Growth stocks had been improving some, but the sellers never quite disappeared, and now they’re back with a vengeance—many growth-oriented measures are down 6% to 10% this month alone, and even the broad market is going along for the ride.

Thankfully, we never got heavily invested given the indecisiveness, and now we’re throwing up some safety nets—we sold one stock yesterday (giving us more than half in cash) and put two others on hold.



Despite the selling, we’re not throwing in the towel—we see a ton of decent setups still, so if earnings season goes well, there could be some liftoffs. But for now we’re remaining cautious until things change for the better.

Before we get into this recommendation, I just wanted to highlight our upcoming annual conference.

9th Annual Smarter Investing, Greater Profits Online Conference



It will take place from August 17-19 and you will hear from many experts (including me!) about opportunities in the market.



Today, we are recommending a stock with hidden value.



Some additional details:

• Its healthcare analytics division has grown at a 30%+CAGR and has a huge market opportunity in the years ahead.
• A slower growing competitor just got acquired at a premium valuation.
• My price target implies 70% upside within 12 months, but longer term this could be a multi-bagger.

All the details are inside this month’s Issue. Enjoy!

A 10-year Treasury bond pays just 1.4%. A three-year CD pays less than 1%. A 20-year AAA-rated municipal bond pays 1.20%. After taxes and inflation, you don’t even break even. And that’s not to mention the fact that bond prices can plummet if interest rates rise.

The only game in town is dividends. You can still generate high rates from well-chosen dividend stocks and other income-paying securities. It’s nerve-racking to have so many of your investment dollars in the stock market, but with bonds so low paying and treacherous, there is little choice if you need to generate income.



In this issue I highlight an ETF that strikes a more conservative cord than most dividend stocks. It employs a time-tested strategy that has proven to earn consistent high income while generating capital appreciation at the same time. It also pays dividend on a monthly basis and should thrive when the environment normalizes on the other side of the pandemic recovery.



For more great picks and information about navigating the current environment please join me for the 9th Annual Smarter Investing, Greater Profits Online Conference, August 17-19. We have an incredible lineup of experts ready to share their best picks.

This Friday marks the expiration of July options, and if everything holds steady, our calls in MRO, GPRO and SGMS will expire worthless. As a result, we will maximize the call premium on each position. Per usual, on Monday I plan to sell my shares in each position and start the search for more opportunities.

Current Market Outlook


The news-driven environment featuring incessant rotation and crosscurrents remains in effect; throw in the fact that breadth is narrow (about half of stocks are still below their 50-day lines despite the S&P 500 and Nasdaq being near new high ground; broad market indexes are chopping sideways) and earnings season is approaching and we think it’s best to continue going slow and aim to buy on weakness. That said, there are a growing number of good-looking growth stocks out there—not a ton are kiting higher, but there are lots of setups and, while there have been bumps in the road, the sellers really haven’t been able to sink their teeth into them despite some recent strength. All in all, we’re more optimistic than not, but stock selection and solid entry points are key.

This week’s list has a variety of sectors represented, including a few that have avoided the market’s volatility. Our Top Pick is Arista Networks (ANET), whose stock is in a smooth uptrend as growth picks up steam.

Stock Name	Price	Buy Range	Loss Limit
Antero Resources (AR)	15	13.8-14.3	12.3-12.7
Ares Management (ARES)	65	62-64	57-58
Arista Networks (ANET)	371	363-370	340-345
Bentley Systems (BSY)	64	62-64.5	57-58.5
FIGS, Inc. (FIGS)	44	42.5-45	36-37
L Brands (LB)	77	73-75.5	65.5-67.5
NVIDIA Corporation (NVDA)	821	775-795	700-710
PayPal (PYPL)	303	288-297	268-273
Rapid7 (RPD)	103	97-101	87-89
Synaptics (SYNA)	158	154-158	136-138

The bull market remains intact, so I continue to recommend that you be heavily invested in stocks that help achieve your investing goals.

Today’s featured stock is a consumer stock with a classic cookie-cutter story, which brings the possibility of extended long-term growth.



As for the current portfolio, to keep it at our maximum level of 20 stocks, we’re parting company with long-time holding Huazhu Group (HTHT), for a variety of reasons.



Details inside.



Lastly, I hope you’ll join me for the 9th Annual Smarter Investing, Greater Profits Online Conference, August 17-19. We have an incredible lineup of experts ready to share their best picks.

Markets struggled for direction this week as data coming in is mixed and growth and inflation battle for a “goldilocks” middle ground. The controversy over DiDi’s recent IPO has Chinese-listed U.S. stocks in the crosshairs of both China’s regulators and American legislators. Looking ahead, these summer doldrums may just be a precursor to the market continuing its bull run and a bit of a pullback totally in line with the sharp upward swing we have experienced since March 2020. Today we have a pink sheet blue chip clean tech idea of the highest quality.

Here is your July Wall Street’s Best Digest, Mid-Year Top Picks Update issue 843.

Welcome to our Mid-Year Top Picks Update! While the markets in 2021 have continued to drive higher, so have our Top Picks. Our picks averaged a return of 37.5% so far this year, and our Top 5 gained an average of 242.5%!



