despite the pandemic.
They are also underpriced, trading at roughly 14 times earnings or even less. On top of these, each pays dividends and offers an ROE of at least 11%.
Keep in mind that aging is an unstoppable and undeniable trend.
You’ve heard about the large number of Baby Boomers hitting retirement age, with the last of the roughly 72 million from that generation in the US alone turning 65 by 2030.
By 2034, older adults will outnumber children aged 18 and under. That has never happened in American history.
This isn’t a unique case in the US either.
The same is happening in Europe, where 1 of 5 people is already at least 65 years old. Asia is also expected to experience the same thing within the decade, particularly in South Korea and Singapore.
All three stocks, Anthem, UnitedHealth, and CVS offer reasonable opportunities at their current prices. They actually fit the textbook definition of value stocks. Hence, buying and holding these stocks is one of the most straightforward strategies over the next decade and beyond.
To put it simply, this only means one thing. For investors of these medical insurance stocks, time is literally on your side.
Global Market Comments
June 23, 2020
Fiat Lux
Featured Trade:
(HERE ARE THE FOUR BEST PANDEMIC-INSPIRED TECHNOLOGY TRENDS),
(AMZN), (CHWY), (EBAY), NFLX), (SPOT), (TMUS), (ATVI), (V), (PYPL), (AAPL), (MA), (TDOC), (ISRG), (TMDI)
Global Market Comments
April 20, 2020
Fiat Lux
Featured Trade:
(MARKET OUTLOOK FOR THE WEEK AHEAD, or WHAT’S A FED PUT WORTH?),
(INDU), (SPX), (TLT), (ZM), (TDOC),
(NFLX), (UAL), (WYNN), (CCL)
What is a Fed put worth?
That the question that traders and investors alike are pondering.
If the government had taken no action whatsoever in the face of the Corona pandemic the Dow average would easily be at 15,000 today, if not 12,000.
After all, the economic collapse we have seen has been even greater than the Great Depression. More than 22 million unemployed in four weeks? Back then, the Dow Average fell by 90%.
Enter the Feds.
Throw in $6 trillion in expected fiscal spending and $8-$0 trillion in Federal Reserve stabilization of the money markets and quantitative easing, and it makes a heck of a difference. As a result, the national debt will rocket from $23 trillion to at least $32 trillion by next year, a far faster increase than seen after Pearl Harbor.
Stocks love this.
In the past three weeks, the Dow Average has jumped an eye-popping 35% from 18,000 to over 24,000. We are likely trading at 25 X 2020 earnings, but that is just a guess at best. Nobody knows, with essentially all companies withdrawing guidance. On a valuation basis, stocks are now more expensive than at any time since 1929.
You can be excused for being confused, befuddled, and gob-sacked.
All of this adds up to a value of the Fed put of 9,000 in Dow Average terms, 17,000 in a worst-case scenario, and 27,000 if you want to go back to 1933 share valuations.
Stocks here are now priced for perfection. To buy shares here, you are making the following rosy assumptions:
1) The Corona epidemic is peaking and it is clear sailing from here.
2) Shelters-in-place ends in two weeks.
3) Critical shortages of medical supplies end.
4) US Deaths top out at 60,000 from the current 40,000, the most optimistic White House forecast.
4) Business will immediately bounce back to pre-epidemic levels
5) Domestic and international travel resume immediately
If all of the above take place, then at a stretch, shares are justified at maintaining current levels and will churn sideways from here.
Here is what is more likely:
1) We are nowhere close to a peak, especially in states that never sheltered-in-place, and there could be a secondary peak in the fall. At 2,000 a day, US deaths will easily top 100,000 in a month.
2) Shelters-in-place will extend to June in the most populous states.
3) Medical supply shortages will continue for the indefinite future, with 50 states bidding against each other to buy fake masks from China.
4) Dozens of large companies and perhaps a quarter of the country’s 30 million small businesses will go bankrupt before the recovery begins.
5) There is no sign that domestic and international travels are getting off the runway anytime soon.
If that is the case, then stocks here that are wildly overpriced are due for a retest of the Dow 18,000 and (SPX) 2,400 lows.
No matter what happens, traders should be cognizant of an enormous bifurcation of the market that has taken place.
Stay at Home stocks, like Zoom (ZM), Teladoc (TDOC), and Netflix (NFLX), have spectacularly outperformed the market. Many of these had already been recommended by the Mad Hedge Technology letter and the Mad Hedge Biotech & Healthcare letter because they were leaders in their own technologies (click here).
