[CNBCfix Fast Money Review Archive — October 2018]
[Wednesday, Oct. 31, 2018]
Karen stuns in red turtleneck, unfortunately struggles to make point
Well, too bad Stephanie wasn't around to hear it.
Steve Winoker on Wednesday's (10/31) Halftime Report told Judge there are 3 reasons he upgraded GE; the first reason was Larry Culp. (Larry's immense greatness should already be priced in by now.) The 2nd reason was that the stock is under $10. (The price of a stock isn't a catalyst for the stock moving up or down.)
Judge, to his credit, again questioned how much Larry Culp can really do even if he is the Greatest CEO of All Time.
But not everyone was aboard with the notion of GE being a buy. Pete Najarian predicted "maybe the 7s" for the stock. Steve Weiss said, "I'm with you."
Weiss said he's concerned about AAPL because of "the unbelievable availability of any new iPhone you wanna get."
Kourtney Gibson made the case for FB, while Weiss countered with GOOGL, claiming it doesn't have the "issues" of user engagement. (This writer is long FB.) All Kourtney needed to say was that it's ludicrous that both of these stocks are not trading for double their current price, but that's the Never-Ending Fallout From 2000, all these smart folks who aren't ever going to be fooled again by a tech crash.
On the 5 p.m. Fast Money, we were dying to hear CNBC superfox Karen Finerman's opinion on this market, especially in gorjus turtleneck; all she said was that days like Wednesday can make you feel like you missed the bottom, and/or that there's more selling to come, so "I don't really love them so much actually."
OK. Whatever.
Weiss stuck in 1980, clinging to inflation’s-just-around-the-corner thesis
Judge at the top of Wednesday's (10/31) Halftime Report recapped the market's month and then said, "The real question, is what now."
Well, that's actually "the real question" for every moment of every show.
Ed Yardeni predicted a retest of the Sept. 20 high but chided Powell for his "neutral" shifting. "Why mess with it? Leave it alone," Yardeni said.
Steve Weiss said he doesn't agree with Yardeni at all and asserted, "I think Powell's doing the right thing," stressing, "You can't wait for inflation to occur (snicker)."
Yardeni said, "We've been scared about inflation coming back for how long now?"
Moments later, Grandpa Weiss sought to clarify, "I'm not looking for a major decline in the market. What I'm saying very clearly is that the best days are behind us."
Pete Najarian said he doesn't know if we've seen the bottom, because he's "not so sure" that volatility is done. We wuz figuring, after the relentless shellacking in late October, it'll probably be more like Nov. 7, but maybe we're a few days ahead of the game.
Joe Terranova twice said Wednesday is "spooky" but admitted "technicians are gonna love today" and said he's buying SMH and QQQ on Wednesday.
Jon Najarian suggested lots of potential in names on his "shopping list" and indicated FB could be 180-200 in "6 or 9 months from now." Actually, it could happen sooner than that. (This writer is long FB.) However, Doc said he trades in the short term, not long term.
Probably more from Wednesday's Halftime/Fast Money later.
‘Power’ trip: Stephanie would rather own General Electric than a ‘perfect’ industrial, sounds as if her net worth is 100% in GE
Stephanie Link on Tuesday's (10/30) Halftime Report was given all kinds of time to explain her psychology about GE's print — and heaven help anyone who might get in the way.
"I wanted to be long into it; I wanna be longer now," Link snarled.
Josh Brown said Larry Culp has to execute. "He will," Stephanie promised.
Joe Terranova rightly questioned of Culp, "Does he even have a plan?"
Stephanie, who while discussing this stock sounded either 1) as panicked as a character in "Halloween" or 2) like a relative of Larry Culp, eventually claimed, "They restructured a lot in terms of power," one of about 5-10 mentions of the "power" division. (Give Judge credit on non-Culp euphoria; a bunch of other people on CNBC have been anointing Culp the next Steve Jobs.)
Judge brought up Stephen Tusa's skeptical view. Stephanie finally shrieked to Joe, who never said anything about perfection, "If you want perfect, go find another industrial." But that's exactly the point, Josh Brown correctly told Stephanie.
Stephanie concluded on GE, "You've already seen the majority of the correction." Sure. But if it's trading at $7 a year from now, you'll still feel like a chucklehead.
Moments later, Stephanie said of UAA, "You guys were giving me a hard time (actually, they weren't, at least not on camera) for buying GE beaten down. Guess what. I bought this one when it was beaten down."
Congrats. You bat 1.000.
No mention of Mark Yusko for 2nd day after it’s-2000-all-over-again theory
Stephanie Link on Tuesday's (10/30) Halftime Report indirectly invoked the P.E. Fallacy, suggesting that "everyone sold Facebook and went into Google because the valuations are comparable." (P.E. ratio is an effect not a cause of stock demand.)
Joe Terranova said he's "not sure" you can buy FB without knowing "what the security costs (snicker) are going to be." Stephanie cut him off to say "we already know that" and that user engagement is what's important. (And that was before the GE conversation.)
Steve Weiss dialed in to say he bought more GOOGL, for "a few reasons," one of those being "my equity exposure's extremely light" (stocks don't go up or down based on how much cash Stephen Weiss has) and of course, the multiple (the multiple is an effect not a cause of stock demand).
Josh Brown made a stink about how the Instagram founders quit apparently because ... Facebook started counting Instagram logins as Facebook logins (snicker). (This writer is long FB.)
Joe corrected Judge that he doesn't own AMZN, sold it 6 weeks ago. Joe said he wouldn't buy it now.
Jon Najarian somehow "had no idea" that UAA could surge 25% on an earnings report.
Josh Brown said he'd buy NVDA if he didn't already have an outsized position because at under $200, "they're giving the stock away."
Joe shrugged that "Nvidia is in free fall," and why buy a "near-term free fall" such as NVDA or AMD when you can buy INTC. (Perhaps that's one of the "perfect" stocks that Stephanie thinks he's finding.)
Joe said if we get above 2,706, "I'll be the first to buy the FANGs."
