Jake, I'm going to tell you something that you may not want to hear but I feel like we have enough rapport that it won't be that big of a deal: All that time you spend working at additional blue-collar jobs in order to make another $35 a day might be killing your ability to make a lot more and not have to deal with all of these out-of-hand unskilled laborers all day. I struggle with the same thing; I can't go to Columbus professional networking events that could get me out of this since I'm always leaving Lancaster (or until recently, Dayton) at 6pm or later hungry as hell and much of the good stuff is in Dublin, Worthington or whatever. Most Downtown networking events are at lunch. And even if I could network at them, I gotta tell them that I can't close or sell the store for another year at the earliest. It's a viscous cycle.

12 hours ago, GCrites80s said:

RE: Macy's, the most devastating thing that happened to department stores is the lack of white-collar jobs in this country brought on by computers and the internet. Most jobs now either have uniforms or it's OK to wear Wal-Mart clothes at them.

The death of the suit/tie "office attire" can not happen soon enough.  Especially the tie. Death to it!  ?

9 hours ago, audidave said:

Further good news(or bad news for KJP)from testing in NY from a doctor:
 

@FaheemYounus: Treatment news! 5 critically ill COVID patients (on ventilators) received antibody-rich plasma from 5 other patients who had recovered from COVID. 

Results: 3 discharged; 2 in stable condition!

Now 1 of my recovering patients wants to donate his plasma!

https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/fullarticle/2763983?resultClick=1

They did this with Ebola as well. I hope this really ramps up and becomes much more widely applied.

3 hours ago, GCrites80s said:

I was just at the supermarket. It looks like they overordered bottled water since it was piled up all over the place. By now there's fewer customers in there than there normally would be.

I was at Kroger shopping for my dad at about 11am and it was not crowded at all and the only major things they were out of were of course toilet paper and cleaning supplies. Strangely enough they were completely out of regular yellow mustard also. There was no line at the u-check or at the pharmacy. A Kroger employee had told me the best time to shop was between about 11am to 2pm and they seemed to have been right.

Well I just put my money where my mouth is and bought just under $5,000 worth of oil stuff.  Wish me luck. 

On 4/3/2020 at 10:31 AM, jmecklenborg said:

Well I just put my money where my mouth is and bought just under $5,000 worth of oil stuff.  Wish me luck. 

 

A year from now you'll probably be glad you did. I have continued to buy small additions to S&P500 index funds.

59 minutes ago, Dougal said:

 

A year from now you'll probably be glad you did. I have continued to buy small additions to S&P500 index funds.

 

Marathon Oil is near its 52 week low, near $3.50 ... It's been as high as $18 this year and over $6 only a month ago. Might be a decent fluctuation buy

On 4/3/2020 at 10:31 AM, jmecklenborg said:

Well I just put my money where my mouth is and bought just under $5,000 worth of oil stuff.  Wish me luck. 

 

I think oil stocks will go lower yet, but I def think you'll be making money in 6 months and profit nicely in a year 

2 hours ago, YABO713 said:

 

Marathon Oil is near its 52 week low, near $3.50 ... It's been as high as $18 this year and over $6 only a month ago. Might be a decent fluctuation buy

 

Seems like a decent bet.  I did it shorting near $3.50 puts.

market seems to be trending up this week so far.  Apparently some good signs that we are nearing the worst of the pandemic and may be on the road to recovery by end of the month, at least for some parts of the world.  

 

So the conversation last week about the Dow falling below 20k are quiet for now or does anyone still see that being a reality?

33 minutes ago, gottaplan said:

market seems to be trending up this week so far.  Apparently some good signs that we are nearing the worst of the pandemic and may be on the road to recovery by end of the month, at least for some parts of the world.  

 

So the conversation last week about the Dow falling below 20k are quiet for now or does anyone still see that being a reality?

 

We haven't even hit the recession yet - give it time.

1 hour ago, Clefan98 said:

 

We haven't even hit the recession yet - give it time.

 

It's an artificial recession. If a recession can be induced, then so can a recovery.

