1 minute ago, jmecklenborg said:

Why would somebody hold a stock like that long-term that doesn't pay even a paltry dividend?  

 

It was below $150 three years ago and is above $650 now.  I can think of some reasons.

8 minutes ago, jmecklenborg said:

Why would somebody hold a stock like that long-term that doesn't pay even a paltry dividend?  

 

It's up 83% YTD who cares about a dividend lol

And not sure what to make of this one:  Definitely shows an "uptick" around the time lockdowns became commonplace, too, but the uptick is more a swing from "headed for major YOY decline" to "making up a moderate amount of lost ground, with a long way to go still" instead of SAM's "steady state" to "stratosphere":

 

 

One possible explanation for this is that the pandemic hit the budgets of craft beer drinkers less seriously than it hit the budgets of macrobrew drinkers.

19 minutes ago, Gramarye said:

And not sure what to make of this one:  Definitely shows an "uptick" around the time lockdowns became commonplace, too, but the uptick is more a swing from "headed for major YOY decline" to "making up a moderate amount of lost ground, with a long way to go still" instead of SAM's "steady state" to "stratosphere":

 

One possible explanation for this is that the pandemic hit the budgets of craft beer drinkers less seriously than it hit the budgets of macrobrew drinkers.

I read a WSJ report a few weeks ago that said major beer brands are available in supermarkets and their sales are up, while the niche brands' sales are down because they are harder to find or require a riskier/less necessary trip. It makes sense.

22 minutes ago, Dougal said:

I read a WSJ report a few weeks ago that said major beer brands are available in supermarkets and their sales are up, while the niche brands' sales are down because they are harder to find or require a riskier/less necessary trip. It makes sense.

 

I'm not surprised.  Makes sense to me, too, though I personally have allocated my beer budget during lockdown almost entirely to Summit County microbreweries.  But that's a deliberate choice to buy local, and it does involve extra trips (though I've been in and out of Akronym, R Shea (Valley and Downtown), Thirsty Dog, Mucky Duck, Missing Falls, and HiHo, almost always in less than 10, and never felt unsafe).

 

Thirsty Dog even does home delivery now.  Akronym does, too, though I haven't used that service because Akronym is a little easier for me to get to in person.

In the case of InBev's flagship beers, they could actually be doing worse since at events you end up consuming them since you can't get your favorite "home" beer a lot of times. But InBev's craft and microbrews have good distribution in supermarkets and convenience stores so you don't have to go to the specialty beer store or taproom to get them. Same with Sam Adams.

16 minutes ago, GCrites80s said:

InBev's flagship beers

 

Damn.  I had never looked at this one before, or knew that its stock symbol is BUD.  It's down 30% this year.  It definitely seems like more of a sure bet on a recovery than a lot of the other crap people are speculating on, i.e. Carnival or the Cheesecake Factory . 

 

Plus it's currently paying a 2.67% dividend.  

SAM crushed earnings yesterday.  Stock is up 18% today even though markets are down overall.  Luxury brands still do well in down economies it would seem (see also: TSLA).

1 hour ago, DarkandStormy said:

SAM crushed earnings yesterday.  Stock is up 18% today even though markets are down overall.  Luxury brands still do well in down economies it would seem (see also: TSLA).

What's interesting about Tesla, is that without payments from other auto manufacturers for fuel efficiency credits, they would be way in the red.

Edited July 24, 20204 yr by freefourur

You have to wonder how long the other automakers will pay protection money to Tesla before they build their own loss-leader electric cars, resume ordinary-size car production or throttle back the size of the trucks (not likely) in order to be able to stop funding a competitor. They might keep this arrangement too though.

12 minutes ago, freefourur said:

What's interesting about Tesla, is that without payments from other auto manufacturers for fuel efficiency credits, they would be way in the red.

 

I was talking about their reported revenue - down slightly YoY but much better than compared to the rest of the industry.  I'd have to take a deeper look at other "luxury brands" to see how they've held up in 2020.

