As of today’s close, our Seasonal MACD Buy Signal is still on Hold. Our 8-17-9 MACD “Buy” indicator applied to DJIA, S&P 500 and NASDAQ are all negative (see blue arrows in charts below). The criteria to issue our Seasonal MACD Buy Signal is a new buy signal using our 8-17-9 MACD indicator on or after the first trading day of October and DJIA, S&P 500 and NASDAQ must be in agreement.
This criterion still has not been met yet. Even after today’s gains, a one-day DJIA advance of 464.35 points (1.98%) is still needed to turn DJIA’s MACD positive and S&P 500 needs to advance 27.27 points (1.05%) for its MACD indicator to turn positive. NASDAQ needs to gain 51.94 points (0.76%).
Stock Portfolio Updates
Over the four weeks since last update, S&P 500 climbed 0.1% higher while Russell 2000 slipped 2.7% as of yesterday’s close. The Almanac Investor Stock Portfolio’s blend of cash, long and short positions climbed a respectable 1.9% over the same time period excluding dividends and any trading costs. Our Large-Cap portfolio performed best, up 4.7% followed by Mid-Caps up 3.1%. Small-Caps were 0.8% higher.
Per last month’s update, short positions in PDF Solutions (PDFS), Mattel (MAT) and Mosaic (MOS) were covered using their respective average prices on October 20. PDFS was covered for a 13.1% gain; MAT recorded an 18.5% gain and MOS 11.0%. All three traded lower after being covered, but they are all higher now.
Mid-cap short positions in Foundation Med (FMI) and Mellanox Tech (MLNX) did not work out as well. FMI third quarter earnings (actually losses) were the catalyst for a single-day jump of $8 which blew well-past its stop loss of $45.01. The position was covered the following day at $51.15 and a sizable loss. MLNX was also stopped out at a modest loss of 5.2%.
In the large-cap portfolio, the short position in Sealed Air (SEE) was also stopped out and covered. That leaves Tesla (TSLA) as the sole remaining short position. TSLA’s third quarter missed estimates and shares once again tanked, but appear to have found firm support right around the $300 level. Cover the TSLA short position. For tracking purposes it will be closed out of the portfolio using its average price tomorrow.
Switching to last month’s long
Stock Basket, a few more positions have been added to the portfolio.
Argan (AGX) was added on November 15 and
is on Hold.
CBRE Group (CBG) was added on November 2 and
Owens Corning (OC) was added on October 25.
CBG and OC are also on Hold.
Customers Bancorp (CUBI) and
ePlus (PLUS) were also added to the mid-cap portfolio, but were both quickly stopped out. Both were stopped out to due earnings disappointments. PLUS opened just below its buy limit on November 3 and closed below its stop loss on the same day.
Remaining open, new long ideas can still be considered on dips (“Buy Dips” appears in the Current Advice column of the portfolio table). Buy limits and stop losses for these positions have been changed. New buy limits appear in the “Buy Limit” column. Each stocks original “Presentation Date & Price” remained unchanged.
All other positions in the Stock Portfolio are on hold. Please see following table for current advice and updated stop losses.
Disclosure Note: At press time, officers of the Hirsch Organization, or accounts they control held positions in, ANET, BUSE, CCS, HSY, MHO, RMCF and SMG. They did not hold any positions in the other stocks mentioned in this Alert, but may buy or sell at any time.