Novonix (NVNXF) shares broke above 5 this week and have more than doubled since early August even as the market is under pressure due to the slowing of federal stimulus, China’s property debt issues, and some increase in interest rates and inflation.

Thank you for subscribing to the Cabot Turnaround Letter. We hope you enjoy reading the October 2021 issue.

Most investors, and the general public, seem to regard the transportation industry as somewhat dull. But transportation is a fundamental component of human existence, and companies must constantly strive for relevance, and must now navigate a secular shift in fuel sources. We discuss five transportation companies that are updating their strategic playbooks with hopes of turning around their prospects.



The market has a bias against stocks that trade at low prices, making this a go-to source of contrarian investment ideas. We make our case for five such stocks.

The marijuana sector peaked in February, bottomed from late March to mid-April, and since then has been building a base, preparing for a resumption of the big advance.

Fundamentals in the industry remain terrific, as second quarter results have recently revealed, and while the trend toward legalization in the U.S. continues, it’s taken a back seat at the federal level for now, so all the action remains at the state level.



In the portfolio today, we continue to hold patiently, with the portfolio one-third in cash, waiting for a new uptrend—but if you’re eager to buy now (while things look cheap) I do have some suggestions.



Full details in the issue.

Last week, despite a large market decline on Monday, the major indices took a baby step forward. The S&P 500 gained 0.51%, the Dow rose 0.62%, and the Nasdaq eked out 0.02%.



The advance came despite ongoing uncertainties around Chinese property developer Evergrande and the seemingly hawkish message from the Fed announcement. Now the focus has shifted to Washington, D.C.’s finest and the decision around the debt ceiling and infrastructure. Add a sprinkle of Chinese power concerns and there seems to be just enough worry to keep investors on their toes.

The market has recovered remarkably quickly from last Monday’s sharp selloff. Thus, the long bull market remains intact and I continue to recommend that you be heavily invested.

Today’s featured stock is another conservative one, with a good yield, and in an industry that’s truly unloved. And that means its valuation is dirt cheap.



As for the current portfolio, I am selling our biggest loser, DocuSign (DOCU), and downgrading Tesla (TSLA) to Hold.



Details inside.

Current Market Outlook


After last Monday’s plunge, the initial rebound was very encouraging, and the fact that the major indexes are still doing their best to hang in there is a plus. But, while many individual stocks are in decent shape, the wild rotation that has been a hallmark of 2021 has returned, with money racing into cyclical areas and out of growth stocks the past couple of days. We’re still sticking with a stock-by-stock approach, and most names, despite their wobbles, remain in fine shape, simply pulling in after big runs; others, however, look worse and should be pared back or sold. To be fair, such action isn’t totally surprising—big breaks like last Monday’s usually have some reverberations, so we wouldn’t say the action is negative as much as it’s a sign we’re still in the tricky, choppy environment that has existed for some time. We’re going to leave the Market Monitor at a level 5 and see how things play out in the days ahead.

The good news is that this week’s list is full of names that have enjoyed outsized accumulation of late. Our Top Pick is Devon Energy (DVN), which looks like a leader of a fresh breakout in energy stocks (and cyclical stocks more broadly). We suggest aiming for dips as these names usually pull in after powerful rallies.

Stock Name	Price	Buy Range	Loss Limit
Apache (APA)	23	22-23.5	19.5-20
Biohaven Pharmaceutical Holding (BHVN)	133	130-134	116-119
Brooks Automation, Inc. (BRKS)	109	102-106	93-95
Cimarex Energy (XEC)	88	82-85	72.5-74.5
Devon Energy (DVN)	35	32-34	28.5-29.5
DoorDash (DASH)	217	206-212	185-189
SeaWorld Entertainment Inc. (SEAS)	58	56.5-58.5	51.5-52.5
Signet Jewelers (SIG)	84	82-85	73-75
Snap Inc. (SNAP)	80	78-81	69-71
SVB Financial Group (SIVB)	674	655-675	600-610

In the September Issue of Cabot Early Opportunities we continue to focus on tech stocks, while adding a small-cap biotech stock into the mix. We also review some of our portfolio management musings from last month.

Enjoy!

The market’s weak start to September and this Monday’s decline flipped our Cabot Tides to bearish; we responded by selling half of our leveraged long fund (SSO) and holding the cash. However, even with that decline, we were encouraged to see growth stocks hold firm, and the bounce back since then has also been good to see. If this turns out to be one big shakeout, there are many names on our watch list that we’d like to start positions in, but it’s too soon to conclude that.

Tonight, we have no changes, though the next few days should be key.

Despite the recent dicey market, there are two great opportunities created by a weird interest rate move that is likely to correct itself in the months ahead.