The problem with these companies is that they are all expensive, in some cases trading at hundreds of times their earnings.
Then there are the Reopening Stocks that will deliver outsized returns once we make it to the downslope of the epidemic. These include United Airlines (UAL), Wynn Hotels (WYNN), and Carnival Cruise Lines (CCL), which we heavily sold short near the market top, and led the recovery of the last three weeks.
The problem with these companies is that they may have to go bankrupt first, or at least accept a heavy government ownership and dilution of existing shareholders before they return to normal.
It’s a quandary that would vex Solomon.
I always tell people, if you want to make an easy, reliable, and safe living, get a job at the Post Office. Avoid the stock market.
OPEC cut oil production by 10 million barrels/day, for two months, and then 8 million barrels a day for the rest of the year. Oil prices plunged anyway to a 20-year low at $18.50 a barrel, as it only puts a small dent in the 34 million barrel a day oversupply. It only postpones the day when many energy companies go bankrupt.
The Economy could be turning on and off for 18 months, believes Fed governor Neil Kashkari. He may be partly right. I am expecting two Coronavirus waves to lead to two shutdowns in the spring and fall, and the stock market may reflect the same. If so, stocks are wildly overpriced here, and the bear market could last another year. Sell shorts, or at least add hedges, and buy the (SDS).
US Budget Deficit to top $3.8 trillion this year, the most since WWII. We were already headed for a monster $1.5 trillion in red ink before the virus hit. Now we are pouring gasoline on the fire. It'sis my worst-case scenario, I had the national debt rising from $23 trillion today to $30 trillion in a decade. It looks like that will happen by next year.
Only 90,000 cleared US airport security in one day, down from a typical 2.2 million, or down 95%. It appears that 90,000 people a day don’t care if they get Covid-19 or have already had it. Some 80% of all flights globally are grounded, with many countries now stranded. With massive debt loads, it is only a question of how soon the big US airlines go bankrupt and how much the government gets to own on the way back up. Don’t buy any airlines no matter how cheap they get.
US Retails Sales collapsed by 8.7% as the paycheck-free economics takes hold. The March Empire State Manufacturing Index crashed to a record low of 78% and March Industrial Production is off 5.4%, the lowest since 1946. The parade of the worst economic data in history has begun. And we go into this with stocks at record high valuations, more expensive than they were in January.
Goldman Sachs says this depression will be four times worse than the Great Recession of 2008-2009, likely falling 35% annualized in Q2. Unemployment will hit 15% or higher, but stocks will not retest the March lows. The bounce back in H2 will be bigger than any seen. It more or less corresponds to my view. They must have some smart people at (GS).
March Homebuilder Confidence brings the biggest crash in history, down 42 points to a reading of only 30. It's the greatest decline since the 35-year history of the index. The last time we were this low was in June 2012. Some 21% of builders are reporting virus disruption.
Housing Starts collapsed a stunning 22.3% in March, the worst one-month figure ever recorded. Social distancing makes open houses impossible. But this will be one sector that leads us out of the depression. There is still a chronic generational housing shortage.
Weekly Jobless Claims topped 5.1 million, taking the grim four-week tally to a staggering 21 million. Out of the frying pan, into the fire.
Gilead Sciences (GILD) drug sent stocks soaring, up 900 points overnight. Its Remdesivir brought rapid recovery in already infected patients at the University of Chicago in a phase three trial. The market is hypersensitive to any good Corona news. Sell into the rally.
China GDP took a 6.8% hit in Q1 as the Corona pandemic takes its toll. Services are recovering faster than manufacturing, which is why the smog has not come back yet. And international trade has ground down to zero. Public transit has been abandoned for private cars. It could be a preview to our own recovery.
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 $18 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 recovered nicely this week, thanks to some frenetic trading. I used the Monday 700-point dive in the market to cover most of my bearish positions and add short-dated longs in Apple (AAPL) and Facebook (FB).
Finally, I dove back into selling short the US bond market on the assumption that unprecedented borrowing will destroy prices.
My short volatility positions (VXX) were hammered again, even though volatility declined on the week. There seems to be heavy short selling of deep out-of-the-money puts on the assumption that the Volatility Index (VIX) won’t rise above $50 again.
We are now up +0.45% in April, taking my 2020 YTD return down to -7.97%. That compares to a loss for the Dow Average of -15% from the February top. My trailing one-year return returned to 33.88%. My ten-year average annualized profit returned to +33.67%.
This week, Q1 earnings reports continue, and so far, they are coming in much worse than the most dire forecasts. The only numbers that count for the market are the number of US Coronavirus cases and deaths, which you can find here.