1 hour ago, gottaplan said:

market seems to be trending up this week so far.  Apparently some good signs that we are nearing the worst of the pandemic and may be on the road to recovery by end of the month, at least for some parts of the world.  

 

So the conversation last week about the Dow falling below 20k are quiet for now or does anyone still see that being a reality?

the Dow does not necessarily correlate directly with a recession.  There is hope that it will be a V recession and bounce back quickly 

1 hour ago, Clefan98 said:

 

We haven't even hit the recession yet - give it time.

 

Agree.   This market is not going to spring back to life and carry on like it was prior to Feb 19.    Good chance IMO a recession will outlast the virus.   

Patient investors should do very well when this economy comes back, but it won't be in April, May, or June.    It will be several months down the road.

22 minutes ago, KJP said:

 

It's an artificial recession. If a recession can be induced, then so can a recovery.

Good luck with inducing a full recovery. We were headed into a recession with or without the corona. Factoring in the virus will only make the recession deeper and longer than it had to be. 

 

42 minutes ago, KJP said:

 

It's an artificial recession. If a recession can be induced, then so can a recovery.

 

I know some of you guys have said it before but this virus is going to be the death knell for large swaths of the US brick and mortar retail sector.   

If true, the next industry to suffer will be commercial real estate since we will have large amounts of empty buildings to add to the already large amounts of empty buildings around the country.  This in turn will possibly leave the unemployment numbers much higher than 3% or so they have been.   This in turn will mean less people traveling to and from work and vacationing and so on and on....

The domino's are already set in motion and it could be possibly years before this market gets back to where it was.

 

But if you all want to dump all the $ you got into the market this week because you think different, I wish you all the best and hope you are correct!      

2 hours ago, gottaplan said:

market seems to be trending up this week so far.  Apparently some good signs that we are nearing the worst of the pandemic and may be on the road to recovery by end of the month, at least for some parts of the world.  

 

So the conversation last week about the Dow falling below 20k are quiet for now or does anyone still see that being a reality?

 

The Dow did fall below 20k.  I'm still kicking myself for not deploying more of my cash cushion for what may prove to have been a once-in-a-decade opportunity.  I'm still at about 16% cash.

 

I was fortunate enough to have started my first job in fall of 2007 and my first job with a 401(k) in 2009.  A lot of the most dramatic long-term gains in my portfolio are simply the result of having started my adult investing life at a market nadir.

 

We've already rebounded about 4500 points from the 3/23 low.

 

You mean falling below 20k again?  I personally think that "double dip" recession tracks the odds of having a "double hump" pandemic.  When social distancing measures are lifted, we'll see coronavirus cases track upward again as people start mingling again, but I think we'll have the infrastructure in place to handle it by then.  What the market is beginning to price in is that there's a good chance that quarantine measures will not be extended further than their currently-scheduled end dates; we may lift some restrictions entirely or we may go the less strict route that some advocated from the outset, which is focusing on isolating only the most vulnerable rather than the entire population.

 

I have seen lenders being very willing to work with borrowers in granting forbearances and loan modifications in order to avoid foreclosures.  No sane lender wants to try to sell a foreclosed home in this market anyway.  In addition, lenders themselves are not the heart of the storm like they were in 2008-2009, so they have more flexibility.

Sold my ATHX stock, kept the May puts short position.

3 minutes ago, Gramarye said:

 

You mean falling below 20k again?  I personally think that "double dip" recession tracks the odds of having a "double hump" pandemic.  When social distancing measures are lifted, we'll see coronavirus cases track upward again as people start mingling again, but I think we'll have the infrastructure in place to handle it by then.  What the market is beginning to price in is that there's a good chance that quarantine measures will not be extended further than their currently-scheduled end dates; we may lift some restrictions entirely or we may go the less strict route that some advocated from the outset, which is focusing on isolating only the most vulnerable rather than the entire population.

 

 

Yes that's what I meant, falling below 20k again.  Somehow the gains this past week seem artificial, like the bad news really hasn't hit yet.  I think everyone is scurrying for safe havens & value plays but hard to see much that isn't hurt by this, including pharmaceuticals & tech stocks.