 

Other staples are doing well - Walmart, Target, Dollar General, etc.  So it's hard to pinpoint a trend of luxury vs. mainstream/lower end brands off of just the few examples I listed.  But with less traveling and bars shut down, I could see people buying more beer to drink at home and some might want to "treat themselves" with a higher end beer (Sams is the 4th-largest brewery in the U.S. so it's hard to call them "craft").

 

As for Tesla, I anticipate the accounting gimmicks will dry up soon and they'll go back to being a loss company.  They've reportedly delayed rent on their NY factory.  The regulatory credits you mentioned are anticipated to drop significantly the 2nd half of 2020.  And the sales on their higher margin models (S and X) have slowed way down in favor of the more "affordable" models (3 and Y), which they make less margin on.  On top of that, there are many, many anecdotal reports of terrible build quality in the new Model Y and Tesla has been slow to re-open service centers, despite selling more and more vehicles.  Elon also continues to exaggerate (mislead? lie? if you're a skeptic) the claims about "autonomy."  The deadline, of course, continues to get pushed back.

 

I'm of the mind that they did everything they could to post four straight quarters of "profitability" for S&P 500 inclusion.  They are now the 12th-largest company by market size.  But many issues remain long term, including build quality (as evidenced by ranking last in initial quality by JD Power survey).  They are trying to expand rapidly (Shanghai factory expanding, Berlin factory started I believe?, and the recent announcement of another U.S. factory near Austin...which, of course, included tax abatements or whatever) while competitors are catching up - notably VW.  I think the "technology lead" Tesla fans spout is shrinking, but they don't want to admit it.

Edited July 24, 20204 yr by DarkandStormy

10 hours ago, DarkandStormy said:

 

 

As for Tesla, I anticipate the accounting gimmicks will dry up soon and they'll go back to being a loss company.  They've reportedly delayed rent on their NY factory.  The regulatory credits you mentioned are anticipated to drop significantly the 2nd half of 2020.  And the sales on their higher margin models (S and X) have slowed way down in favor of the more "affordable" models (3 and Y), which they make less margin on.  On top of that, there are many, many anecdotal reports of terrible build quality in the new Model Y and Tesla has been slow to re-open service centers, despite selling more and more vehicles.  Elon also continues to exaggerate (mislead? lie? if you're a skeptic) the claims about "autonomy."  The deadline, of course, continues to get pushed back.

 

 

Yes, the other luxury brands are down more than Tesla. The thing with the Y is that it is indeed $10K more than the 3, while just being a tall 3 so the profitability should be better. This month's Car & Driver has a Model Y review and it scored poorly on ride and handling. Without a transmission or changeable axle gears the only way to change gearing is to change the wheel and tire size (or add planetary gearsets to the hubs -- a no go due to weight, complexity, cost and friction). In order to keep the range from tanking as compared to the 3 due to a crossover's additional weight and drag area, Tesla made the wheels and tires taller which has a damaging effect on ride and handling while raising the "gearing".

 

This leads us to who buys crossovers, who is Karen and Megan. They don't care about handling but ride is important. But Tesla has "marketed" to Kyle instead who is a completely different customer/stock purchaser than Karen and Megan. Tesla isn't on their radar but Karen loves blasting Nickelback and Jason Aldean her Chevrolet crossovers while Megan is in constant conflict between Honda, Subaru, Mazda, Toyota and other makes with Dad (Buzz) having input on the decision as well since he's funding the whole thing. If Y sales are to do what they are supposed to do, they gotta find a way to get those demos -- which could come at the expense of some Kyles, at least customer-wise but not stock-wise (the real customers).

1 hour ago, GCrites80s said:

 

Yes, the other luxury brands are down more than Tesla. The thing with the Y is that it is indeed $10K more than the 3, while just being a tall 3 so the profitability should be better. This month's Car & Driver has a Model Y review and it scored poorly on ride and handling. Without a transmission or changeable axle gears the only way to change gearing is to change the wheel and tire size (or add planetary gearsets to the hubs -- a no go due to weight, complexity, cost and friction). In order to keep the range from tanking as compared to the 3 due to a crossover's additional weight and drag area, Tesla made the wheels and tires taller which has a damaging effect on ride and handling while raising the "gearing".

