Last week, roughly 30% of the companies in the S&P 500 reported earnings, and there were several other reports of interest. A few notes:
This “incredible economy” is being brought to you by Visa. Visa’s profit and revenue during its fiscal second quarter increased from a year ago, the company said on Tuesday, as solid travel and spending patterns continue to hold up in spite of hot inflation levels. If only all those travelers could figure out how to pay off their cards.
Apple’s lead marketer for the new Vision Pro headset retired as Apple monkey-hammered its Vision Pro shipment projections down 50%. I guess demand for $3,500 headsets isn’t that great, just like demand for iPhones in China isn’t that great-- iPhones sales there fell 19%, the gadget’s worst performance in China since Covid struck.
Express out, Brandy Melville in. Clothing retailer Express filed for bankruptcy.
Moody’s Ratings downgraded Boeing’s credit rating to Baa3 from Baa2, just one notch above 'junk' status (with a negative rating outlook). Apparently, building incredible exploding paperweights that are “designed by clowns, who are in turn supervised by monkeys” isn’t such a great business model after all.
Tesla (TSLA) has popped 41% since its Tuesday earnings report despite reporting its biggest year-over-year revenue plunge since 2012.
Looks like Facebook will have to sell a lot of private data to the NSA and a ton of Chinese advertising in order to make up for their hugely disappointing revenue forecast. Facebook parent Meta (META) has cratered 13% since its Thursday earnings report.
Google and Microsoft both beat on earnings. Their stocks are giving back a little this morning, but they were up huge Friday— partly because they smashed estimates but mostly because we love stock buybacks and dividends.
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The only thing worse than the soaring inflation we’ve seen over the last few years is stagflation, a condition that combines economic stagnation with soaring inflation.
Thursday’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP) report was a disaster. The stagflationary GDP print came in below the lowest Wall Street estimate while core Personal Consumption Expenditures (PCE) came in above the highest estimate. The Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA)-- once again-- steamrolled all over Wall Street's benevolent forecasts for a soft landing and dive-bombed right into the heart of stagflation nation.
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Here’s a list of our advisory clients’ current top equity holdings:
Iron Mountain (IRM)
Apple (AAPL)
Google (GOOGL)
Microsoft (MSFT)
Costco (COST)
Amazon (AMZN)
Vertex Pharmaceuticals (VRTX)
Snowflake (SNOW)
Goldman Sachs (GS)
Caterpillar (CAT)
Visa (V)
Nike (NKE)
Blue Owl Capital (OWL)
Blackstone Secured Lending Fund (BXSL)
Unum (UNM)
Merck (MRK)
Blackstone (BX)
Bank of America (BAC)
Lemonade (LMND)
Walmart (WMT)
Since last month, SNOW, NKE, UNM and LMND are new while the rest have been there a while; we trimmed Eli Lilly (LLY) and Nvidia (NVDA). We also own substantial allocations of etf’s XBI, XLE and SMH. As for how much you may want to own of any of these, everybody’s financial plan is different, so your portfolio should be, too. Call anytime to discuss.
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