One of the things about value investing that I think makes it hard for most investors to embrace is the fact that value-based principles tend to be counter-intuitive to the mindset that most often gets presented about the market. The first, most basic principle of value investing fits well with rule #1 of investing in […]
Read MoreThis week I’ve turned my focus primarily back on the Food Products industry in the Consumer Staples sector. It’s an area of the market that doesn’t get much buzz from market media types because it isn’t very sexy – but it is one of very few segments of the market that has seen consumer-driven improvements […]
Read MoreUncertain economic conditions are often a good time to think about stocks that most people tend to overlook because they’re “boring.” These are stocks that also tend to operate in counter-cyclical fashion. They often make up segments of the economy that you and I rely on every day, but that don’t generate the same kind […]
Read MoreOver the last few weeks, the market has started to get choppier, which generally means that it’s harder to determine whether investors are bullish or bearish. That’s a sign of uncertainty about market direction, and I’ve noticed that an increasing number of analysts have started to talk or write about something I’ve believed for some […]
Read MoreThe “herd mentality” can be a funny thing to think about in societal terms – but it’s a real thing in the stock market. The sheer number of publicly traded stocks on U.S. exchanges alone creates a wave of market data that no single person can handle alone, and that’s a big reason why it […]
Read MoreThe broad sense of hope that 2021 will set the stage for a broad recovery on multiple fronts seems to be a primary reason the broad indices pushed to a new set of all-time highs at the end of last week, with a total increase since January 1 of a little less than 6%. Indications […]
Read MoreAs a conservative-minded, value and fundamental-driven investor, my natural tendency is to shy away from stocks that market experts and popular market media analysts tend to talk to the most about. That means that my investments rarely look very sexy – but I’m far less interested in being sexy than I am in being able […]
Read MoreWhat tends to generate less buzz in market news and other media outlets than the attention that is focused on the Tech sector that has dominated most of the past year is another COVID-driven trend that I think is also very important and has a few different interesting layers to it. Stay-at-home orders, shuttered restaurants […]
Read MoreI’ve been writing quite a bit lately about positioning yourself conservatively to keep trading in a functional way even when the market is very extended. The commentary lately, and even market activity (increasing bond yields, rising inflation uncertainty), seems to be grappling with this question too. One of the biggest elements that comes to play […]
Read MoreFor the stock market, 2021 clearly appears to reflect investor’s desire to move away from the pandemic-dominated conversations of 2020 and look ahead. One of the ways that has been seen over the last few weeks is in a pretty broad rotation away from conservative, defensive-oriented stocks in sectors like Consumer Staples and into more […]
Read MoreThroughout the course of the last couple of years I’ve found the Consumer Staples sector, and specifically the Food Products industry a good place to find useful investing opportunities. In 2018 and 2019, a lot of that was being driven by international trade concerns that increased uncertainty in the marketplace. 2020 made the industry a […]
Read MoreIf you think strictly about price performance and what the price of a stock is now relative to where it was in the past – in particular, relative to where it was on a pre-pandemic basis – it’s pretty easy to understand why so much attention has been paid to Tech stocks that make remote […]
Read MoreBeing a contrarian investor can mean a few different things. To some, contrarian investing is correlated with value investing, and I think that makes sense in a lot of ways. For one thing, being a contrarian means recognizing that all price trends – up or down – are finite in length and duration. That means […]
Read MoreUncertain economic conditions have proven to be a good time to think about stocks that most people tend to overlook because they’re “boring.” These are stocks that also tend to operate in counter-cyclical fashion. It’s been interesting – but not surprising – to see a bit of a resurgence in stocks in the Food Products […]
Read MoreGetting ready to close out a year that most of us are probably anxious to put behind us and look ahead to the future has been a common theme lately on social media. I think it’s certainly true that exhaustion about COVID and everything associated with it has most people hoping for better things in […]
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