The yield curve, defined as the difference between short- and long-term interest rates, has flattened as the benchmark 10-year Treasury rate has fallen. The rate has fallen from 1.75% in February to the current 1.31%, despite the stronger economy and persistent inflation.



I believe rates have moved far too low. Interest rates are still well below what has been defined as normal for the last decade. The 10-year rate is still well below the pre-pandemic level. Plus, the benchmark rate averaged between 2% and 3% during both the Obama and Trump Administrations.



Interest rates have fallen too far and are likely to trend higher in the months ahead. Two portfolio stocks benefit from the difference between short and long rates and have been held back by the falling rates. These stocks are likely to move higher as the situation reverses

Last week the major indices took another small step backwards. The S&P 500 lost 0.57%, the Dow fell 0.06%, and the Nasdaq declined 0.41%.



The decline deepened among all the major indices Monday as ongoing uncertainties around Chinese property developer Evergrande heightened. Evergrande faces a debt payment on its offshore bonds Thursday, so until some clarity is seen I would expect to see further volatility.



The S&P 500 has now witnessed a 4.4% decline since the closing highs back on September 2. So the 5% pullback everyone has been discussing over the past several weeks could come to fruition over the next few trading sessions.



To be more defensive, this week I am going to sell in-the-money calls to stay a bit on the safe side.

From a stock market point of view, I suggest avoiding homebuilder stocks in the coming years. Companies that build single-family homes will be competing with a glut of existing homes on the market.

This week’s market recap is a familiar story—the major big-cap market indices are doing great! But the small cap index is still wallowing in the mud.

Remain mostly bullish, but continue to pick your spots. The overall market looks great, and our own 7.5% Rule has flashed, portending higher prices in the months ahead.

The market is at new all-time highs. If there’s more bad news, it could go a lot higher. The biggest risk to the market right now is stronger-than-expected second-quarter GDP growth.

The news media continues to whip investors into a frenzy over the direction of interest rates. Depending on where you look, you can find knowledgeable financial pundits making the case for steady, unchanging interest rates or for the Fed to lower the fed funds rate in July.

The S&P 500 is at new all time highs as I write this. We have a market that wants to go higher, but it just keeps getting interrupted with negative headlines. It seems like we can’t get through a week without bad trade news or signs of a weakening global economy that prevents the market from taking off.

The G-20 meetings in Japan yielded only incremental progress. This was grudgingly accepted as a positive by markets with most emerging market stocks getting a boost as we headed into a slow and short week.

Not surprisingly, this week wasn’t a great one for our portfolio. I had a feeling the party was winding down last week, when we had an average gain of 105% going and had just seen our stocks pop an average of 6% over five days.

Lean bullish. The market’s evidence remains mostly positive, though the action of growth stocks over the past two weeks has been less than stellar. But when looking at the overall market, we see more positive vibes than negative ones.

Hedge fund interest is up 18% in this medical device company. The shares have a current dividend yield of 2.16%, paid quarterly.

It’s time to look at some income ideas and this preferred stock is paying a nice 5% fixed rate.

There aren’t a lot of bright spots out there in today’s market but one datapoint I thought worth sharing is this: Heading into today the average return of our positions was 15% better than that of the S&P 500 Index over a comparable time frame.

This is the type of day where you’d typically want to be just watching and waiting, or even doing a little buying. But we have two positions that are at or near prices where we need to take some action.

Special Bulletin - Audio

The stock market is down again today due to oil price competition and aggression between Russia and Saudi Arabia, which led to plummeting oil prices.

I had already sensed an opportunity in big oil over the weekend and wrote an article that will appear on the Cabot website in the coming days.

The Model Portfolio is holding its own in this storm thus far, but we continue to pare back as needed given the selling wave.

This bank is trading at an undervalued level and has a current dividend yield of 4.91%, paid monthly.

It looks like we’ll be ending this week on a big down note as stocks are heading south once again. The culprit is no surprise; concern that this virus will spark at least a short-term economic downturn.

This financial company is expected to produce growth of more than 27% this year, and recently announced a 3-for-2 stock split.

Please understand that stock market corrections are about market adjustments and reactions to news and economic scenarios.

A few Cabot Options Trader subscribers have asked me about ways to protect gains in their portfolios, so I thought I would write to everyone with a couple of strategies using options to hedge your portfolio.

A subscriber recently asked me if I keep a journal of my trades. Many traders keep journals so they can look back at their trades and evaluate what they did right and what they did wrong.

Want to know how the big institutional investors use options? Here is an example of how one trader spent $132 million on three technology stocks.

Options trading has its own vernacular. To know how to do it, you need to know what every options term means. Here are some of the basics.

Our Cabot Top Ten Trader’s market timing system consists of two parts—one based on the action of three select, growth-oriented market indexes, and the other based on the action of the fast-moving stocks Cabot Top Ten features.