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Investing in up markets is easy. From the December low until recently, the strong market provided a huge tailwind that sent marijuana stocks soaring—and had our portfolio, at the peak, up 57.2% year-to-date.

In football, too many scouts focus on how a prospect looked in the workout room or running drills in a T-shirt and shorts.

A couple of years ago, before we began writing Cabot Wealth Advisory, someone in our office came up with the idea of sending out a free monthly email that answered many of our subscribers’ most common questions. We named it Ask Cabot, but as time went on we stopped getting as many general investing questions, and we got busy with our paid publications. So we stopped that and started Cabot Wealth Advisory. Since its inception we have gotten a slew of questions and today some of our readers FAQs get answered.

Of course, I couldn’t finish this weekend’s Wealth Advisory without at least mentioning the overall market. In case you missed it ... the sellers have taken control. But the most important thing is that the sellers had taken control of most stocks before this week - I wrote two weeks ago about how there was a growing divergence between the few leading glamour stocks and the broad market.

The market got a nice bounce off the Christmas Eve lows. It’s up about 10% since then. But the bounce back is leveling off. If the market continues to recover here, it will be in a guarded and cautious state for another year or two. Beyond that, there will be fantastic opportunities to get aggressive. But, for now, I will remain cautious but not fearful.

The market has been a little soft this week as better-than-feared results from many large caps, including Microsoft (MSFT) and Facebook (META), have been somewhat overshadowed by renewed fears of banking turmoil. Thanks First Republic (FRC). That stock is down 96% from its 2023 high (and that wasn’t a particularly high price).

After a stratospheric 60% rise from the March low, the S&P 500 pulled back 7% in the last few days.

While there are growing signs of risk, the market is, as always, difficult to predict in the near term. If it does selloff, that’s okay. Stocks in this portfolio are well positioned to endure further hardship and thrive beyond this crisis. Another down leg in the market will represent an opportunity to better position ourselves ahead of the ultimate recovery.

The market was mixed today with cyclical stocks outperforming—at day’s end, the Dow was up 139 points while the Nasdaq was down 2 points.

Today’s note includes the Signet Jewelers’ (SIG) earnings update and our price target increase, as well as our ratings changes from this past Monday, and the podcast.

Last week, I went snowboarding in Vermont for a couple days. I booked my hotel room at the very last minute, only a couple of hours before I left on Wednesday. There were a few reasons for my procrastination, including a blizzard menacing the Northeast. The fourth hotel I called, an...

As markets are in a volatile state, many investors swerve toward income stocks and the energy sector.

If you watched my Stock Market Crash Course video on Friday, you know that we’re in for more volatility this summer. Volatile markets are stressful for many investors, who don’t like seeing their stocks bob up and down indecisively. Not to mention that a lack of direction in the...

Yesterday, you heard from Timothy Lutts, who wrote about the stock market’s three-week rally and why it’s time to buy. He wrote, “My charts tell me the worst has passed, and this correction will soon be replaced by a new leg up in the Bull Market of 2009. So my goal today is to get you back into the market, so you’ll be one of the early winners!” And he recommended that you follow the guidelines in Cabot Stock of the Month Report, of which he is the editor. Today, I want to delve into the history of that publication and explain why it’s so popular among investors, especially those new to the stock investing game.

Every human being, no matter how rich or poor, how tightly scheduled or time-squandering, gets just 24 hours of it per day.

We get a lot of questions from our subscribers, often the same question many times. So today we’re answering some of our most common inquiries. These are questions and comments that can help all investors better understand not just how we invest, but also some important principles that will quickly improve your skills.

Despite the weakness in the broad market, most of our stocks have held up well. Over that past week, not one of our remaining stocks fell, and only Primo Water (PRMW) failed to move at all. Our average gain of 3.4% this week was almost 4% better than the S&P 600 Small Cap Index.

The industry is the realm of genetic medicine and the stock is Illumina (ILMN), currently trading in the low-60s. Illumina is one of two major public companies that make tools used for genetic medicine. The other is Affymetrix (AFFX). To say that they’ve been competitive would be polite; there have been lawsuits and countersuits about intellectual property in recent years.

We admire people with the courage of their convictions, those who know their own minds and don’t waver. It’s a good thing to be called tenacious, persistent, tough, steady or steadfast. A good thing, that is, if you’re not a growth stock investor. The rules say that growth investors should stick with a winning stock for as long as it rises. The problem comes when a stock starts to lose value but the investor has faith in the stock and demonstrates that conviction by holding it all the way to financial disaster.

The market has been all over the place this week, starting with a decisive cracking of its intermediate-term on Monday, a good-looking snapback from Tuesday through Thursday (especially among leading growth stocks, many of which zoomed to new highs) and bookended with this morning’s selling pressure on renewed trade fears.