The Insider Report

Out of the 3600 or so publicly traded companies there are even less that have management buying a significant amount of their own stock.  We estimate this universe at The Insiders Fund to be just 250-300 during the last year.   Source: Stock Picking Is Dying Because There Are No More Stocks to Pick – MoneyBeat – WSJ

We analyzed Dorian LPG based on recent insider activity and depressed valuation for a buy-side opportunity.  Our results are as follows with a buy signal of 4, relatively weak. It will be interesting to see how it reacts to earnings Wednesday, June 14th, 2017. Chart- Bullish Divergence on the RSI +1 Analysts- Analysts have graded Dorian LPG Inc. with four buy and four hold ratings. It is worth taking note that J.P. Morgan valued LPG as a strong buy in early May with a target price of $14, as an overweight stock in comparison to its $9 price at the time. +1 Insiders- Chairman, John Hadjipateras, might see potential growth … Read more

As the summer draws closer, we could probably forgive some chief executives for making long, lingering looks out the window. Vacation plans must be scheduled. There are people to see, socially. And for the business? It’s going well enough. The market’s been on a rampage. It can go on autopilot a few months, can’t it? Yet as the weeks ticked down to Memorial Day weekend, some CEOs bucked the edict to sell in May and go away, and chose to buy stock in their company.

Advanced Auto Parts, AAP  had a dismal week dropping from an already depressed price of $150 to $133.63 as of Wednesday close.  That did not dissuade CEO Thomas Greco from spending $2.2 million to purchase 16,000 more shares.  Greco has been a steady buyer over the last year purchasing over $ 5 million worth of stock, to date losing money on every purchase.  Hedge fund titan Starboard Value Opportunity fund picked up $47 million as well.  Ok, do they not understand that Amazon is targeting the auto parts business?  Maybe Amazon will just fly out buy them?  The latest earnings … Read more

With volaitlity as low as it is, it may now be a good time to hedge a portfolio against some unknown risk such as a geopolitical event, oil shock, sun spot satellite communications breakdown, or financial meltdown to loss of internet or trust in digital transactions.  One good way to do that is to buy long dated call options on the VIX.   All insurance costs something and stock market portfolio insurance is one of the most expensive kinds of insurance. Source: VIX Options

What’s striking is the role played by the biggest technology leaders, again reminiscent of the dot-com era. According to Bespoke Investment Group, Apple (AAPL), Facebook (FB), Amazon.com (AMZN), Microsoft (MSFT), and Alphabet (GOOGL) accounted for 4.6 of the 7.89 percentage-point gain this year in the S&P 500. Through Thursday, S&P data maven Howard Silverblatt calculated, the top 15 S&P 500 stocks generated half of the big-cap benchmark’s year-to-date increase. (What has changed is that Amazon and Alphabet both flirted with $1,000 share prices, while two decades ago stock splits were all the rage.) Source: Bitcoin and Tech Stocks: A 21st … Read more

Venture Funds Flood Startups With Cash Investments in first quarter rose 37% from the previous period, to $14.5 billionInstacart employees fulfill orders for delivery at a Whole Foods store in Los Angeles. The company raised $400 million in the first quarter. Investors injected $14.5 billion into U.S. venture-backed startups in the first quarter, up 37% from the previous period, according to data from Dow Jones Ven Source: Venture Funds Flood Startups With Cash – WSJ

Source: For Senior Citizens, the Future of VR Lies in the Past | WIRED   Chips, chips, and more chips.  I’ve heard it said recently that we are living in the golden age of microchips.  I believe that.  The PC may be in secular stagnation but there is a whole new world of autonomous driving, internet thing of things, cloud storage, and even VR wherever that path may take us.

An inability to capitalize on the good earnings news is a function of several factors:Stretched valuations ahead of the reportsThe halting consideration that the broader market isnt advancing on good earnings newsGrowing concerns about the vitality of the U.S. economy, which has left participants reluctant to accept upbeat guidance at face valueThe heightened political uncertainty surrounding the French presidential electionGrowing angst about the fate of tax reform efforts in the U.S.; andContinued Source: Briefing.com: In Play – Apr 19 12:42:47

The number of patents and key underlying technologies for 5G mobile networks will evolve significantly within next 5 years. However, early analysis shows that Qualcomm will still be the IP leader but may be not as dominant as in 4G-LTE. The device makers like Apple, Samsung, and Lenovo are also working on 5G IP development in order to minimize IP licensing costs. Qualcomm is an interesting contrarian play.  Apple is suing them, they just lost an $800 million arbitration to Blackberry, and they have problems in Korea. None the less, this is the most dominant comany in the mobile technology … Read more

The Dow just experienced its first 8 consecutive down days since 2011. More like a bear cub hug.

Trump and the Republican’s failed effort to overturn and replace Obamacare- Contrary to popular opinion, that’s a bullish development. The CBO estimates repeal and replace would save the Government $323 billion over 10 years. That’s a big withdrawal of money from the economy and would be the opposite of a stimulus. Moving on to tax reform- Under current rules, by declaring that foreign profits are permanently or indefinitely reinvested abroad, American companies can defer taxation on that money. How much money, exactly, is subject to interpretation, but careful estimates extend from about $2.4 trillion to roughly $3 trillion. Since this … Read more

In a brilliant piece of brinkmanship, Trump distances himself from Ryan’s unpopular replacement for Obamacare. If fixing the broken healthcare system was simple, they would have done it already.  The repeal of Obamacare was a huge withdrawal of government stimulus.  Let’s hope repeal fails and our government can start listening to caregivers about how to reduce costs instead of  politicians’s untested ideologies.  Contrary to popular consensus failure is bullish as its fiscally stimulative.  The current repeal and replace plan would act as an enormous drag on the economy as trillions of tax payer dollars would be withdrawn rather swiftly from … Read more

Monarchy tries to build economic and religious ties in region, taking more independent tack after tensions with U.S. ally. Source: Saudi King Leads Hundreds of Princes, Clerics, Military Officials on Asia Trip – WSJ