Jim, Doc: IBM’s deal nothing
more than a ‘Hail Mary’
Embedded within a lackluster Halftime Report on Monday (10/29), panelists expressed a remarkably stark view of IBM's big acquisition.
Misstating the function of a Hail Mary, Jim Lebenthal bluntly stated, "Look, it's 4th and long for IBM. They're throwin' a Hail Mary pass." (See, a Hail Mary typically occurs when there is only time for one more play, or perhaps a small handful of plays, regardless of down and distance.)
Judge claimed that "10%" or fewer of NFL Hail Mary passes work, as if he's actually got any research on the topic.
Jon Najarian said IBM said back on the conference call to "expect a big deal," so there you go, but he agreed with Jim that "it really is a Hail Mary."
Joe Terranova claimed that $3 billion of Red Hat sales "will equate" to $12 billion in IBM sales and concluded, "It is a good acquisition, it's just that (sic) by a challenged company."
2,532. 2,532. 2,532. Got it. 2,532. ...
Monday's (10/29) Halftime Report suffered the same irrelevancy as several other episodes this hideous month, which is picking which one of Mike Wilson's 25 recent predictions to highlight that panelists were opining about the day's trading activity that was about to be radically different within an hour or two.
(That makes it hard to get much useful information from what amounts to a pack of momentum traders whose "fundamental" (snicker) market opinions twist in the wind with yesterday's tape.)
Judge brought in Tony Dwyer, who predicted some sort of pending recovery but also some kind of fade into year-end.
Joe Terranova seemed to meander about the market eventually sorting itself out. Jon Najarian was on the right track on the subject of China, stating, "After the midterms, I think there's a negotiation." (He could've said that ending this interminable election cycle will give stocks a big lift regardless of who gets the House, and by this point, honestly, does anyone really care anymore?)
John Rogers, always a good guest and not on the show often enough, mentioned what he said is his favorite stock, MSGN, and also trumpeted recently shellacked MHK and VIAB, the latter he called "the most hated stock" he's owned in years. (It's refreshing when someone touts VIAB without also touting the Atlanta Braves tracking stock, or whatever it is, Mr. Gabelli.)
Doc said of VIAB, "If you think that stock is hated, just take a look at Facebook."
Sarat Sethi backed Rogers' endorsement of MHK.
On the 5 p.m. show, Steve Grasso continued to pine for the perfect flush, all the way to 2,532, when EVERYONE IS SCARED TO DEATH and puking out their stocks.
Member of ‘The Truth Trio’ says FANG stocks even worse than 2000 (but his positions are nowhere to be found at CNBC.com)
Bulls desperate for good news got a gift from Friday's (10/26) Halftime in the form of Mark Yusko, who not only claimed "We're gonna play out like 2000, 2001, 2002" but suggesting today's market has "eerie, eerie similation- uh similarities between the late '20s and the early '30s and today. K."
Why did he leave out September 1987?
Yusko was, actually, a fine guest who spoke clearly and didn't interrupt people despite the interruptions that happened to him. He did have a great line, offering a "technical term" for 3%, "That sucks." Nevertheless, the buffoonery runneth over, as Yusko contended "The FANGS were as overvalued as any group of stocks we've ever seen in history" and added, "I think Amazon from here will be dead money for a decade. I think Netflix from here will lose you money for a decade." (This writer is long FB.)
Judge, in his most cogent question of the day if not month, asked Yusko, "Why does the next real big correction, or whatever it is, have to be, like, the biggest one. Or close to '08, or have- or have all the- you know, hyperbolic nature to these calls."
Yusko responded that "we've been building up to the 2nd-greatest bubble in history," but now it's "worse."
Piecing together evidence for his case like they do with grassy knoll theories, Yusko said he detected real inflation from his Chapel Hill, N.C., burrito bowl and drink that he says used to cost $10 and now costs $18. "It was good, but it wasn't that good," Yusko explained.
Kevin O'Leary asked Yusko why credit spreads aren't blowing out. Yusko said that's because "they don't have covenants anymore," the first time we've heard "covenants" on the show in months if not years.
Yusko spoke of diversifying into "crypto" (snicker) with a straight face and offered to talk about it more; Judge didn't take him up on that. We never saw one of those pop-up windows on the screen denoting Yusko's long and/or short positions, nor did Judge ever ask, nor did we see any kind of disclosures at the Halftime Report portal on CNBC.com ... or anywhere at CNBC.com.
Yusko said of Mike Wilson, "I need to hang out with him. He's part of The Truth Trio. Someone labeled us on Twitter, Gundlach, me and him are The Truth Trio, so I- I wanna hang out with that guy."
Yusko actually said "we've met all 10,000" hedge funds.
When he wasn't interrupting Mark Yusko (it started with Yusko's first few words over the definition of "fair value"), Josh Brown said it's hard to believe that "the selling just stops on a dime."
Kevin O'Leary contended that "things are getting cheap."
Meghan Shue said typical pullbacks in a given year are 14%. Shue said she's not "leaning in" to this selloff, but, "We're not making any rash decisions."
Jon Najarian bluntly declared that a bunch of morons were buying put protection and VIX calls in the last few days, "this is the wrong time to be doing it" and in fact it's frankly "stupid" because "they way overpaid for it."
Despite offering a gloom scenario from the get-go, it was only 3/4 of the way into the program when Yusko contended, "We're gonna play out like 2000, 2001, 2002," suggesting down high single digits this year and down double digits next year, "a shallow recession," and then, "the debt bubble breaks."
Eventually Judge said to Josh Brown, "Can you please, can you please, let him answer the question."
"I'm wrong all the time," Yusko admitted at one point.
Kevin O'Leary said, "Mark, I respect what you're saying." Goodness knows why.
Liz Ann Sonders says September 2018 might well be market top for next 2 years
Judge on Thursday's Halftime brought in ... yep ... Mike Wilson, the most bearish person the show can find in October 2018 ... but by also summoning Liz Ann Sonders, Judge managed to find someone even more bearish than Mike.