 

I usually focus more on sectors than specific stocks - Im staying away from energy at the moment although oil stocks are probably at all time lows.  Tech stocks?  maybe.  Consumer goods?  Sure.  

2 hours ago, Clefan98 said:

We haven't even hit the recession yet - give it time.

 

The market isn't the economy.

 

It's not always perfect, but the market is more often a leading indicator than a reactor.

Just now, DarkandStormy said:

 

The market isn't the economy.

 

It's not always perfect, but the market is more often a leading indicator than a reactor.

 

Yeah, I get that.

 

And I haven't see anything that supports your second opinion.

16 minutes ago, gottaplan said:

 

Yes that's what I meant, falling below 20k again.  Somehow the gains this past week seem artificial, like the bad news really hasn't hit yet.  I think everyone is scurrying for safe havens & value plays but hard to see much that isn't hurt by this, including pharmaceuticals & tech stocks.

 

I usually focus more on sectors than specific stocks - Im staying away from energy at the moment although oil stocks are probably at all time lows.  Tech stocks?  maybe.  Consumer goods?  Sure.  

 

I think the bad news has already hit and been processed, which is why we bumped up against 18,500 two weeks ago.

 

Jobless claims will be staggeringly high, but for how long?  I know one person who shared that she has applied for unemployment for the first time in her life, and expects to be on it for three weeks due to unpaid furlough from Goodyear.  But she's not like a typical filer; she has a return date.  I imagine her experience is fairly normal.

 

Legions of people are out of work from industries like day cares and restaurants.  But government action has not erased the need for such places, the market demand for such places, and therefore those jobs will come back when the legal restrictions are lifted.  Others will return more slowly, but I think the slow-returning sectors will actually be substantially outweighed by the quickly-returning ones.

11 minutes ago, Clefan98 said:

Yeah, I get that.

 

And I haven't see anything that supports your second opinion.

 

https://www.moneycrashers.com/leading-lagging-economic-indicators/

https://www.edmondsun.com/news/business/the-stock-market-tends-to-be-a-leading-economic-indicator/article_6b16a076-cc0b-11e8-b432-1fbf156cf048.html

https://www.thebalance.com/leading-economic-indicators-definition-list-of-top-5-3305862

^ One man's opinion.

Here's another opinion:

https://www.marketwatch.com/story/analysts-say-its-time-to-ditch-the-stock-market-as-a-leading-indicator-2016-02-18

12 minutes ago, Gramarye said:

Legions of people are out of work from industries like day cares and restaurants.  But government action has not erased the need for such places, the market demand for such places, and therefore those jobs will come back when the legal restrictions are lifted.  Others will return more slowly, but I think the slow-returning sectors will actually be substantially outweighed by the quickly-returning ones.

 

The problem will be for the restaurants and small businesses that close outright.   It will take quite some time for the market to fill those spaces.   A recent estimate said 25% of all small businesses in the US may not survive this period.  

46 minutes ago, Clefan98 said:

^ One man's opinion.

 

I listed three sources, but ok.  Like I said, it's not perfect.  Because nothing is.

Working through a midwest market call related to construction activity, it was brought up that Ohio, along with Michigan and many other states use gas taxes to fund DOT road/bridge budgets.  Nobody is driving/using gas and it's crushing these state budgets.  That's why a national infrastructure bill is probably right around the corner.  What are some solid plays for that strategy?  Heavy equipment manufacturers, concrete, steel, aggregate...

18 minutes ago, DarkandStormy said:

 

I listed three sources, but ok.  Like I said, it's not perfect.  Because nothing is.

 

Anybody who only pays attention to the DJIA isn't getting the full picture regarding the whole economy vs. The Market, that's for sure. A price-weighted index of only the 30 largest companies can't do that. If you want the almost the whole market, follow Dow Wilshire 5000 or at least do S&P 500 if you want to take out the volatility of the small caps. What's good for Amazon isn't what's good for the country.