On Monday, April 20 at 7:30 AM, the Chicago Fed National Activity Index comes out.
On Tuesday, April 21 at 9:00 AM, the March Existing Homes Sales are released.
On Wednesday, April 22, at 9:30 AM, the Cushing Crude Oil Stocks are announced.
On Thursday, April 23 at 8:30 AM, Weekly Jobless Claims will announce another blockbuster number.
On Friday, April 24 at 7:30 AM, US Durable Goods for March are printed. The Baker Hughes Rig Count follows at 2:00 PM. Expect these figures to crash as well.
As for me, I am sitting here eating a pineapple upside-down cake that my daughter just whipped up. It's my favorite cake made by my mother, which I always got on my birthday.
Of course, I have to wash the dishes. If anyone wants to supplement their trading income, housekeeper and domestic and wants to live in mansions at Lake Tahoe and San Francisco, please contact customer support immediately.
Stay healthy.
John Thomas
CEO & Publisher
The Diary of a Mad Hedge Fund Trader
Here is a great health-tech name for you that is up 10% in the past 30 days – Teladoc Health, Inc. (TDOC).
The fallout from the coronavirus has been brutal and we will see the first round of bankruptcies in a few weeks for companies who get hit with that debt service payment tsunami.
The Nasdaq is now down almost 30% in just 3 weeks and I can proudly say that the tech letter avoided the bulk of the carnage.
But aside from the fallout, the pandemic has underscored the desperate societal need and use case for health tech.
The unpreparedness of the U.S. administration has been cringeworthy, to say the least, essentially pigeonholing the virus as a non-American issue or an unreliable media ruse.
The consequences are a government and society bereft of a real health solution, not to mention testing kits.
Our policymakers are reeling.
As the administration has found out, this is not something that a 50-basis rate cut can solve.
Exposing the holes in our health system isn’t fun to do but this is where the use case for technology cross-pollinating with healthcare to create products and services to buttress these types of health scares comes into play.
Seeking alternatives to face-to-face health solutions is becoming a pressing issue.
Remote diagnoses through telehealth services could become an important tool, although physical testing for the virus would have to be done in person.
Influenza pandemics are the perfect environment to enlist services from these types of telehealth services that could disseminate important and crucial guidance and consultation to sick patients.
Especially in the initial screening process of judging whether patients’ needs - immediate action or not - could improve the efficiency of hospitals and clinics.
At the outset of the virus spread, many clinics globally were refusing to test potential sick people because the doctors themselves did not want to take the risk of getting sick.
The lack of ICU hospital beds in the U.S. has been highlighted as an Achilles heel and reducing the numbers of hospital visitors by categorizing them into different need-based groups would help the healthcare professional community on the ground.
We have been swamped by images from Wuhan, China of nurses and doctors being overworked and overwhelmed to sometimes death.
That must be avoided in the future.
Virtual patient traffic at privately held telehealth company American Well has risen about 11% since the first U.S. coronavirus death and an infusion of demand has been recorded at similar companies as well.
If it’s just the basic knowledge of whether going to the supermarket is safe or not or if flying on an airplane or not is feasible, people need to know.
Knowledge is power and knowledge is safety.
Some might get nervous about early viral symptoms and some might seek more information on how to stay safe.
Brad Younggren, Chief Medical Officer of 98point6, offering private text-based diagnosis and treatment via a mobile app, said their physicians were encouraging patients diagnosed with influenza to communicate if they do not improve.
Teladoc said it has been partnering with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to provide near real-time surveillance data on the spread of the virus.
An $8.3 billion U.S. bill signed into law on Friday to fund the coronavirus outbreak response includes $500 million to waive certain restrictions on Medicare telehealth coverage. That provision is aimed at encouraging senior citizens to choose at-home virtual healthcare services.
Analyzing the tech markets today – they are showing signs of extreme stress.
Tech stocks have been utterly decoupled from fundamentals as the radioactive waste effect from the health scare floors any inkling of optimistic sentiment.
The drawdowns have been heavy which validates the tech letter going 100% cash for the short-term.
The policy missteps have added more turbulence to an already sensitive situation akin to lighting a match and throwing it into the tinder box.
What started out as an exogenous event has morphed into a broad set of externalities crushing whole industries such as travel, energy, banks, airlines, hospitality, and hotels.
Dealing with an oil crisis, health crisis, and interest rate crisis doesn’t just work itself through in a matter of days and tech companies are being repriced accordingly.
Teledoc is one of those companies to keep in mind once the chaos blows over.
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