Various articles I'm reading point to a so-called "dream scenario" with a Biden win and likely GOP control of the senate, without a "blue wave". Apparently, gridlock is seen as a good thing by many investors.

Futures are up.

Dow +384 or +1.4%
S&P +62 or +1.84%
Nasdaq +299 or +2.57%

My guess is the encouraging words on Stimulus II plays a big part.

I can see that. They know the rules they need to play by for the forseeable future. Gridlock means no "Green New Deal" or big tax changes.

Nice day!

Forget what I said about wishing the election was decided already. I think I like all this doubt & uncertainty, good for markets.

I think it has nothing to do with imaginary stimulus package we have been waiting for since August. The Senate is still run by McConnell and he will only bring a package forward for less than a $1 trillion which will NEVER be accepted by Biden, Pelosi and the Democrats etc. The market is going up since they know Biden can't raise taxes and they prefer a Democrat to a Republican since they know the reality is the R's are the big spenders not the Ds. Also they are glad to be done with Trump and his unstable ass.

Futures on Sat are not very accurate and have noticed large swings by Sun evening. But right now its mixed from -.06% to +.15%.

Wait and see mode.

This past week was good though. Recovered quite a bit from the past 4 (?) weeks.

Sun futures up from 1.1% to 1.6%.

:banana:

Which is why Trumps soon leading an insurrection and sedition movement to oppose the election results is especiall6 damaging. I am expecting the markets to react very negatively to Trumps nonsense soon.

I guess Pfizer has some good news regarding a vaccine. A great day is expected.

Nice! Thanks for the heads up.

Dow is up +5.4%
S&P is up +3.9%
Nasdaq is up +.54%

https://www.cnn.com/2020/11/09/healt...ive/index.html

Just looking at my stocks the ones that went up the most today other than Pfizer were Disney, Marriott, royal Caribbean and Carnival Cruise. Netflix went down, lol.

I don’t know. Wouldn’t it be much more prudent to have the government in charge of developing a vaccine instead of that nefarious “Operation Warp Speed?” I don’t trust those capitalist vampires. So what if it takes the government two or three years to develop a vaccine, at least we know they have the public’s best interest at heart.

Well, China and Russia already have a vaccine.

BTW anyone know how successful those vaccines are? I'm going to assume any negative news will be a state secret.

Well that makes sense I guess.

The Pfizer vaccine is supposed to work much better than expected. I would still be cautious about these releases because they have been used to pump up stocks in the past. But crossing fingers because this is incredibly good news.

This is where I'm at, too. If the results weren't good, they wouldn't have released them so it's a little bit of working backwards from the conclusion. And Lord knows they have a real motive to make it look as rosy as possible. Still, cautiously optimistic.

SI

WTF Nasdaq? You are spoiling the party this afternoon

Well if the vaccine does work then technology companies like Zoom are going to take a hit.

Yeah, but Nasdaq was up this morning when it got announced.

And I still think the idea that everyone goes back to full-time working from an office is a thing of the past.

Yep, agree with that totally.

Just occurred to me that it also lowers odds of Stimulus II or the size of it.

Carnival popped +39%.

Hopefully you guys are in upper management, because those of us in the lower rungs don't think it will last.

We peons don't micromanage ourselves

SI

Crazy.

If you bought a Model X on March 18th ($79,990) — you could have owned over $560,000 of stock today had you invested that money in Tesla instead of in *a* Tesla.

Yes — Tesla is currently trading at over 7x what it was on that day. @elonmusk

— Yoni (@OriginalYoni) November 24, 2020

It's got a long, long way to go too.

The markets are jumping today after Trump pardoned the turkey.

I need to start dabbling in individual stocks.

Good luck but be careful. There are epic stories at

wallstreetbets

Stick to what you know and don't overthink it.

I don't trade for price, I trade things that I believe in, that I think will be good picks, and good companies that I can hold for upwards of 20 years.

Having said that I've done very well with the tech stocks and got in pretty early on Tesla. Although, it wasn't anywhere near as deep as I would have liked. I had FB stock on the day it went public, same with Roku.

We've discussed it before, but the ARKK ETF gets you companies like this without the single stock exposure. Basically, they invest in stocks that disrupt the traditional order of the economy. Cutting edge stuff.

Oh yeah baby, happy days are back (at least, for now).

Wed futures are looking really strong also but not sure if it's accurate at 6pm ET.

For anyone keeping track, record high for S&P and Nasdaq on Wed. Dow is just below it's record high that it set earlier. Rise of optimism, Trump's statement about leaving WH, and great vaccine news.

https://www.cnbc.com/2020/11/27/stoc...lose-news.html

I hadn't realize the markets were up so much in Nov.