Liz Ann, who is stunning but wasn't shown on TV this time, said, "It wouldn't surprise me if a year from now, 2 years from now, we look back and say, you know, the be- be-, the September of, uh, 2018 was the peak of the bull market."
But then, as Mike does in basically every appearance, Liz Ann watered down the terminology into mashed potatoes, clarifying that "it could very likely be a cyclical bear market in an ongoing secular bull market."
A cyclical bear market within an ongoing bull market.
That's interesting.
Mike, by contrast, had to deal with a tough hombre in the form of Joe Terranova, who impressively mentioned Mike's Sept. 12 comment of a "multi-year bear market" and wondered if, after a decade of buying the dip being the smart strategy, "this time is different."
Mike dodged the statement/question, saying that the "bear market (sic)" started in December/January, then predicted the next 12 months: "I suspect we're gonna be range-bound for another year or so. That's your bear market."
Hmmmmm. OK. So now a "bear market" is defined as the 2018 market, which is up 1% (S&P) and 6% (Nasdaq Composite).
Scott Wapner introduced Wilson as "The Street strategist who called the correction" and "The man who saw the selling coming."
Scott did not say that on Sept. 17, Wilson agreed it's "correct" that he has a 2,750 S&P 500 target. And that Wilson actually said then, "People are cramming into defensives and growth stocks. Because they're the safe havens; in a world of lower growth, that's what you wanna own." And that he claimed, "These stocks in the U.S. are gonna have to be sold to buy the things overseas."
Nor did Scott say that on Oct. 1, Wilson claimed both "You're gonna get chasing in areas people don't own, because they're gonna work" and "Uh, but I think what they're gonna wanna buy are the things that have worked all year."
If Mike's the guy who calls the market correctly each week, as Scott and Melissa claim regularly, why don't Scott and Mel ditch TV and launch a hedge fund with Mike and make more money than Warren Buffett?
Didn't think so.
Wilson seemed to be saying Thursday that stocks are near a turning point — to the upside. As for the selloff, "80% of it's probably done at this point," Wilson contended, calling 2,450 or 2,500 "a very good entry point" in the next 4-8 weeks, except if it hits 2,450, then it would seem like we're only maybe 50% of the way there, not "80%."
Judge credited Wilson for calling a "dead-cat bounce" the other day when there was a "bounce." Maybe the month of October is just a dead-cat drop.
Wilson brought up an angle he has recently floated but has escaped mention by Wapner. "I would also argue that maybe the market's starting to sniff out a Republican sweep," Wilson said, adding "We'd probably be a seller of that."
Steve Weiss said that's "exactly" what "some people" he's spoken to are thinking. (So now we're predicting elections 2 weeks from now and A) the immediate market reaction to this possible event and B) the long-term market reaction to this possible event.)
Weiss bragged that he bought NVDA at 40 and sold at 80 and then claimed it shows he doesn't get it because the stock's now a lot higher. Weiss remains obsessed with MSFT supposedly having an "excessive" valuation.
On the 5 p.m. Fast Money, Tim Seymour said "there's a reason why we're pulling back," namely "we were way overbought" because people were "indiscriminate" about multiples. (Sorry, multiples are an effect of stock demand, not a cause.)
Karen Finerman complained that GOOGL is doing "absolutely nothing" with its cash hoard.
Steve Grasso wants to see a test of 2,532 before he'll feel really comfortable buying. A lot of people are demanding to see the "whoosh" or "flush" before they feel comfortable buying. Shame on the market for not cooperating with that.
Carter Worth, in a classy comment, said, "I still read newspapers manually, the printed kind."
Karen: ‘I kinda find this fascinating’
Judge on Wednesday (10/24) conducted a Halftime Report, but the stock market fireworks didn't occur until a few hours later, so we'll just fast-forward to the Fast Money gang.
Steve Grasso said, "They're looking for 2,532. ... Bears are throwing numbers out there that you can't believe."
Karen Finerman said, "I didn't do a lot today, although, I mean, I kinda find this fascinating, especially the last half-hour where they're just absolutely puking out anything. I mean, it was a real puke."
Karen touted GOOGL despite its "horrible day," contending it's "so overdone, it's ridiculous."
Karen's right. October 2018 has been a suck-fest for stocks, no doubt about it, and a buncha people are getting buffaloed. But think of it this way: In a short while, it'll be a massive gift (assuming you've got some dry powder and didn't do all your buying in August), and no one will even remember what was going on this month.
Steve Grasso tried to convince Karen this is all about the Fed, but Karen wasn't fully aboard.
Guy Adami tried to make a point that selloffs get scrutiny that doesn't occur when stocks go up.
"The worst thing that can happen in my opinion is we open up higher tomorrow," Adami said.
Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz
We did, actually, manage to wake up during Monday's (10/22) Halftime Report, around the time Joe Terranova made it sound like he was about to deliver the Gettysburg Address in stating that investing is now about ... drum roll ... "quality companies."
Josh Brown sounded practically giddy that you can earn "roughly 2% in a 1-to-3-month Treasury-bill portfolio."
Guest host Brian Sullivan asked his panel if the bottom is in, kind of a strange question on such a sluggish day. Alli McCartney doesn't think so. Jim Lebenthal said the market "isn't believing past earnings." Joe suggested the market is just going to "end up nowhere" and said there's a "deleveraging process in the market."
Steve Weiss told Sully, "I'm not sure frankly of the value of the question" because "market bottoms aren't created by trading down 5-6%."
Sully challenged Weiss to appear on Worldwide Exchange at 5:01 a.m. Eastern.
Then came Mr. Excitement, Toni Sacconaghi.
When was the last time Halftime/Fast Money invited Peter Schiff to discuss $5,000 gold?
On Friday's (10/19) Halftime Report, Jim Lebenthal indicated he's been drinking some of the Kool-aid of a sorta-bear who's frequently on CNBC.
"What's been happening here Steve is a rolling bear market," Jim explained.
Is that right.
