Search

The phrase you hear more than ever from market prognosticators these days is that they are “cautiously optimistic” about the state of the stock market. In some ways this is pretty useless advice, but in another it hits the nail on the head. The market clearly wants to continue to rise; the world is awash in liquidity, and the Fed seems determined to keep interest rates low for some time. In addition, momentum tech stocks seem unstoppable.

Let’s turn our attention to additional profitable opportunities

In that light, I added four extra stocks at the end of this month’s issue; bonus stocks that won’t permanently join the portfolios, but nevertheless offer excellent money-making opportunities today.

Spooky season is upon us! Yes, the usual October selling has commenced, although it’s been fairly mild thus far. But things feel unsettled, what with the expanding war in the Middle East, a toss-up presidential election less than a month away, and with earnings season getting underway this week. So today, to counter any further turbulence, we trim one modest laggard and add a new, low-beta, dividend-paying European stock that’s been a favorite of Cabot Explorer Chief Analyst Carl Delfeld for some time.

Details inside.

Stocks hit another pothole this week after President Trump re-escalated tariff rhetoric against China last Friday, which genuinely spooked the market for the first time in months. He has since walked back some of those comments, and the market is rebounding in an encouraging way today. But the U.S.-China trade war is definitely back in the news, so today we aim to steer clear of it by adding a new position in something that’s a little outside our normal sandbox: a foreign currency. More specifically, it’s a fund that offers exposure to a well-known European currency, and it’s up more than 12% year to date – with more potential upside ahead. The fund was recently recommended by Carl Delfeld to his Cabot Explorer audience.

Details inside.

Cabot Top Ten Trader Editor Mike Cintolo wrote this about a month ago: “As the general market has heated up, we’ve noticed more and more ‘Bull Market stocks’—brokerage, investment bank and asset management firms, each of which directly benefit from higher stock prices and increased trading activity—pushing to new highs.” The market...

WHAT TO DO NOW: We think the strong action from the mini-panic low in early August is a good sign the next big move is up—but the timing of that move is less certain, possibly getting going soon, but it could also take more time to set up. Our market timing indicators are improving, and so we’ll do a little more buying tonight, but we’re OK going slow here to see how the rally progresses from here. In the Model Portfolio, we’re adding a half-sized stake in Shift4 Payments (FOUR) and putting On Holding (ONON) back on Buy—though we’re also holding on to a cash position of around 32% and want to see further upside soon before putting more cash to work.

In reviewing the charts of the major U.S. stock market indexes, I noticed that the Dow, the S&P 500 and the NASDAQ each look as if somebody is slogging uphill in deep thick mud. That’s a bit like a “two steps forward one step back” pattern.

Sizing up a merger arb opportunity requires more than just garden variety equity analysis. In his famous letter to Berkshire Hathaway shareholders in 1988, Warren Buffett laid out four questions to answer regarding arbitrage situations:

1. How likely is it that the promised event will indeed occur?
2. How long will your money be tied up?
3. What chance is there that something still better will transpire – a competing takeover bid, for example?
4. What will happen if the event does not take place because of anti-trust action, financing glitches, etc.?

Today, we add a new Cabot Turnaround Letter recommendation that we think comes close to answering all four.

In the wake of a rare down December, stocks have come roaring back to kickstart 2025, up more than 2% through the first three trading days. It’s early yet, but perhaps the bulls are taking control again after a sluggish end to an otherwise very productive 2024.

Still, there were enough yellow flags under the surface to close out the year that it’s worth taking a cautious approach for now. So today, we add a mega-cap, high-yield dividend stock that’s been a staple of Tom Hutchinson’s Cabot Dividend Investor portfolio for some time.

Details inside.

You can do well enough to take control of your retirement, rather than just drifting toward it like a canoe heading for the waterfall.

