Skip to main content

"BEST" of New Year 2019!

Happy New Year to all. Finally 2018 is over and hopefully new year of 2019 would bring some much needed calm and sanity to the world of politics, economy and markets! 2018 ended as worst year for investing since great recession of 2008. While I have written about 2018 to be similar to 1998, it turned out to be worse than expected. Looking back at my recommendations at start of year, it turned out to be one of the worst year of recommendations. Let's take a look at it briefly.
  • Overall returns were negative high double digit percentages (compared to negative 6.2% for S&P). 
  • Only 6 out of 18 recommendations did better than market
  • Best performers were NTNX, RGNX and QURE
  • Worst performers were SN, NLNK and GE. The last one (GE) was real surprise. I never expected GE to be down by 57% in 2018.
So overall it was quite dismal performance. It would have been better to just invest in S&P instead. But that was last year. The Q4 market turmoil has left many stocks at "discounts" and I cannot resist the temptation of coming up with my 2019 list of 20 recommendations. In the world of acronyms, let's call 2019 theme of recommendations as "BEST" - Biotech, Energy, Streaming/Social/Semi and Technology! And here are the recommendations:
  • Biotech: NKTR ($33), VKTX ($7.50), CRSP ($28), CELG ($64), XBI ($71)
  • Energy: RIG ($7), OAS ($5.5), ECA ($5.7), XLE ($57)
  • Social/Streaming/Semi: FB ($130), NFLX ($260), DIS ($109), MU ($31), AMD ($18), ROKU($30)
  • Technology: AAPL ($155), MSFT ($100), ZUO ($18), WDC ($36), AMAT ($30)
Let's see how these BEST recommendations do in 2019. It will all depend on how markets do and that depends on following factors:
  • Direction of US interest rates 
  • US/China Trade 
  • GDP growth of world economy
  • Regaining of Trust by tech companies (especially FANG)
  • Establishing confidence in banking/financial institutions (that it's not 2008/2009)
  • Sanity to world political landscape
If 2018 indeed mimics like 1998 or even 2008, there is silver lining since both 1999 and 2009 had 20% plus returns! Here are my market predictions:
  • 1-2 more Interest rate hikes by FED. 
  • 10 year treasury would hover around 2.75 to 3.25
  • US GDP growth: 2 to 2.5%
  • US unemployment rate: 3.5 to 4.5%
  • S&P by end of 2018: 2750 to 2850
Happy New Year!
/Shyam

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

2024: The year of.....

Wishing you a joyful New Year filled with laughter, love, and unforgettable moments, surrounded by cherished family and friends. May the 2024 bring similar gains as in 2023! I had great 2 weeks break with travels to Turkey with family and then solo trip to Palm Springs. Both places are amazing and definitely worth a visit if you get chance. Talking about gains in 2023 - Here is recap of 2023.. Inflation fallen below 4% and heading towards 3% Unemployment firmly below 4% Real wages growing above 4% GDP growth around 3% Markets: S&P notching one of the best year with 24% gains while Nasdaq doing even better with 40% gains thanks to Magnificent-7 (or TAMMANNA) many of which had triple digit gains My personal recommendations did exceptionally well - many of which were up by high double digits (e.g. INTC) and some of them had triple digit gains (e.g. META) All in all - 2023 was great year.  As calendar changed to 2024, what's in store for new year? This is election year in many coun...
Post a Comment
Read more

Elections and Rotations!

2024 will be known as an important year in terms of elections (97 nations covering half the population) across the major countries in the world. We are only halfway thru the year and already some key nations have gone thru elections and voters have indicated their preference for change (in a way). Let's take a look at few. India - Modi's BJP started with lots of enthusiasm with slogans of "Modi ki Guarantee" and "400 paar" (more than 400) seats (out of 543). Indian voters (which I considered one of the most smartest) gave reality check to Modi and BJP by reducing BJP count to 240 (from 303 in previous parliament) forcing it to form coalition government. I have lot more detailed hypothesis on these results (but not here). Almost everyone (including me) got their predictions wrong and lost some friendly bets. Indians want balance between "Strong, Prosperous, Proud" India with "Inclusive, Employment and Harmony". Modi and BJP are quick learn...
Post a Comment
Read more

The "i" factors are back again!

Happy Earth Day! In following Stotra, we remember Mother Earth every morning before touching feet to the ground. समुद्रवसने   देवि   पर्वतस्तनमण्डले   । विष्णुपत्नि   नमस्तुभ्यं   पादस्पर्शं   क्षमस्वमे   ॥ Samudra-Vasane Devi Parvata-Stana-Mannddale | Vissnnu-Patni Namas-Tubhyam Paada-Sparsham Kssamasva-Me || Meaning : 1:  (Oh Mother Earth) O  Devi , You Who have the  Ocean  as Your  Garments , and  Mountains  as Your  Bosom , 2:  O  Consort  of  Lord Vishnu ,  Salutations  to  You ; Please  Forgive my Touch  of the  Feet  (on Earth, which is Your Holy Body). (source: Green Message site) So let's make sure that we honor Earth every day and preserve her for millions of years..After all we have only ONE! It has been six weeks since I wrote about markets. During that time, markets reached all time highs (almost touching 5300) and down by 5% from those levels. W...
Post a Comment
Read more