For his part, Steve Weiss sounded wishy-washy, revealing he's out of AMD, which was supposedly a great company in turnaround mode when the stock was over $30.
"I thought it would bounce with the market," Weiss admitted. #that'swhatwemeanbymomentumtraders
Tom Lee made the case for a rotation into value (snicker).
Josh Brown said a "trader" should not buy FDX but that it's a "different story" as to whether an "investor" should. (It's either going down or it's going up regardless of whether the buyers are "investors" or "traders.")
On Thursday's (10/18) 5 p.m. Fast Money, Karen Finerman stunned in black turtleneck (below) and called the reaction to URI "way, way bigger" than what the stock merited.
Guy Adami offered a sensational tribute to Max Meyers, who's moving up the CNBC ladder to Squawk Box duties.
Someone just said Friday was ‘the worst thing that could’ve happened’ to bulls because there was ‘no catharsis’
Tuesday's (10/16) Halftime Report panel made the pending NFLX earnings call sound as important as Bush v. Gore at the Supreme Court.
Jim Lebenthal insisted, "It's all about sentiment" regarding NFLX.
Bill Nygren actually talked up NFLX. Judge suggested NFLX could be a "referendum" (snicker) on growth vs. value (double snicker). Bill called that a "false comparison." Bill said if NFLX charged $15 a month, "growth would slow dramatically."
"To us, this is a media company," Bill explained.
Judge also felt compelled to ask Bill about GE. Bill admitted his shop was "big fans" of John Flannery and considered him "an exceptional manager." He said he doesn't think Flannery deserved firing.
Joe Terranova was asked about TWLO's slide. "What a gift," Joe said.
Judge promised Lee Cooperman on Wednesday's show. We're guessing that if Lee could change anything about the American legal system, it would be, "Loser pays."
Guy Adami on the 5 p.m. show, obviously ignoring the insight of Mike Wilson, claimed, "Day to day, there's no- there's no way to figure this out."
Karen Finerman said earnings have been "really, really good," and guidance has been good too.
What in the world was
Carter Worth talking about?
It's called "filler."
Apparently not having enough Rolling Bear Market Buffoonery/cryptogarbage/pot stocks (notice how that's superseded cryptogarbage in terms of show coverage now)/latest momentum trading updates for 45 minutes of fresh material Monday (10/15), Fast Money for some reason tapped Carter Worth, whose specialty is predicting stock-price moves based on previous buying and selling activity, to deliver a history lesson on ... American retail.
Worth decided to compare ... this is actually what he showed on a screen ... Sears, Woolworth's, Amazon and Walmart employees as a percentage of U.S. population at the time of the company's peak head count ... numbers that appeared to bear zero correlation to each other.
(Also, Worth lists "309 M" as U.S. population for both Walmart and Amazon. From a Google search, we just learned that current U.S. population is 325 million and that the population was 309 million in 2010.)
Worth eventually told Karen Finerman, who turned up in stunning new hairstyle, "There's only 2 things. There's only 2 kinds of weakness. A weakness to take advantage of, and a weakness to stay away from." Or in other words, some stocks you wanna buy, and other stocks, you don't wanna buy.
Missy Lee hailed as a conquering hero the dude who recently said people would chase the things they don't own and chase the things they do own (which one of those is working out) and seems to have unlimited time to appear on television as the lone Wall Street figure who'll show up on TV to proclaim a bear market. He said "OK" 12 times.
Judge didn’t say anything about Mike Wilson’s political call
Last week, as stocks flailed amid a stoooooopid selloff over a rate rise that no one will remember in 6 months, CNBC producers went hunting for whatever bears they could round up and settled on Mike Wilson, who has been calling a bear market since December but now claims a negative "tipping point" involving interest rates.
Scott Wapner spent considerable time on Wilson's latest opinion on the Halftime Report last Thursday (10/11) ... but somehow omitted a curious thesis in Wilson's note last week.
Wilson wrote: "If the market begins to believe that a Republican sweep is likely to occur in the midterms, the likelihood of a tax cut extension, infrastructure spending and continued focus on trade protectionism all rise. We view these potential policy paths as inflationary and likely to add to the deficit, providing upward pressure on rates."
So Wilson is suddenly claiming a Republican rally in the midterms.
No. Check that. Wilson is saying "if" the market "begins" to "believe" in such a rally, then ...
Apparently Wilson is claiming that simply belief in a Republican sweep makes tax cut extensions, infrastructure and protectionism more likely, which apparently will uncork interest rate spikes.
Is this for real?
So basically, according to Wilson's note, if you like the Democrats in November, you should be backing up the truck on this market. That's even though Judge was heard to tell Lee Cooperman on the Feb. 7 Halftime that "History would suggest that, that when you have a, a, a midterm election turnover, uh, the market doesn't like that."
That was around the time Jim Lebenthal was warning everyone of the "summer election cycle."
So basically, the bear case is a Democratic win ... as well as a Republican win.
On Monday's (10/15) Halftime Report, Carl Icahn spent much of the session complaining about Michael Dell.
Other than that, Joe Terranova declared NFLX's earnings release this week is "so important" (snicker).
Jon Najarian said he sees a "flush" in a lot of recently hammered tech names. "Joe's lookin' at Netflix. I'm not sayin' he's wrong. I'm lookin' at Facebook," Doc said.
Kevin O'Leary said he's come to learn that you should own NFLX "coming into earnings."
Desperate for bears, Judge aired a Squawk Box clip of David Gerstenhaber, who said stocks' outlook "isn't nearly as good as it was."
Judge claimed he's "very struck" that both Jim Cramer and Rick Rieder are "both worried about a Fed policy error (snicker)."
Carl Icahn said "you have to be cautious" about this stock market. He didn't say anything about the "Day of Reckoning" (snicker) that was coming a couple years ago.
Doc on Sept. 21 called for a chase for performance into year-end
We figured that Friday's market action probably didn't flush out all the worrywarts, and that was confirmed by Carter Worth's ludicrous remarks on Friday's (10/12) Fast Money.
