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Overnight US Market : The stock rotation continues out of high-tech and into cyclicals

Higher yields remain the catalyst

The longs in the technology stocks continue to get hammered and the rotation into the cyclical continues as fears of interest rates have traders repricing the high flyers of 2020.

The final numbers are showing:
  • S&P index -20.72 points or -0.54% at 3821.23
  • NASDAQ index -310.98 points or -2.41% at 12609.16
  • Dow industrial average rose 306.21 points or +0.97% at 31802.51
The NASDAQ index closed below its 100 day moving average for the 1st time since October 30.
Some of the oversized decliners today included:
  • Doordash -11.92%
  • Snowflake, -10.74%
  • Chewy, -8.01%
  • Zoom, -7.91%
  • Nio, -7.66%
  • Nvidia, -6.99%
  • Square, -6.74%
  • Broadcom, -6.57%
  • Palantir, -5.91%
  • Tesla, -5.86%
On the positive side, some of the Reddit meme stocks were in the big gainers:
  • Express, +62.6%
  • Gamestop, +40.1%
  • Koss, +26.79%
  • AMC, +15.52%
  • Bed Bath and Beyond, +10.32%
Airlines also rose sharply:
  • United airlines, +7.03%
  • Southwest Airlines, +6.41%
  • American Airlines, +4.94%
  • Delta Air Lines, +3.61%
Big cap high flying names of 2020 had a tough time of it today as well:
  • Facebook -3.35%
  • Amazon -1.58%
  • Apple, -4.13%
  • Netflix, -4.48%
  • Microsoft -1.79%
  • Alphabet -4.3%
Other winners included:
  • Walt Disney, +6.27%
  • Whirlpool, +3.46%
  • Ford, +3.10%
  • MasterCard, +2.9%
  • Citigroup, +2.82%
  • Cisco Systems, +2.79%
  • Exxon, +2.39%
  • General Motors, +2.29%
  • Home Depot, +2.16%

Apple supply shortage to last into April: sources

Apple will likely miss its schedule for mass producing a more affordable iPhone, while inventories of existing models could remain low until April or longer, despite suppliers in China gradually resuming production amid the coronavirus outbreak, sources familiar with the matter told the Nikkei Asian Review.

Apple had previously planned to release a more affordable iPhone this spring to maintain sales momentum into the first half of the year. Mass production was supposed to start by the end of February, but multiple sources say meeting that target is now very challenging and production could be delayed until sometime in March.

The U.S. tech giant had previously asked suppliers to ready up to 80 million units of iPhones, including up to 15 million units of the cheaper model, for the first half of 2020, the Nikkei Asian Review reported. With that aggressive production plan now uncertain, Apple became the latest major tech company to lower its revenue forecast on Monday.

“The suppliers are doing their best to produce and ship the [cheaper] iPhone within four weeks. …The delay can’t be too long, otherwise it will affect the sales strategy of Apple’s new products in the second half of this year,” one of the people, who has direct knowledge of the matter, told Nikkei.

“On average, suppliers in the iPhone supply chain are currently operating at around 30% to 50% of capacity,” another source told Nikkei. “The constrained supply of iPhones will likely extend to April. There are still a lot of hurdles, from labor shortages to logistics transportation.”

“The biggest uncertainty is still lingering as no one can be sure whether the coronavirus is under control,” the person said. The source added, however, that most suppliers expect to have more employees back at work as soon as next Monday, after the 14-day quarantine period expires for those who returned from other provinces by Feb. 10. (more…)

Sources: Apple mobilizes suppliers to launch first 5G iPhone range

 In a quest to reclaim its crown as the world’s most innovative tech company, Apple is mobilizing suppliers to produce its first ever 5G iPhones next year, with the three flagship models also set to include the most advanced mobile processors available and leading-edge screens, the Nikkei Asian Review has learned.

The upgraded iPhones, which Apple hopes will vault the company over Huawei’s current position as the second-biggest smartphone maker, will also likely accelerate global carriers to roll out 5G telecoms infrastructure — especially outside China, which has already invested heavily in the nascent technology.

Apple has been slow to embrace 5G; its iPhone 11 series this year only features 4G wireless technology. However Apple will push to reclaim its former glory as the maker of the world’s “must-have” smartphone with the major product line overhaul in 2020, sources told Nikkei. The iPhone, first launched in 2007, still accounts for around half of company revenues.

Apple plans to ship at least 80 million of the new 5G phones, one of the sources said. Rivals such as Samsung Electronics, the world’s largest smartphone supplier, China’s Huawei Technologies and second-tier competitors such as Oppo and Xiaomi, have already launched 5G phones.

“It will be the first time Apple introduces 5G iPhones … There will be three of them and the company has set an aggressive sales target,” one of the people familiar with the company’s thinking said.