 

This leads us to who buys crossovers, who is Karen and Megan. They don't care about handling but ride is important. But Tesla has "marketed" to Kyle instead who is a completely different customer/stock purchaser than Karen and Megan. Tesla isn't on their radar but Karen loves blasting Nickelback and Jason Aldean her Chevrolet crossovers while Megan is in constant conflict between Honda, Subaru, Mazda, Toyota and other makes with Dad (Buzz) having input on the decision as well since he's funding the whole thing. If Y sales are to do what they are supposed to do, they gotta find a way to get those demos -- which could come at the expense of some Kyles, at least customer-wise but not stock-wise (the real customers).

 

Ford cancelled (cancel culture!) the Focus and Fiesta, and now I'm hearing that Toyota is axing the Yaris and Honda is nipping the Fit.  We're going to have almost no small cars available to purchase new in the USA in 2021.  I mean, Ford replaced the Focus and Fiesta with...the Ranger and the Bronco!!!

 

The Y could end up being a complete dud - meaning it will be the enthusiastic object of youtube videos...Here's Why the Model Y and Bud Dry failed!

 

Smash that Like Button!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Apple announced a 4-1 split today.  I recall them having 7-1 and 2-1 splits in the past 10 years.  Meanwhile, other so-called tech companies refuse to split like Google and Amazon.  

 

If my prior experience with the "free" trades on TDAmeritrade is any indication, it and the various free trading platforms will be charging ridiculous fees to "process" the split.  This is going to a FEEding frenzy!

 

TD Ameritrade charged me $38 to process a reverse split back in April.  We'll see what they do with this real split.  

They don't talk about that in the ads, now do they? 

56 minutes ago, GCrites80s said:

They don't talk about that in the ads, now do they? 

 

Well the free trading lets me get my counts evened up, so there's that.  Having 9 or 26 or 88 shares of something bothers me.  

13 hours ago, jmecklenborg said:

Apple announced a 4-1 split today.  I recall them having 7-1 and 2-1 splits in the past 10 years.  Meanwhile, other so-called tech companies refuse to split like Google and Amazon.  

 

This is their fifth, I believe, stock split since they IPO'd.  It's largely irrelevant as most brokerages now offer fractional shares.

KODK received a $765m government loan this week to produce generic drugs.  It triggered 20 circuit breakers.  There's also lots of evidence of insider trading.  Anyway, you could have 15x'd your money from Monday to last night.

On 7/23/2020 at 1:41 PM, Gramarye said:

One possible explanation for this is that the pandemic hit the budgets of craft beer drinkers less seriously than it hit the budgets of macrobrew drinkers.

 

Boston Beer Company isn't really a beer company - 75% of their revenue comes from non-beer beverages.  They own the Truly hard seltzer brand, Angry Orchard hard cider, and Twisted Tea.  They also merged with or acquired the Dogfish Head brand as well.  They're expanding into Cincinnati, btw, for those in SW Ohio.

 

So SAM vs. BUD isn't solely a "craft vs. macrobrew" discussion.

 

Meanwhile, BUD beat earnings estimates in Q2 and is up ~7% this week.

46 minutes ago, DarkandStormy said:

 

Boston Beer Company isn't really a beer company - 75% of their revenue comes from non-beer beverages.  They own the Truly hard seltzer brand, Angry Orchard hard cider, and Twisted Tea.  They also merged with or acquired the Dogfish Head brand as well.  They're expanding into Cincinnati, btw, for those in SW Ohio.

 

So SAM vs. BUD isn't solely a "craft vs. macrobrew" discussion.

 

Meanwhile, BUD beat earnings estimates in Q2 and is up ~7% this week.

Out of curiosity,  do you know how much of Budweiser's or Inbev's portfolio is made up of non beer, or non macro beer brands?