Worth started uttering mumbo jumbo about how Friday was "the worst thing that could've happened" to bulls because there's "no catharsis." (Note to Carter: Basically the whole world is waiting for the "catharsis" or "capitulation" or "whoosh" to get the all-clear signal to buy again so that they NEVER LOSE MONEY ON A STOCK AGAIN. It doesn't mean it's going to happen.)
(Further note to Carter: This selloff is stooooopid, and everyone knows it, and everyone's dying to jump in, and the only reason they haven't is because they think they might still be able to get a better deal next week.)
Karen Finerman astutely pointed out that markets did indeed withstand some selling on Friday. "It DID go down," to the tune of a "400-plus point reversal," then rallying, Karen said.
On Friday's Halftime Report, Shannon Saccocia predicted "a few more days at least" of feeling the "full brunt" of the selloff.
Gorjus Liz Ann Sonders claimed sentiment had been starting to get "frothy," or December-January-esque, again. That's funny; we haven't heard Judge bring up "euphoria" in months, perhaps not since January.
Steve Weiss admitted "I don't really know" if the bottom is in. But he said he bought airlines, which he hasn't been in for "months and months."
Indicating he's been asleep for 3 years, Weiss sounded stunned that the president has attacked the "credibility" of the Fed, and "that's scary." (Sorry that we're not that scared.)
Jim Lebenthal curiously cooked up the notion that, "Fridays have traditionally in this, in this administration been a bad time to buy. You've got 3 days of news cycle. Anything could come out."
Weiss said Larry Kudlow is "talking 2 ways" (snicker) about tariffs.
Josh Brown explained that Ford has sold at 6 times for 10 years "because they're not good at making cars and selling them."
Jim Lebenthal said there's "no need to be a hero" in NFLX. But Josh Brown said he likes the risk/reward, shrugging that it has twice bounced off 320.
Steve Weiss made a fair point that if you think energy is rising, there are better plays than Big Oil, but he somehow claimed "Big Oil is very, very tough to analyze." (Translation: Whenever oil or nat gas rises, they're good plays.)
Karen Finerman on the 5 p.m. Fast Money spoke of Jamie Dimon's handling of the conference call. "He is setting up Marianne Lake to become his successor," Karen inferred. "This is just my own opinion, that he would like to have a woman in that role."
Early October 2018 will forever be known on CNBC as the ‘Crazy Fed Crash’
To no one's surprise, Scott Wapner on Thursday's (10/11) Halftime Report brought back Mike Wilson, the only bear/semi-bear CNBC can find these days and the closest thing to a fear-monger the show has been able to feature this year. (Apparently Marc Faber and Kyle Bass no longer do interviews.)
Wilson actually started off ... OK (see, that's his favorite word) ... this time.
"We got this sort of exogenous shock in rates 2 weeks ago, which by the way, we didn't really see," Wilson refreshingly admitted before questionably attributing the move to a "funding deficit" that has created a "liquidity problem."
But moments later, Wilson said, "We're going through a rolling bear market."
Then he said it again. And as usual, panelists sat on their hands and bought it hook, line and sinker.
"Rolling bear market" is Wilson's gimmick for grabbing headlines and getting written up in Barron's. It's a term that 1) isn't even remotely accurate and 2) makes no sense.
Yet again, neither Scott Wapner nor any of his panelists had the brass to question "how in the world is this a bear market" and "what are you talking about," because they're just a pack of momentum traders who twist in the wind at any zigzag and aren't any better than Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson at predicting the direction of the stock market.
We like how several panelists really liked AMD over 30 a couple weeks ago; nobody said a word about it Wednesday and Thursday. (If it's such a great company reinventing itself, isn't it a better buy at 25 than 34?) Then there were the Najarii on Sept. 27 trumpeting FB calls (stock was 168) right after Scott Devitt the same day pounded the table for AMZN 2,525.
Barely more than a week ago, we were hearing about the "chase for performance" into year-end, when Mike Wilson claimed people would chase the things they didn't own and chase the things they did own (that's correct).
OK?
OK.
Karen Finerman on the 5 p.m. Fast Money said you should buy at the point of "maximum pain," but she wasn't quite feeling that Thursday.
We agree. The problem is, everybody is using that barometer to time the market, so the bottom could quietly happen while everyone's sitting around waiting for it, and so nobody really has any idea whether there is gobs more pain ahead Friday, or whether stocks will be a moonshot from here.
"There was some panic today," said Steve Grasso.
Melissa Lee advertised CNBC's 7 p.m. Eastern "Market Sell-Off" special. It was basically just an extension of King Momentum Trader Jim Cramer's Mad Money but featured Seema Mody in green dress.
Jim Birdsall clearly taking
time off this week
One indication that this stock market will soon (we don't know which day) start going right back up stems from what you did NOT hear on Thursday's (10/11) Halftime Report.
No one was talking about unloading stocks. Rather, everyone was verbally dancing around the fact that this selloff is stoooopid.
Jim Lebenthal, who was practically shut out, offered that we're "pretty far" from a recession/bear market.
Jim said he's ready to "pounce" but can "wait a day or two" to start buying.
(Of course, it's fine to wait. Why not let the market find its footing again. Here's the problem with that. What happens in times like these is that, on the day of the bottom/reversal, stocks can experience such a massive plunge that you can actually make a year's worth of return on a hyper-V recovery in a single day, and the thought of that is hard to resist.)
(But then again, anyone nibbling last Thursday-Friday ... gulp ... now feels like a moron.)
Joe Terranova, who tends to grasp for definitions and slogans at times like this, contended, "I think it's about leverage, and I think it's about liquidity."
Steve Weiss contended that there's a "reasonable case" to be in 10-year bonds.
Judge said Larry Kudlow said this is "just a correction."
Steve Liesman suggested that the market may have bought "more of the hype around the tax cuts than might be warranted," which hardly seems like the cause of being down 1,400 Dow points in 2 days.
