Saturday, September 21, 2024
From the 1980s until crude oil crashed in 2015, the master limited partnership (MLP) structure dominated energy midstream—your gathering, pipeline, processing, and storage companies. Midstream revenues come from committed fee structures and are very predictable and MLPs pay tax-advantaged distributions, so the structure can be very profitable for the sponsor/general partner/owner. But many investors don’t […]
There is no doubt that in an inflationary environment—such as the one in which we find ourselves now—consumer spending habits are affected. As prices continue to rise, people will stop to consider the things they really need versus the things they would like to have. For example, when it comes to food, people simply must […]
A large block trade was placed last week in the beleaguered exercise equipment maker, Peloton (PTON). The 30,000 contract diagonal call spread may suggest there is some medium-term upside in the stock. The trade also implies there is a limit to how high the stock may climb over the next year and a half. The […]
The steel industry showed up on the unusual options volume radar last week, with both United States Steel (X) and Nucor (NUE) near the top of the list. NUE preannounced much lower than expected earnings, and X was expected to follow suit. At least some traders were snatching up blocks of short-term X puts, possibly […]
After the inflation numbers came out last Tuesday, the Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJIA) futures dropped by 700 points in minutes—from above 200 points to the positive to more than 500 points down. The inflation rate of 8.3% was higher than the expected 8.1%. As one TV expert noted: “The future is messy.” Truer words […]
In 2016, renowned value investor Monish Pabrai developed a simple concept called “Uber Cannibals.” He suggested that buying a five-stock portfolio of companies that were buying back large amounts of their own stock, that were cheap based on undefined valuation multiples, and that fit his definition of quality, would outperform the market.I have discussed many […]
Many don’t follow this one asset… But there’s decades of proof to show that where this one asset goes… things like stocks, bonds, and others tend to follow. You can pull up a chart of this asset yourself right on your phone or computer. The asset is contained in just 3 ticker symbols. But, in […]
Finding winners in the pharmaceutical sector is not an easy process. But it is potentially quite lucrative. For the pharmaceutical companies themselves, the current environment for success is reminiscent of the Greek myth surrounding Sisyphus, whom the gods condemned to repeatedly roll a boulder up a hill—only to have it roll down again once he […]
A few weeks ago, Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell threw the stock markets under the bus with his comments about making stopping inflation the Fed’s top priority. If the central bank follows through, the result will have interest rates moving higher and staying higher for longer than stock market investors were expecting. That sent stocks […]
It’s not often that you see a large options block trade open up with only a day until expiration. Yet, that is what occurred last week in Invesco QQQ Trust (QQQ), the extremely popular Nasdaq 100 ETF. The trade appears to be a one-day covered call that generated over $5 million in premiums collected from […]