2 minutes ago, GCrites80s said:

Anybody who only pays attention to the DJIA isn't getting the full picture regarding the whole economy vs. The Market, that's for sure. A price-weighted index of only the 30 largest companies can't do that. If you want the almost the whole market, follow Dow Wilshire 5000 or at least do S&P 500 if you want to take out the volatility of the small caps. What's good for Amazon isn't what's good for the country.

 

I don't pay attention to the DJIA at all.  It's a worthless metric.  I pay closer attention to the S&P500, NASDAQ, and a "total market" index.  Of course, like I said, none of these are perfect leading indicators of where the economy is going.  But they're almost never lagging.

Ask a Dow follower what happens if 3M shoots to 100,000 and the rest go to $1

 

Whooeee look at that Dow!

1 hour ago, GCrites80s said:

 

Anybody who only pays attention to the DJIA isn't getting the full picture regarding the whole economy vs. The Market, that's for sure. A price-weighted index of only the 30 largest companies can't do that. If you want the almost the whole market, follow Dow Wilshire 5000 or at least do S&P 500 if you want to take out the volatility of the small caps. What's good for Amazon isn't what's good for the country.

 

An immense supply chain interruption is underway.  For example, I just attached a shot of the PO's to a single Chinese supplier at my company.  These orders were all placed before any of this nonsense.  Their arrivals at Long Beach were always unpredictable, along with the journey to Chicago and then to Ohio.  We're not getting confirmable information that this stuff is actually being produced right now, let alone shipped, since there is always a lot of mystery surrounding Chinese suppliers.  They like to play games like buy their stuff from an even cheaper supplier in Vietnam or India and claim that they made it, which means even more unknowns with quality and the timetable.  

 

 

So with our supply of Chinese-made materials running low or out, U.S. buyers are forced to buy from U.S. producers, who are much more expensive.  So pretty soon they're going to be running third shifts to pump out as much product as they can to take advantage of the interruption from China.  They're gong to make too much - because a lot of the people who do purchasing and estimating in the U.S. are pretty dumb - and so then all the sudden there will be a glut of U.S. and Chinese stuff sitting around in warehouses. These highs and lows mean people end up blowing budgets (there will be a lot of wasted material and wasted labor) and this whole year ends up being a wash as it takes 6 months or more for everything to re-equalize.  

 

 

 

 

^American companies tend to be so supply oriented that they often wind up sitting on way too much inventory due to fear of losing sales to being out of something or to buy enough to score a "deal". There's often a tendency of Americans to think if they are out of something that a person asks about that the people were ready to buy right now when in reality life is full of tire-kickers and people who like to memorize prices. This over-emphasis on supply can be seen with the Big 3 automakers (constantly), Atari in the '80s and late-2000s to 2010s Gibson for example. They have no sense of the scarcity ploy that Nintendo have become masters at... just check current prices of Nintendo Switches on the secondary market. Hint: you have to click on the listing because Amazon is out and doesn't want to expose how high they've gotten https://www.amazon.com/s?k=nintendo+switch&ref=nb_sb_noss_1

 

edit: Note that the toilet paper companies are not like this. In that business demand was so steady that there was no need for overproduction especially due to the low money density of the product. That's how we got a month into this and still no toilet paper.

Edited April 7, 20205 yr by GCrites80s

^I can't overemphasize how dumb so many people are out there in "the supply chain".  The Spinal Tap 12" versus 12' happens all of the time.  Just today we had a truck come back with 24 of 28 skids because the customer only wanted 4 skids.  How often does someone who meant to order 4 pizzas order 28 by mistake?  But out in the industrial supply chain, there is no "human" measurement to so many of these abstract products.  The people ordering stuff literally can't picture it.  So they just type stuff in their computer, press enter, and 2 days later truckloads of crap show up that they don't need.  

On ‎4‎/‎6‎/‎2020 at 11:31 AM, Dougal said:

 

A year from now you'll probably be glad you did. I have continued to buy small additions to S&P500 index funds.

 

The thing about oil right now is that everything is dependent upon the Saudi/Russia situation. If they're having a meeting, they're having a meeting during their day which is our night.  They also could have a meeting on a Saturday or Sunday.  So everyone in the U.S. with money in oil stocks is just going to wake up one day with 20%+ gains but no telling which day.  