Liesman delivered another shot to Rick Santelli (but not by name, and Santelli wasn't on the show Thursday) and then defended the central bank as everyone somehow on CNBC seems to be floored by Donald Trump's comments about the Fed. "I mean, I think somebody needs to say that the president's out of control when it comes to his commentary on the Fed. He has really gone way over the line," Liesman said, only about the 50th time we've heard in 3 years that Donald Trump has gone way over the line.
Liesman at one point used the term "promulgated."
Later, Judge offered Jeffrey Gundlach uninterrupted soundbites for 5 minutes (that's correct) and 3 minutes (also correct), as well as a few other comments.
Jeffrey opined that the "rise" in rates and the "speed" of the rise are weighing on the market. Who knew.
Gundlach pointed to U.S. outperformance from the rest of the world since June and concluded, "Something bad must be happening."
Then again, he said the Fed isn't being too aggressive but perhaps was "far too dovish for far too long."
Gundlach correctly said it's "kind of a myth" that the Fed is "really all that independent." What he didn't say is that the Fed is just a massive consensus that deals with input/pressure from not only the White House but Congress, Wall Street and foreign governments and banks. It's not like Jerome Powell can just show up and giggle, "Hee hee hee, I'm hiking to 6.75% today!"
Jeffrey Gundlach said Donald Trump is a "different kind of guy" and noted, "He calls out everybody."
Karen: Stocks suddenly trading down in integers is ‘appealing to me’
After the bizarre, ludicrous conclusion to Wednesday's stock-market trading session, all we wanted to do was hear from CNBC's golden Karen Finerman, who typically rises to the occasion on such days.
On Wednesday's (10/10) Fast Money, Finerman explained: "Clearly, markets overseas are gonna open down ... I'm sort of intrigued by this. I always say that when things start to trade down in integers at a time, something else is going on, and that's appealing to me."
"I don't think that things have changed that much fundamentally in terms of how the U.S. economy is doing," Karen added.
Karen said the bar has gotten "significantly lower" for earnings.
Karen said she took a "weenie approach" to getting back into FB and GOOGL with call spreads.
Steve Grasso said, "We're right around support levels," but he seemed wishy-washy as to how much more "deleveraging" will occur.
The panel spent considerable time critiquing the accuracy of Donald Trump's "crazy"-Fed comments. #electedtoentertain
Grandpa Weiss unloads, might’ve gotten Jedi Mind-Tricked by Mike Wilson
Steve Weiss opened Wednesday's (10/10) Halftime claiming an accurate stock-market call, stating, "I've been pretty clear, I've been lightening exposure significantly, uh, cutting basically all the positions that I had to some degree, except Allergan ... just because I think it's a safe haven."
Congrats.
Weiss said he's "uncomfortable" with "valuation extension" and claimed "I started doing it a few weeks ago." (He didn't explain why GOOGL is selling off after trumpeting its supposedly great valuation again Wednesday.) (Translation: Weiss and others think GOOGL is great BECAUSE IT HAS A LOW P.E. RATIO, but it's still down 175 bucks from its high.) (Further translation: If trading stocks is all about P.E. ratio, why not just build a P.E. algorithm?)
Weiss claimed "inflation is burgeoning" and also cautioned, "If you rely on past cycles, you're making a mistake. 'Cause there's no playbook for this whatsoever."
Well, we'll take the other side of that. Because in 2014, on Sept. 19, the Nasdaq Composite was 4,600. On Oct. 1, it was in the 4400s, and Larry Altman told the Halftime Report that markets "usually bottom around the first week and a half, 2 weeks in October." On Oct. 15, it was in the 4100s. On Oct. 31, it was 4,600 again.
Weiss singled out MSFT as one to sell. But Pete Najarian said he sees "opportunity" in MSFT.
Even though no one on this commercial-less program (for about the first 45 minutes) (#lostrevenue,Judge) could explain, as far as we could tell, why the Dow was down 400 points Wednesday, Weiss sounded a bit like he's been drinking Mike Wilson's Kool-aid "tipping point" (photo above is not from Wednesday). Just a day earlier, Judge declared with a straight face, "Mike's been pretty on the money uh with how the market has traded," ignoring that just a week ago Monday, Wilson claimed both "You're gonna get chasing in areas people don't own, because they're gonna work" and "Uh, but I think what they're gonna wanna buy are the things that have worked all year."
Some call this a "tipping point."
We call it a "gift." (#buyFAANGwhenyoucan,laughlater)
How do we know that bonds caused stocks to fall rather than the other way around?
While Steve Weiss played the inflation/multiple card on Wednesday's (10/10) Halftime, Kari Firestone revealed, "I don't find this so startling."
Kari said there's a case that rate fears are "a little overplayed" and noted, "We're still up 8% on the S&P."
Jon Najarian recapped the path of the S&P over the last 2 months and stated the UVXY indicates there's "not nearly the panic" that there was around the Super Bowl (regarding stocks, not the possibility of the Patriots winning it again, which wasn't realized).
Pete Najarian shrugged that it's "significant selling in the names that have these incredible multiples."
Pete admitted he bought EBAY at 33, and he likes it, even though it's lower Wednesday.
Joe Terranova, who didn't say "time correction" this time but does see a "momentum correction," grumbled "candidly" that investors are "lazy" and that "investing is not an entitlement."
Joe grumbled that people piled into SFIX in the 50s while "they don't even know what it does."
25 minutes into the show, Judge said some "large investors" had been emailing him recently that this is "Goldilocks."
Scott Minerd revealed in January that ‘the key is to know when to get out’
Scott Wapner on Wednesday's (10/10) Halftime tried to scare Steve Liesman into believing that JEROME POWELL IS NOT GOING TO STOP!!!!!!!
Liesman simply responded, "I think not raising rates right now is monetary policy malpractice."
Liesman said the last week's stock market activity is merely a "lurch" into a different rate mindset.
Joe Terranova announced that Jon Najarian said before the show that the Fed's "terminal rate" is 3.50-3.75. Steve Weiss asked Joe to define "terminal rate." Joe looked surprised and stated, "When the Federal Reserve stops!" Weiss said he thought that's what Joe meant, but, "I just don't see it there."