Those are some great numbers! And as the markets continue to move higher, so does the economy continue to gain strength.



Job seekers are beginning to come back into the market after months of receiving temporarily increased unemployment benefits; that made the unemployment rate for June edge up to 5.9%. Housing sales continue to rise, as does manufacturing. That’s all great news!



In this month’s issue, we highlight updates on many of our Top Picks from our January issue. We begin with Growth stocks, and here we offer updates on the electric vehicle and travel sectors. In Growth & Income, our updates include a retail pharmacy, a jewelry company, a business that markets cell phone towers, and a tobacco stock.



In Financials, you’ll find several banks that pay nice dividends. Our healthcare offerings are four biotech companies. And in Technology, we profile a search and a software stock.



Our Resources and Energy stocks include gold mining, uranium, and lithium companies. And our Low-Priced stock operates in the therapeutic arena. Our remaining Top Picks updates are several funds that offer exposure to the AI, marijuana, cybersecurity, and income sectors.



In addition to our Top Picks updates, I’ve also included a section of new ideas, beginning with apparel, conglomerate, and gaming companies in the Growth genre. In Growth & Income, you’ll find a railroad company as well as a business that sells ID solutions.



Our Healthcare offerings are an HMO, a life sciences company, a biotech, a REIT, and a healthcare tech business. In Resources, we highlight a gold and a lithium stock. And in Funds & ETFs, our contributors profile a real estate and a genomics company.



I hope you are having a wonderful summer. For me, I’m dipping my toes back into travel, taking a few mini trips. And I’m preparing for our Cabot Smarter Investing, Greater Profits Online Conference, to be held August 17-19, 2021. I hope you will join us. As always, please don’t hesitate to email me with your feedback and questions. My address is nancy@financialfreedom.com.

There’s no doubt it has been an incredible year for the market. The S&P 500 has witnessed five straight months of gains while simultaneously carving out new all-time highs in the process. And last week was no different. The market continued to forge higher, with all three major market benchmarks closing the week near or at all-time highs. The S&P 500 added 1.67%, the Dow gained 1.02%, and the Nasdaq advanced by 1.94%.

Things could actually be turning optimistic for the market and it’s looking like this could be more than just a bounce back from the overdone December lows. There is still risk out there. But a catalyst may be emerging for strong upside with increasing optimism for a U.S./China trade deal. My market prognosis is changing from pessimistic to good with a chance of great.

U.S. stocks delivered great performance in January and are now taking a breather. As such, I expect the S&P 500 index to trade between 2625 and 2825 for a while. The trading range might end up being a little higher or a little lower, but for now, a repetition of the trading range that took place between late October through early December seems most likely to occur. I anticipate that the market indexes will continue advancing later this year.

The market continues to look good as stocks are grinding higher with a few normal-looking down days mixed in (like yesterday) to keep investors honest. Average in, spread out your buys across different stocks, and take note of the current trading range and where support, and overhead resistance, appear to be. Action is starting to pick up in our portfolio, with a few companies having reported this week and a number on tap for next week too.

The sellers finally showed up today, with some negative headlines causing the market to pull back. In the Model Portfolio, we’re standing pat tonight with 35% in cash, though we’re spying a few names for possible new buying.

The market isn’t spiraling downwards anymore. It’s actually looking healthy again. The next stages of this market should be ideal for dividend payers and the relative return of dividend stocks in the upcoming quarters and years could be the best in a long time. Only one rating change today as we are selling a half position.

Emerging markets (EEM) continue to gain ground, and just today moved above their 200-day average. Since the S&P 500 index bottomed the day after Christmas, the EEM has risen 14% to reach a seven-month high.

The stock market recovery continues in a slightly better style than I had hoped for. I had expected big upswings followed by pullbacks, which is normal for a recovery.

As we close out the fourth week of 2019 small caps are looking good.

It’s time to do some more buying. Our Cabot Tides has flashed a new buy signal, and while the near term could easily see some retrenchment, the evidence is building that the worst of the market’s downturn is over and that another bull phase could be starting. We are adding one new position and buying the remaining half (to make them full positions) of two other positions.

Our first move in 2020 is going to be to modestly reduce our exposure by dropping a few stocks that are looking weak right now.

This midstream energy company trades at a P/E ratio less than 13 and pays a high dividend yield of 6.29%, paid quarterly.

In light of last night’s events in the Middle East, and this morning’s market declines, I wanted to update where we stand with our Cabot Profit Booster positions. The good news, despite today’s wobbles, is that all are working very well!

Here are the top five holdings in this gold fund.

The shares of this gold royalty company recently hit a 52-week high, and the future looks promising.

This industrial machinery company is expected to grow 75.5% next year.

This pharmacy company has been under pressure due to the drug industry’s ups and downs.

Coverage of this marijuana stock was also recently initiated at Buckingham and B. Riley, with ‘Buy’ ratings.

This electric car company earned $1.86 per share in its latest quarter, surprising Wall Street and analysts who had forecasted -$.42.

https://cabotwealth.com/analyst/mike-cintolo/

This bank is growing at triple-digit rates and its shares look undervalued.

This space-age company is growing at double-digit rates, readying for its first flights next year.

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.