I have not checked but I would assume with all their brands it may account for considerably more than the average person may think.

1 hour ago, DarkandStormy said:

KODK received a $765m government loan this week to produce generic drugs.  It triggered 20 circuit breakers.  There's also lots of evidence of insider trading.  Anyway, you could have 15x'd your money from Monday to last night.

I'd love to see the underwriting of this loan. Exactly how did Kodak secure the loan. I don't think Kodak even has $765M in assets.

29 minutes ago, Brutus_buckeye said:

Out of curiosity,  do you know how much of Budweiser's or Inbev's portfolio is made up of non beer, or non macro beer brands?

I have not checked but I would assume with all their brands it may account for considerably more than the average person may think.

 

 

Eagle Snacks

2 hours ago, DarkandStormy said:

KODK received a $765m government loan this week to produce generic drugs.  It triggered 20 circuit breakers.  There's also lots of evidence of insider trading.  Anyway, you could have 15x'd your money from Monday to last night.

 

Release the Kodak:

 

Edited July 31, 20204 yr by jmecklenborg

1 hour ago, Brutus_buckeye said:

Out of curiosity,  do you know how much of Budweiser's or Inbev's portfolio is made up of non beer, or non macro beer brands?

I have not checked but I would assume with all their brands it may account for considerably more than the average person may think.

 

I don't.  I know their biggest three, I believe, are Budweiser, Stella Artois, and Corona.  Bud launched their Bud Seltzer this year - likely to compete with Truly and all the other hard seltzers, which has been growing fast in recent years.  There is also a Corona hard seltzer apparently.  But yeah, they have a ton of brands - Platform Brewery in Cleveland (and tap room in Columbus), for example, is under the AB-InBev umbrella.  Modelo, Goose Island, Hoegaarden, Breckenridge, Rolling Rock, Shock Top, Michelob, Labatt, Busch...just to name a few more.  I think I read it's something like 20% of all beer sales globally are from AB.

 

With all of their brands, I haven't been able to find a breakout of beer vs. hard cider/tea/seltzer.

Edited July 31, 20204 yr by DarkandStormy

2 hours ago, Brutus_buckeye said:

Out of curiosity,  do you know how much of Budweiser's or Inbev's portfolio is made up of non beer, or non macro beer brands?

I have not checked but I would assume with all their brands it may account for considerably more than the average person may think.

 

https://www.ab-inbev.com/content/dam/universaltemplate/ab-inbev/investors/presentations-pdf-archive/AB InBev 4Q19 Results Presentation FINAL.pdf

 

Their annual report says 10% of sales (approx $3 billion) comes from non-alcoholic brands, and alcoholic other-than--beer is approaching 3% or $1 billion in sales.

On 6/21/2020 at 11:21 PM, jmecklenborg said:

 

A guy at my workplace who doesn't make big money showed up last week on a brand-new Suzuki sport bike

 

 

 

 

Bad news...the guy who bought this bike 6 weeks ago was in a very serious car wreck last weekend.  He broke his hip, leg, ribs, etc.  They're guessing that he'll be out for at least six months. 

 

So...I imagine that he's going to have to sell this brand-new bike since he bought this toy with credit.  Dave Ramsey strikes again. 

 

 

On 7/13/2020 at 11:47 PM, Gramarye said:

I'm a little leery of the fact that part of the investing thesis for Workhorse appears to be their stake in Lordstown Motors (https://www.fool.com/investing/2020/07/13/why-workhorse-group-stock-is-higher-today.aspx).  While Lordstown Motors might prove to be a great investment, it's a black box as far as the financial statements of Workhorse are concerned.  Maybe I'll be able to find something about Lordstown Motors in the Workhorse SEC statements, but the information I'd actually want is probably confidential to Lordstown and therefore Workhorse isn't going to be revealing it in public filings even if they know it.  I'm not generally a fan of investing in a public company as an indirect way of investing in a private company.

 

Lordstown is going public via SPAC (similar to Nikola).