Apple reports fourth quarter earnings after the U.S. stock market closes on Wednesday. (more…)

Samsung estimates operating profit down by 56% in second quarter

Samsung Electronics estimated its operating profit more than halved in the second quarter, amid growing concerns over US trade sanctions on Huawei and Japan’s export controls of high tech materials to South Korea. The poor earnings guidance comes as the semiconductor industry is buffeted by the slowing global economy, the US-China trade war and US export controls on Huawei. The US campaign against Huawei has increased chip inventories as the Chinese telecoms maker is one of the Korean tech sector’s biggest customers.  South Korean chipmakers face a gloomy outlook following Japan’s decision this week to impose tighter restrictions on exports of key chemicals used for chips and smartphones amid political disputes over wartime labour compensation.  Operating profit at the world’s largest maker of memory chips and smartphones was estimated at Won6.5tn ($5.6bn) for the April-June period, down 56.3 per cent from Won14.9tn a year earlier. Still, Samsung’s guidance was better than market estimates of Won6tn provided by Reuters. Sales were estimated to have fallen 4.2 per cent year on year to Won56tn. The company is set to announce detailed earnings later this month.  Chip prices have continued to fall since late last year, but shares of Samsung have gained nearly 20 per cent so far this year on expectations of a second-half recovery in the chip cycle. However, the downturn is expected to continue through the second half as external headwinds grow.

Teach Yourself to Be Great

Can you teach yourself to trade? Do you realize how important learning on your own is if you really want to be a successful trader? Everything about Kevin Bruce’s trading is self-taught. He started in the basement of the University of Georgia library: The school had old editions of the Wall Street Journal on microfilm. In the basement dungeon, he would compile his own record of the open, high, low, and closing prices for all markets. At the time, Bruce was actually working at a gas station at night, and between cleaning bugs off windshields and pumping gas, he had time to think and research–which is where he would analyze that price data. Bruce had a Texas Instruments handheld calculator that helped him sort through price data collected from the library. He figured out how to mathematically define a trend (in order to profit from its movement). It was a basic trend trading system. It was the same system he had used for the trading game in school with slight tweaks. Ultimately, it was the same one he would use with real money in the decades to follow.

Now ,Iam Reading

I am reading two of the best books: Master Trader by Laszlo Birinyi and and Where We Lived by Jack Larkin and one of the worst ever, Forecast by Mark Buchanan.
A disproportionate number of scholarly people have below average ability in spatial relations. I am one of them. I am reading Barrons’ “Mechanical Aptitude and Spatial Relations Test” to improve.
Ha. I now know what a tongue and groove pliers and an allen wrench is.

ATMs To Generate Receipts In Hindi-Hindi Ke Achhe Din

ATMs in Hindi-speaking states will now generate receipts in Hindi, along with English, as the Home Ministry has asked the Reserve Bank of India to direct banks to procure only those ATMs that can print receipts in Hindi. 

The ministry has also instructed two major foreign suppliers of ATMs to upgrade the software in the existing ATMs to ensure printouts in Hindi. 

The Department of Financial Services has written to the Home Ministry, saying the matter is under consideration. “We will be perusing this matter… the issue is that the printout of the receipt (from the ATM) should come in the language in which the transaction is being made,” a Home Ministry spokesperson said. 

At present, only ATMs procured by the Union Bank of India from Diebold firm have the facility to print in Hindi. 

(more…)

An IBM Hard Drive Being Loaded Onto An Airplane In 1956

IBM-HARD DISK
 

This is a picture of an IBM hard drive being loaded onto an airplane in 1956. According to @HistoricalPics, which tweeted the picture, it’s a 5 mega-byte drive, and it weighed more than 2,000 pounds. 

To put that in context, 55 years later, the weakest iPhone 5S has a 16 gigabyte drive, about 3,200-times as big. And it weighs a quarter of a pound. The IBM hard drive could have stored exactly one iPhone picture, and nothing more.

Timeline — from Thomas Edison to the unwinding of GE Capital

1890 — Four companies representing inventor Thomas Edison’s interests merge to form the Edison General Electric Company.

1932 — GE Credit Corporation begins to offer credit to customers to buy General Electric appliances.

1981 — Under chief executive Jack Welch, GE Capital begins a dramatic ascent. Between 1986 and 1993 profits double to $1.5bn and assets to $155bn. GE Capital becomes the world’s largest car-leasing company, the world’s largest ship container leasing company and the biggest private mortgage insurer.

2004 — GE Capital buys Dillard’s credit card unit for $1.25bn.

2008 — As the credit markets seize up, GE announces its first fall in quarterly profits for five years. In September, chief executive Jeff Immelt calls Henry Paulson, the then Treasury secretary, to say GE “was finding it very difficult to sell its commercial paper for any term longer than overnight”.

2011 — GE buys MetLife Bank, an online retail banking arm.

2013 — Mr Immelt sets a target that GE Capital should provide no more than 30 per cent of group earnings.

2014 — GE Capital has $7bn of net income, assets of $499bn and more than 35,000 employees. It operates in 40 countries. In the US, GE takes Synchrony Financial, its store credit card arm, public in a $2.88bn initial public offering.

2015 — Mr Immelt announces plans to sell the bulk of GE Capital over the next two years and return the company to its manufacturing roots.

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