3 hours ago, gottaplan said:

Working through a midwest market call related to construction activity, it was brought up that Ohio, along with Michigan and many other states use gas taxes to fund DOT road/bridge budgets.  Nobody is driving/using gas and it's crushing these state budgets.  That's why a national infrastructure bill is probably right around the corner.  What are some solid plays for that strategy?  Heavy equipment manufacturers, concrete, steel, aggregate...

 

I'm also hearing the same. There's also the possibility that a few transit/rail projects may get included. Amtrak is going to try to get the Hudson River tunnels funded as well as the first year of its growth program:

http://allaboardohio.org/2020/03/02/amtrak-considers-new-resources-for-new-trains-services-including-ohio/

29 minutes ago, jmecklenborg said:

^I can't overemphasize how dumb so many people are out there in "the supply chain".  The Spinal Tap 12" versus 12' happens all of the time.  Just today we had a truck come back with 24 of 28 skids because the customer only wanted 4 skids.  How often does someone who meant to order 4 pizzas order 28 by mistake?  But out in the industrial supply chain, there is no "human" measurement to so many of these abstract products.  The people ordering stuff literally can't picture it.  So they just type stuff in their computer, press enter, and 2 days later truckloads of crap show up that they don't need.  

 

People who went to college for business only want to go into the financial sector since everyone told them to and it is heavily romanticized. Humanities majors can also be good at it due to their attention to detail but they, understandably, don't want to do logisitcs either.

Did you know... the Spinal Tap Stonehenge thing really did happen to Black Sabbath (but in reverse) right around the time Spinal Tap came out? Their Stonehenge rocks were supposed to be 9 feet but came in at 9 meters. Here it is from the Born Again tour:

 

 

There is no way that mistake didn't add thousands and thousands of dollars to the cost of the tour.

1 hour ago, GCrites80s said:

 

People who went to college for business only want to go into the financial sector since everyone told them to and it is heavily romanticized. Humanities majors can also be good at it due to their attention to detail but they, understandably, don't want to do logisitcs either.

 

The problem with business & finance majors is they all burst out of school thinking that they know everything about business & finance. Tons of them are getting totally licked in the market right now.  Thankfully they have plenty of time to recover.  I'm too cynical to think that this will inspire younger people to be conservative with their money and to demand conservative monetary policy from their government and from the companies they work for. 

12 minutes ago, GCrites80s said:

Did you know... the Spinal Tap Stonehenge thing really did happen to Black Sabbath (but in reverse) right around the time Spinal Tap came out? Their Stonehenge rocks were supposed to be 9 feet but came in at 9 meters. Here it is from the Born Again tour

 

I have heard that the real stonehenge is pretty underwhelming.  But no way is it more underwhelming than...Plymouth Rock. 

^^One issue that I faced when I got out of business school was that I was so sick of reading about it and just wanted to do it. When I'd pick up a business magazine or paper it was disinteresting to me since they were so soft and ambiguous as compared to the hard stuff in textbooks. Something I didn't realize at the time was that business is so HUGE as compared to the magazines I was used to reading. I had grown up reading dirt bike, R/C car and guitar magazines. If you read a dirt bike or R/C car magazine for a year or two you learn everything you can for awhile from them while afterward it's just for product updates and entertainment. With a guitar magazine it's more like 5 years.

 

On the other hand, business is for life and there's no way to break it down into the meal-size portions of an enthusiast magazine. You're stuck with bite-size pieces. All you can do is get your business papers every week or go to their websites on a regular basis. Farming magazines and papers are the same way. Anyone can get the basics down even without school. But, much like the English language, to go deep and pick up on all the subtitles and nuances that it takes to be actually good at it is going to take much longer. The guitar magazine can teach you to play a Judas Priest song pretty quickly, but I'm still picking up on new playing nuances inherent with that band 25-35 years after I first heard the songs. And that's why startups made by noisy people in their 20s statistically are almost always trash while new companies started by people nearing retirement age have a much higher success rate -- regardless of funding since those 20s tech bros really love to pound the pavement and do get funded irresponsibly.