 

The big play for Workhorse is a contract with USPS. One of the other bidders, Mahindra, has dropped out. Workhorse is the only contract that would be for purely electric vehicles. So it's likely that the Postal Service will hand out a couple contracts. That's expected to happen at the end of September. Keep an eye on that if you're into WKHS.

The Chevy S-10 based mail trucks used currently have been in service 25 years plus. Cheeto claims he saved Lordstown but is trying to kill the USPS and un-save Lordstown.

On 7/31/2020 at 10:04 AM, freefourur said:

I'd love to see the underwriting of this loan. Exactly how did Kodak secure the loan. I don't think Kodak even has $765M in assets.

 

This is being investigated by the SEC.

^ The feds do this kind of financing in order to create an industrial capacity which does not exist and will not develop naturally in a timely manner.  DoD, especially, will pay companies to hold idle capacity or sometimes excess inventory in reserve.  FEMA, too.  At least this Kodak deal is a loan.

 

In Cleveland, an example is the Alcoa/Arconic forge operation.  It wouldn't exist but for the US Air Force; that monster 150 ton forge was originally a GOCO project (GOCO=government-owned, conractor-operated).

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-eastman-kodak-stocks/kodak-shares-plunge-after-u-s-blocks-765-million-loan-deal-idUSKCN2561JE

 

Quote

Shares of Eastman Kodak Co (KODK.N) fell about 40% on Monday and were on track for their worst single-day decline after the U.S. government blocked a $765 million loan to the company, which was going to make drug ingredients for use in possible COVID-19 vaccines, because of “alleged wrongdoing” by executives.

 

So Microsoft was trading consistently at $208 all day. There was only one blip during the day and after-hours, and it was a significant blip. Someone bought MSFT for $149.72 at 6:20 pm. Afterwards, it went right back to trading at $208 again.

 

Now how can an investor come along and buy a non-penny stock for such a huge discount? And how can anyone come away with an opinion other than the stock market is a rigged game?

10 hours ago, KJP said:

So Microsoft was trading consistently at $208 all day. There was only one blip during the day and after-hours, and it was a significant blip. Someone bought MSFT for $149.72 at 6:20 pm. Afterwards, it went right back to trading at $208 again.

 

Now how can an investor come along and buy a non-penny stock for such a huge discount? And how can anyone come away with an opinion other than the stock market is a rigged game?

 

Blips like this are almost always (a) two computers talking to each other with minimal human input, or (b) the exercise of stock options, though those would usually be at a more "even" price ($150, not $149.72, though there might be something in the way an option exercise is reported that could make it appear as slightly under the strike price, I don't know).  Remember, it's not like any of your own stock was forcibly sold at that price unless you had previously sold a covered call on that.

11 hours ago, KJP said:

So Microsoft was trading consistently at $208 all day. There was only one blip during the day and after-hours, and it was a significant blip. Someone bought MSFT for $149.72 at 6:20 pm. Afterwards, it went right back to trading at $208 again.

 

Now how can an investor come along and buy a non-penny stock for such a huge discount? And how can anyone come away with an opinion other than the stock market is a rigged game?

 

Yeah - to bolster @Gramarye those trades are usually options being exercised. 

If anyone cares, I spoke with a colleague last week who told me to invest in Litecoin (LTC)long term as a crypto hedge. It's currently the 4th or 5th most used crypto, but it's transaction speed it the fastest and because the price is currently attainable $50-$60 in the last month, it's likely to draw more interest long term as businesses continue the trend of accepting coins. 

 

Beyond that, I bought JetBlue a month ago because 1) it's low, and 2) I feel like its an obvious takeover target. 

1 hour ago, YABO713 said:

Beyond that, I bought JetBlue a month ago because 1) it's low, and 2) I feel like its an obvious takeover target. 

I bought it because I like their service from Washington.  It's gone down since; but every time it dips I sell $10 puts and have done alright that way.

