New Year 2018: Hit Refresh!

To all my readers, I wish you a very happy new year 2018. During holidays two of my friends gave me Satya Nadella's book "Hit Refresh". Initially I was little skeptical since we read about these companies and their CEOs almost on daily basis so I was wondering what new I would learn from reading the book. I must confess that I was totally wrong. Satya has narrated his personal life, his passion about cricket and corporate life effortlessly and authentically. It's more of a story of transformation he took personally and how he applied his personal experiences to transform a company like Microsoft. Over next few years Microsoft transformation will be similar to what Apple did at start of century. This book is for everyone (not only for those who work in tech) as it does provide some simple tips about life, empathy and culture.
As happens to most of us, start of new year brings new resolutions (which get forgotten by Groundhog Day). So instead of making new resolutions, I thought let's list down few simple tips based on 5 "E"s!

• Engage: Engage with real people face-to-face. Take a break from your phone, social network and look around and engage with nature. Engage with your friends and family in person!
• Energize: This may sound new year resolution of "doing exercise". But it is as simple as taking an afternoon walk, doing 10 min meditation. Go to different places, explore new routes to energize your daily routine.
• Educate: This is one of the best investment one can make. Educate yourself with new skill from YouTube videos or online micro courses. These can be anything from learning a new language (computer or spoken) to cryptocurrency or history of Chile! Help your kid prepare for her AP Psychology test (and learn about brain). Share your thoughts. Write a blog on something you are passionate about.
• Empathize: In general there is lot more need about Empathy in today's world and in particular tech world. And it starts with us practicing every day (even if it may not come naturally for left-brained people). This may be most difficult but one has to consciously try.
• Enjoy: Don't let your new year resolutions rob those enjoyable moments of finishing Ghirardelli Hot fudge Sundae or bucket of popcorn at movies. It's OK to splurge occasionally and enjoy those life-moments. Travel and visit new places (I know one of my friend does this two times every year).

That's enough before this blog starts feeling like life-advise blog (I am sure many of you have stopped reading after first few sentences and that's ok).

Let's look at predictions I made about 2017 and make new predictions and recommendations for 2018.

On macro front, most of my predictions were right on mark (tax reforms, Merkel winning, Oil price, US unemployment, 10-year treasury rate). My prediction about DOW crossing 21K was blown away by nearly 4000 points. On individual stocks, predictions were decidedly mixed. While there were winners like MU, CVRR, VRX, PTCT, there were quite a few losers like SN, REN, ENDP. 

So let's look what would 2018 bring and make some predictions and stock/ETF recommendations:

• Index levels at end of 2018: DOW: 27000-28000; S&P: 2850-2900; Nasdaq: 7500-7600. So overall about 10% gains
• GOP keeping both houses of congress
• US unemployment reaching 3.6%
• US GDP growth averaging between 2.5 to 3.5%
• Emergence of strong nationalist personalities across the world capitals

Now let's pick 18 stock/ETF recommendations:

• Biotech: XBI ($84); QURE ($19); RGNX ($33); NLNK ($8), BMRN ($89)
• Pharma: VRX ($20); ENDP ($7.7)
• Technology: XLK ($63);KWEB ($58). NTNX ($35), MU ($40)
• Energy: XLE ($72);SN ($5); KMI ($18);MRO ($16); GE ($17)
• ETF: XLF ($$27); EEM ($47);

Invest in these ONLY after your do your own due-diligence. As Buffet had said, most of the times it's best to invest in index like S&P 500 (SPY)

Hit Refresh and Be Optimistic!

/Shyam