Edited April 8, 20205 yr by GCrites80s

13 hours ago, jmecklenborg said:

 

I have heard that the real stonehenge is pretty underwhelming.  But no way is it more underwhelming than...Plymouth Rock. 

 

The many, many stones around Avebury are more impressive IMHO. The amount of work to place those boggles the mind.

 

20 hours ago, Dougal said:

Sold my ATHX stock, kept the May puts short position.

 

I too bailed out this morning at 2.95. Although I wished I'd sold it when it was at $4+, I still walked away with a nice profit. Not a bad bit of cash for a couple of weeks of "work."

^I used to live in Wiltshire, just a few miles from both Stonehenge and Avebury. I wouldn’t say the former is underwhelming, but I guess it’s relative to your expectations. Apparently, nowadays it has the obligatory ‘Visitor Center and Experience’ which I’m sure ruins it a little. I first saw it as a kid in the mid 70s, when it was still just there, in a field by a road and you could walk up to the stones, touch them, climb on them etc. 

Kudos to @KJP for calling out the nearby Avebury. Nowhere near as well-known as Stonehenge, but in many respects, more impressive. Probably not as famous as it’s way more spread out and harder to photograph in one frame. 

3 minutes ago, roman totale XVII said:

^I used to live in Wiltshire, just a few miles from both Stonehenge and Avebury. I wouldn’t say the former is underwhelming, but I guess it’s relative to your expectations. Apparently, nowadays it has the obligatory ‘Visitor Center and Experience’ which I’m sure ruins it a little. I first saw it as a kid in the mid 70s, when it was still just there, in a field by a road and you could walk up to the stones, touch them, climb on them etc. 

Kudos to @KJP for calling out the nearby Avebury. Nowhere near as well-known as Stonehenge, but in many respects, more impressive. Probably not as famous as it’s way more spread out and harder to photograph in one frame. 

 

I wish I would have known about Avebury before visiting Stonehenge a few years back.   We all grow up seeing those giant monoliths in books and magazines, then when you walk up to them (at least as close as you can get to them) they do appear underwhelming.  

1 hour ago, KJP said:

 

The many, many stones around Avebury are more impressive IMHO. The amount of work to place those boggles the mind.

 

 

I too bailed out this morning at 2.95. Although I wished I'd sold it when it was at $4+, I still walked away with a nice profit. Not a bad bit of cash for a couple of weeks of "work."

 

 

You might have bailed on ATHX too early.  It's at $3.13 now.  

3 hours ago, freefourur said:

 

 

You might have bailed on ATHX too early.  It's at $3.13 now.  

 

Of course. I always do.

 

EDIT: I set my buy-in, albeit with a smaller position, at $2.93. Fortunately it dropped to that level and picked me up before going back up above $3 again.

Edited April 8, 20205 yr by KJP

Athersys shares are trading higher today after the company announced the FDA has authorized the company to initiate a pivotal clinical trial evaluating MultiStem Cell Therapy in patients with coronavirus induced acute respiratory distress syndrome.

 

Shares of Marathon Oil are trading higher following finalization of production cuts between OPEC+ members in an effort to stabilize oil prices.

1 hour ago, KJP said:

Athersys shares are trading higher today after the company announced the FDA has authorized the company to initiate a pivotal clinical trial evaluating MultiStem Cell Therapy in patients with coronavirus induced acute respiratory distress syndrome.

 

Shares of Marathon Oil are trading higher following finalization of production cuts between OPEC+ members in an effort to stabilize oil prices.

 

There is still a BIG premium in the put options, meaning the writers of the puts are skeptical that the price rise will hold.  May 15 $3 puts are bid 60 cents, asked $1.10.  So if you short a put and the price goes under $3, you're net cost for a share would be $2.40. On a real trade you might actually do better than 60 cents (I got 83 cents), making your cost even lower.  That's how I'm playing it. if it falls under $3, I buy at a cost of about 2.27; if it doesn't fall under $3, I keep the 83 cents I shorted the put for.