Athersys filed a report that one of its Japanese backers intends to sell 16 million shares (almost 9% of the company).  Even the Japanese eventually lose patience.  It's been ten years and they still can't get a product out the door.  Stock finished down 4 cents at $2.35. 

TSLA and AAPL traded today for the first time at their post-split prices.

 

Apple gained 3.18%.  Tesla gained 12.57%.

 

This is absurd.  Fractional shares have existed for a long time on many platforms/brokerages.

21 minutes ago, DarkandStormy said:

TSLA and AAPL traded today for the first time at their post-split prices.

 

Apple gained 3.18%.  Tesla gained 12.57%.

 

This is absurd.  Fractional shares have existed for a long time on many platforms/brokerages.

 

Apple is a real company.  Tesla is not.  Musk just piggy-backed on the Apple split to further his grand trick - the thought that Tesla is somehow a tech company.  

 

 

TSLA is up 254% since its CEO said the stock price was too high...four months ago.

People think only seven stocks exist.

49 minutes ago, DarkandStormy said:

TSLA is up 254% since its CEO said the stock price was too high...four months ago.

 

It makes my head spin even as a TSLA shareholder (though sadly not as much as I was some time ago).

 

It wasn't that long ago that Musk was getting sued for suggesting he could take the company private at $420/share pre-split, and the ostensible grounds for the suit were that he implied there was secure funding to take the company private at that "inflated" number.

TransDigm (TDG), in its quiet way, has doubled since its March low, going from $245 to $508 yesterday (down a bit today). It's still down from $656 in January, but aviation-related suppliers' stock prices seem to be banking on an early return of the air/travel industries. 

 

I dunno ...  It maybe time to sell some calls.

On 6/4/2020 at 8:17 AM, YABO713 said:

Friendly tip - buy Crowdstrike

 

I bought at $92 and it just hit all time high yesterday.  Thanks for the friendly tip.   Watching it now to figure out what to do with it....

We're off 3% today but there's still a long way to go before August's gains disappear, let alone getting the S&P back down to where it belongs around 3,000.  A bear can dream, can't he?

 

 

18 minutes ago, Cleburger said:

 

I bought at $92 and it just hit all time high yesterday.  Thanks for the friendly tip.   Watching it now to figure out what to do with it....

 

Yes, but that was yesterday.  ?  Whoops!

 

(P.S. I also own CRWD, or actually my wife does, and we're holding.  Just enjoying the roller coaster for now.)

 

It's barely noon, but this has clearly been the worst day in the market all year for me.  I've lost 2/3 of my annual salary since the opening bell.  But I have no room to complain yet given the absurd gains I've seen since March.  And I still actually have cash waiting in the wings, maybe 10-12% of our combined portfolios (my wife and I keep separate finances but I'm the chief investment officer for both of us), so I'm actually waiting for a bit of a pullback; I invested a lot in March and April, but I figured the market recovery from the COVID downturn would be a lot longer and shallower.  I certainly didn't expect to see an all-time S&P 500 high in September with no vaccine in production.

1 hour ago, Cleburger said:

 

I bought at $92 and it just hit all time high yesterday.  Thanks for the friendly tip.   Watching it now to figure out what to do with it....

I was in at $94 and left at $132. Wish I could’ve afforded to buy more.

 

FWIW - it might go even higher. Crowdstrike is the gold standard in incident response and cybersecurity, and their only publicly traded competitors- for the moment - is Duff & Phelps who owns Kroll

2 minutes ago, YABO713 said:

I was in at $94 and left at $132. Wish I could’ve afforded to buy more.

 

FWIW - it might go even higher. Crowdstrike is the gold standard in incident response and cybersecurity, and their only publicly traded competitors- for the moment - is Duff & Phelps who owns Kroll

I bought at around 94 and sold last week at 112.  I should've waited.  But I took the proceeds and bought NIO at 14. So it didn't turn out too bad.

VIX generally doesn't increase like this without more of a pullback.  That's something to watch.

 

Markets also got jittery this time in 2016 ahead of election "uncertainty."