Current Market Outlook


The month-long rebound that began in early February clearly cracked last week, with the major indexes falling below key support and with some indexes (like the S&P 500 and NYSE Composite) retesting their February closing lows. There are still many stocks holding up well, including most of the growth-oriented names that exploded higher on big volume in February; however, as we saw last week, good stocks can go down in a hurry when the market hits the skids. Overall, we’re shifting our Market Monitor back down to neutral, and the onus is on the bulls to change that—a few strong days could make all the difference, but this downturn may continue until enough investors have thrown in the towel after the market’s huge run last year. We still advise holding strong, profitable stocks, but new buying should be limited and holding a good-sized chunk of cash on the sideline makes sense.

This week’s list still has a lot of good stories and solid charts, and includes a few newer names. Our Top Pick is ServiceNow (NOW), which remains exceptionally resilient. Just remember to keep new buys small given the market.

Stock Name	Price	Buy Range	Loss Limit
Chegg (CHGG)	74.21	21-22	19-19.5
Continental Resources (CLR)	66.19	56.5-58.5	52-54
Floor & Décor (FND)	68.03	49-51	45.5-47
Fortinet Inc. (FTNT)	137.53	51.5-54	47.5-49
HealthEquity, Inc. (HQY)	70.70	61.5-63.5	55.5-56.5
Netflix, Inc. (NFLX)	423.92	307-322	280-285
PagSeguro Digital (PAGS)	35.09	35-37	31-33
Penumbra Inc. (PEN)	173.25	116-120	106-108
Red Hat (RHT)	0.00	146-153	135-139
ServiceNow (NOW)	341.86	167-172	155-158

That tech stocks would cool a bit has been one of my key themes over the past few issues; and September has seen it come to pass.

You may have noticed that last week when Nvidia (NDVA) announced its earnings, its stock rose 16% while Explorer recommendation Super Micro Computer (SMCI) went up 32%.

This is consistent with my view that Super Micro is a leveraged bet on artificial intelligence (AI), and I expect this will also be the case when Nvidia’s stock price moves the other way. Nvidia is now priced at an incredible 32 times trailing annual sales and has a larger market cap than Germany’s entire blue-chip DAX index. Super Micro has already tripled in 2024 so consider taking partial profits. Remember, J.P. Morgan allegedly stated that he made his greatest profits by selling too soon.

Before we get to an update on my journey through Asia, let me offer a few thoughts regarding recent market weakness and volatility, driven by rising economic and political uncertainty. Sea Limited (SE) bucked the trend with another strong quarter while American Superconductor (AMSC) shares had another tough week after a great run, down 15.8%.

The tariff on-and-off news is creating some turbulence as are the pivotal Congressional spending and tax negotiations.

U.S. stocks markets are now continuing their rebound from the horrendous fourth-quarter 2018 market action. The S&P 500 and NASDAQ indexes look quite bullish, while the Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJIA) lags a bit.

It pays to be an optimist when it comes to investing. So, in a middling market, you’re better off focusing on the positives: The bull market remains intact, volatility is down, earnings growth continues to be robust, and market breadth has spread to the many previously unloved sectors. With that optimistic slant in mind, today we look internationally to add one of the biggest names in South America – an e-commerce giant recently recommended by Carl Delfeld to his Cabot Explorer audience.

Details inside.

We’re finally starting to see signs that investors are realizing that risk actually does exist in the market (I think).

All Explorer positions except Grupo Televisa (TV) advanced this past week and the emerging markets timer (EEM) is positive in an uptrend and above both its 20-day and 50-day moving averages.

Today’s recommendation is a company showing some relative strength that offers a nice blend of emerging growth and Western management. It’s a business with a diversified portfolio of fuel distribution, sugar production, ethanol and electricity, rail transportation and warehousing as well as the distribution of natural gas.

I’m changing my recommendations on Dollar Tree (DLTR) to Hold; and on Big Lots (BIG), Kraft Heinz (KHC) and WellCare (WCG) to Buy.