Skip to main content

Happy New Year 2014!

Year 2013 is ending on a very positive note and upbeat mood. Personally we just came from our relaxing vacation with two more families on Big Island. It was a great vacation.
US Stock markets had their best run since 1997 and all indexes except Nasdaq is ending at all time highs. The yearly gains are outstanding with DOW 28%, S&P 32% and Nasdaq 41%. Instead of individual stock picking or investing in exotic hedge funds or PE, one would have done extremely well by just buying regular index funds with lowest costs. So how did my 2013 recommendations did?
  • Best recommendations: BBY (250%) and MTG (225%)
  • Worst recommendations: VVUS (-31%), CRUS (-27%)
Others like MBI, BAC, KBH, ITB also did ok. Overall if one had invested about $10K per stock, the portfolio would have returned 41% which would have beat S&P by 9 points. Not bad!
During the course of year, I started tracking solar sector but since I had yearly recommendations, I could not change those (personally I did invest in solar and did ok)
So what's ahead in new year 2014?
Let's look at some macro view before jumping into 2014 recommendations:
  • All major world economies seem to be doing good and picking up speed
  • US, Japan, Europe are finally gaining some steam with less concerns on horizon
  • BRIC countries still have some headwinds but most likely they would be able to deal with them (possible election results in India could be one catalyst for Indian markets and economy - on that sometime later)
  • So in all except Debt limit discussions in late Jan, there are no major clouds on horizon
  • Predictions for stock indexes:
    • DOW: 18000
    • S&P: 2014
    • Nasdaq: 5000 (may break all time high)
With that in mind, here are my 2014 recommendations (buy price in brackets) - total 14 stocks.
ALU(4.4), BAC (15.5), GE (28), GRPN(11.7), MTG (8.4), NOK (8), SAN (9), SOCL (21), TAN (35), ARIA (6.8), SRPT (20), YHOO(40), NBG (5.60), RAD(5)
These are mostly my recommendations and I may or may not invest in these personally. You should do your own research before investing. 
Happy New Year to all of you and your families and friends!
/Shyam



Comments

Popular posts from this blog

2025 = Is it going to be 1997 or 2000?

Happy Holidays... After 5 months of hibernation with no real reason than writing block, I decided to use quiet morning of Christmas day to start writing again. Lot has happened in last 5 months - in particular release of Animal Spirits with Fed starting interest rate reduction cycle and historic victory of President Trump for 2nd term. As the year turns into 2025 and stock markets at all time high, one would wonder, what's next?  To answer this, one needs to look back at 1920s and 1990s to give us some context on where markets may be headed. 1920s saw invention of televisions, radio, wider adoption of cars, vacuums, penicillin and many other which we consider household items now. These inventions created roaring 20s with markets going up by 500% eventually leading to crash of 1929. However during mid-20s, markets keep going up due to excitement of these inventions and end of World War-1 and Spanish Flu Pandemic. 1990s also saw many inventions - the key being launch of Netscape in 1...

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...

And the Oscar goes to...

It's Oscar Sunday and time for predictions for few categories - before I digress into talking about drama in DC or markets.  First of all, I want to recognize the damage LA fires have done to the beloved areas of Los Angeles and impacted families across all spectrums. My heart goes out to them and wish them recovery and rebuilding of their lives... This year's Oscar nominees and post nomination period had been interesting to say the least. Due to this, the field is wide open in almost all categories and that's what makes prediction game so interesting. Just to set expectations, I would consider a win if I get even 50% predictions correct given the dynamics of nominees this year. So here are my predictions - "And the Oscar goes to..." Best Picture - Anora (surprise could be "The Brutalist") Best Director - Sean Baker for "Anora" (Surprise could be Brady Corbet for "The Brutalist") Best Actor - Adrien Brody for "The Brutalist"...