There's not a lot of optimism for a stimulus 2 anytime soon. The McConnell and Pelosi bills are 500B - 2200B or approx 1700B apart.

I'm thinking Pelosi overplayed her hand and should have gone with Trump's 1700B / 1800B proposal. No guarantee that it would have passed in Sep/Oct but at least back then it would have been Pelosi + Trump vs McConnell.

Right now, I don't see why McConnell would agree to anything close to Pelosi's ask.

Dems need to clarify what their bill means for individuals and business owners and then run on that in GA. Vote Dem for X check for you/your business.

Definitely some impressive returns for ARKK, but it makes me wonder if the shipped has already sailed for jumping on.

You're betting on the manager to be able to see & bet on future trends, technologies and ultimately companies. If you have faith in her, then the ship has not sailed yet because there is always new up-and-coming disruptors.

But yeah, Tesla is like 10% of the portfolio and a big reason why it's done so well. My guess is Tesla will keep on going up but not near the pace this past year. Her other picks will have to pick up the pace if ARKK huge returns are to continue.

Here are its' top holdings.

I remember when I was in law school around 2000, there was a firm out of Boston (I forget the name) that focused 100% on tech. It was doing gangbusters--taking payment in stock options, etc. But it had no balance in its client base. And the obvious question for them was "what are you going to do when the tech bubble bursts?" And their response was "We aren't into tech. We are into whatever is hot. And when the next big thing arrives, we will be into that."

That firm no longer exists.

For every Warren Buffett, there are 10,000 people/funds/companies who got lucky and got onto a trend before it took off and made a bunch of money and who mistakenly thought that it was skill and not random chance that put them in that position.

Ah, the dot-com boom and bust. I was telling my son this past Thanksgiving to temper his expectations. He picked Tesla (and Boeing) when he started his IRA a couple years ago and has seen Tesla grow quite a bit.

Don't know about you guys but the 00's sucked for our savings. We had the dot-com crash (or the effects of it), the 9/11 crash, and the 2007-2008 Financial crisis. Told him this and that he needs to think long term and be prepared for the ups and downs.


True. ARKK is definitely speculative. Others that fall in the speculative bucket include ASHR (China) and SPCE. Less than 5% of my portfolio but my fun bucket to keep things interesting.

Welp, this week sucked.

My SRAC position is up 50% since this post. The December launch on a SpaceX rocket was pushed back to January but I see more upside potential. Lots of inherent risk here however for many different reasons.

With the Apple car rumors, I think I'll stop reducing my Apple positions (at least in the near future). I can see Apple stock riding this speculation for a loooong while.

I don't know what to think about the automated car stuff. If you had asked me 5 years ago, it seemed like this would be coming any day now. But some smart people have said that it's incredibly difficult with our current transportation setup.

Automated cars are the future. I'd bet, a substantial amount of money on it, I just don't know if it'll be a smart move now. But for a 20 yr outlook, it's a no brainer for me.

If you had told me that nearly all NYC cabs would be out of business within 10 years of Uber starting I'd have said you were absolutely crazy too.

Once Uber can get rid of their drivers they will be killing it.

Yeah it'll be the future, I guess I'm just not sure when that future will be here. We were fed a lot of bullshit from folks like Musk about progress. Seems like the last hurdles will be the most difficult.

Last year when I was travelling and using Uber, talked to a couple Uber drivers (retirees doing side gigs) and they pointed this out. It was inevitable there will be automated Uber cars in the future, leaving them and others out in the cold.

But kudos to Uber for changing the paradigm. I'm glad I don't have to hail a smelly and rude yellow cab in NY anymore.

Also kudos to Airbnb for changing that paradigm. And Tesla, and SpaceX/Virgin Galactic, SaaS applications, and the soon to be Cryptos, AI etc.

Disruptors seem to be coming fast and furious which is great.

Happy days are here again with post-Christmas stimulus bill and that crazy bitcoin thing.

Jack Ma of Alibaba has been missing from public for the past couple months. Probably in Chinese re-education camp for the really, really rich & famous (or possibly hiding somewhere).

(He's definitely pissed off the communist government but I'm rooting for him)

Not a good start to the new year...

Yup, it's sucking.

But January has been historically a good month.

The markets don't seem to mind the Dems winning.

The likelihood of an additional $2,000 stimulus payment is driving the gains today. Check back in a few months when the onerous regulations and taxes kick in.