In a shocker ... actually on CNBC, it's not that much of a shocker (consider that Larry Kudlow is advising the president) ... someone actually claimed Donald Trump might be right about something. Steve Liesman started talking about the "mistake point" and even said, "Where the president is potentially right here" is the notion of whether the Fed should be "preemptively raising rates," which has been the historic playbook, rather than waiting to see the robust inflation.
Judge demanded Rick Santelli declare whether Donald Trump is right or wrong on rates. Rick said he doesn't think this Fed is moving too fast but that other Feds have moved too slowly.
Judge then set up another scrape between Steve Liesman and Rick Santelli in which Rick shouted that Liesman never answers a straight question and Liesman accused Rick of talking over him and ignoring things the Federal Reserve has done right.
At one point, Santelli mocked Steve "there's no playbook for this environment" Weiss, in fact accusing Weiss of relying on old playbooks, stating, "It's not the '80s anymore."
Judge announced that "someone" just sent him a note that "this is Powell's first communications stumble." That would be significant if Judge would actually tell us who "someone" is, for example, whether it's Warren Buffett or ... Scott "The key is to know when to get out" Minerd, who is apparently comparing this week to 1987 (snicker) (buy signal), according to what we heard on Power Lunch.
Nasdaq Comp still up 4% since Judge last got Jedi Mind-Tricked by Mike Wilson (above)
Viewers of Tuesday's (10/9) Halftime got a healthy dose of Mike Wilson for the opening 10 minutes — even though Wilson wasn't on the program.
He didn't need to be, given that Judge was in Wilson Water-Boy Mode again. (That's harsh. Take that back. Barron's writes about Wilson too.)
Pete Najarian actually started off Tuesday saying Mike Wilson "has that great article out" involving the "tipping point" of markets and rates or something or other.
"Mike's been pretty on the money uh with how the market has traded," Judge agreed, a statement with utterly zero basis in fact.
Judge questioned if Wilson is correct (snicker) that "portfolios need to shift" because, among other things, "value is back in favor" (snicker).
Joe Terranova correctly (if not obviously) insisted there's still a "fundamentally strong" argument for tech. Judge then demanded Joe explain why tech is "selling off" and scoffed when Joe mentioned "buybacks."
Judge was so infatuated with Wilson's latest note that he was still talking about it at the 20-minute mark.
Say Judge, what do you think of this "rolling bear market" that Mike says we're in?
Elsewhere, Judge actually wondered is Powell is "potentially gonna make a mistake." omg ... THE FED MIGHT MAKE A MISTAKE!!!!!!!
Steve Liesman marveled about Jerome Powell's "absolute disdain for forecasts." Steve could've made things simpler for us and stated that everybody loves the Fed chief and all of his/her quirkiness while stocks go up; when stocks go south, so do opinions of the Fed chief.
Liesman said the corporate tax cut "went too far," basically because there might not be enough room left for a fiscal response in the event of a downturn.
More from Tuesday's and (perhaps Monday's) Halftime/Fast later.
Without Seema, this definitely would’ve been skippable, but ...
CNBC's stupendously gorgeous Seema Mody gave Friday's (10/5) unbelievably lethargic Halftime Report a big-time jump with a couple of reports on David Einhorn and the day's market news.
Prior to that, panelists batted around the 3.25% 10-year like beach balls at a Grateful Dead concert, with everyone saying it's not a big deal but Scott Wapner nevertheless taking up perhaps the show's most tiresome refrain of all time, MAYBE THE MARKET ISN'T READY FOR ALL THE RATE HIKES THE FED WANTS TO DO!!!!!!!!!!
Rob Sechan said Rick Rieder predicted an "air pocket" at 3.25, but Rob thinks the jobs report was "pretty benign."
Brenda Vingiello, one of the striking new names recently rounding out the panel, made a cogent point about the sudden lack of interest in obsessing over the inverted yield curve, a point Jim Lebenthal endorsed.
Judge for whatever reason let Tom Lee continue for about 30 seconds AFTER it was obvious that Lee's connection was so bad, nobody had a clue what he was talking about. (It probably had something to do with bitcoin being worth $25,000.)
Mody provided an update from David Einhorn; the meat of that news involving Einhorn's disdain for Tesla was picked up by Judge, who insisted on reading portions of it and was interrupted twice, by Josh Brown, prompting Judge to say, "Let me finish; don't interrupt me next time, please." Well, if you constantly invite Josh Brown on your program, expect interruptions. Brown articulates quality commentary. He's not highly skilled with soundbites, and he has trouble knowing when to stop. (Judge appeared to uncork a bit of payback by later bringing up SFIX out of the blue.)
Jim Lebenthal said there's no comparison of Tesla to Lehman Brothers. Lebenthal and Brown agreed that Tesla needs to raise money, and Brown questioned Musk "bailing out" Solar City, though Brown suggested TSLA's success is similar to all the low points of Donald Trump's 2016 campaign that didn't seem to matter.
Judge made an interesting pronouncement: "Active managers have gotten clobbered." Rob Sechan agreed that only 11% of active managers in large caps over 10 years have beaten benchmarks, "and there's been no consistency of who's done it." That latter point would surely have been challenged by Steve Weiss, had Weiss been on the show, because we're sure that Tepper always beats it.
Of course we can't call it a "recommendation," but Josh Brown said "I much prefer" STOR to SPG; he's long STOR. (But he's not recommending it.)
Jim somehow brought up QCOM's dispute with AAPL again (that's beginning to rival The Fed Getting It Wrong in long-running show cliches).
Steve Grasso on Friday's 5 p.m. Fast Money revealed, "I was shocked at the pay package that Culp has."
Neither Judge nor Mel asked anyone about Judge Brett Kavanaugh or Sen. Susan Collins.
Larry Altman’s October
insight from 2014
Judge for some reason on Thursday's (10/4) Halftime Report brought in Lisa Ellis for a lengthy chat on ... Zzzzzzzzzzz .... IBM.
Joe Terranova mentioned TWLO, "my favorite name" (though he just admitted this week he's not in it, so much for being a favorite), this time as an example of what people are selling.
Citing Joe Papa at Valeant/whateverthenameisnow, Judge told Deane Dray that even a superstar new CEO can't fix everything at a troubled company such as GE.
Basically recent episodes of the Halftime Report can be slimmed down to 3 minutes, allowing for everyone to recommend energy.
Karen Finerman on the 5 p.m. Fast Money said, "Today was just an awful day, P&L wise, but in terms of running for cover, I was selling cover."
Mel asked the panel a great question, "What is a good number" in Friday's jobs report.
Karen said "absurd" 4 times (that's correct, quatro) in regard to Elon Musk's latest SEC tweets and called Tesla's corporate governance "horrific."
Thursday's dreadful stock action, and CNBCers' inability to really explain Thursday why the stock selloff/rate spike was happening, reminded us of a great call from 4 years ago — when S&P 500 watcher Larry Altman (picture above from many years ago) told the Halftime Report that markets "usually bottom around the first week and a half, 2 weeks in October, or the first week or 2 weeks in March."
Now, we're not — and nobody else is either save perhaps for Mike Wilson — expecting the S&P 500 to suddenly plunge to the Feb. 8 low within a week.
But we do think Altman had it right, in general, that early October tends to be notorious for stocks, for whatever reason. And we think Karen's decision to sell cover will soon be validated.
Navin Shenoy. Oh, joy.
Steve Weiss on Wednesday's (10/3) Halftime Report said this market continues to have "no playbook."
Joe Terranova said he bought BX on Tuesday. But Joe got tripped up talking about "Stitch Fitch (sic)." After being corrected, he called it "Stick (sic) Fitch (sic)."
The Najarii spoke about options and gave an update on a recent winner, INTC. But they didn't talk about how they were just trumpeting FB calls a few days ago. (i.e., the 1990-93 Buffalo Bills were dominant except for the 4 Super Bowls.) Pete briefly admitted his 33 calls in AMD were probably going to be worthless, then he quickly changed the subject to INTC.
Back to stocks, Steve Weiss averaged down in AMD, revealing he added on Wednesday.
Joe said "do not buy" FB because "there's still too much out there." (This writer is long FB.) We'll take the other side of that. Buy FAANG when you can, laugh later.
On the 5 p.m. Fast Money, Karen Finerman said the earnings bar is "medium high already," which makes her "a little bit nervous." But Karen said Wednesday's employment number bodes "very very well for earnings."
After years of Final Trades and discussing stocks, Josh Brown insists he’s not actually recommending anything (a/k/a SFIX might become ‘the Netflix for apparel’)
Judge on Tuesday's (10/2) Halftime Report reminded Josh Brown that Brown recently "recommended" (that's a key word) SFIX.
(Note: That's "Stitch Fix" that Brown recommended ... not "CNBCfix.")
Brown protested, "I don't recommend stocks. I bought it and said the reason I bought it was because-"
"By virtue of buying it, people take that as a recommendation," Judge explained.
"That's OK, so, I'm a registered person-" Brown said.
"... Play semantics with me, but you know what I'm saying," Judge said.
"It's not semantics! I literally cannot make financial advice (sic grammar) to people I've never met," Brown shot back.
"That's fine," Judge said.
Brown then tried to spin SFIX's quarter as good as possible, pointing to new investments that are "great, long-term ideas for the company."
Brown's non-recommendation was, "I'm not selling."
Judge said he thinks SFIX is "the Francesa (snicker) stock."
Brown concluded by revealing, "My idea with Stitch Fix was, this is a company that potentially could become the Netflix for apparel, which is a massive business."
In a non-recommendation at the end of the show, Brown said, "I wanna mention AMD ... I think it's setting up."
Mike Wilson is now concerned about the 10-year yield
In a stark departure from the Bear Market Buffoonery of Monday's Fast Money (see below), Ed Yardeni on Tuesday's (10/2) Halftime Report said that at the end of last year, "I was predicting 3,100" in the S&P 500, and he thinks "probably 3,500 next year."
"As long as there isn't a man-made crisis, we should have smooth sailing," said Jim Lebenthal.
Yardeni curiously said there's still a lot of "discrimination" as to which stocks are doing well, and which ones aren't.
Josh Brown downplayed the Canadian trade deal, shrugging, "Really all this is is a rebranding of Nafta."
He's probably right. We don't know many of the details yet.
Scott Wapner spent considerable time on GE, allowing Stephanie Link to talk for a while express hyperbole: "I do think that these management changes are substantial," she said, calling lead director Thomas Horton "phenomenal."
Wow. Sounds like GE just landed the Nvidia guy.
Judge, in what quite frankly was one of his best lines in months, said with a straight face to Link, "Mr. Culp may be the greatest CEO who ever lived (snicker) ... but he's not a miracle worker."
Joe Terranova praised the new GE for, in the first 24 hours, not making the Flannery mistake of "overcommunicating."
Jim Lebenthal took a bit of flak for saying he's looking for $10 in GE before buying.
Joe was asked a Twitter question about TWLO. "Twilio right now I am flat. I have no position," Joe said.
That's interesting, because Joe for some reason got wobbly a few months ago on his original (Jan. 2) spectacular bull call in this name, and in recent weeks, his announced positions in this stock seem to twist in the wind.
But he says he's out, so we believe him.
Ed Yardeni brought up something this page has said for a long time regarding financials, which never stops anyone from adding to Citi. "They're getting disrupted technologically. I mean, why do we need branches, why, why isn't everything on our smartphones?" Yardeni asked.
Ed Yardeni called Jay Powell a "straight shooter."
Guy Adami on the 5 p.m. Fast Money referred to "Nordstroms" (sic plural). Karen Finerman suggested (can we say "recommended"?) BID as a play "in an inflationary environment, for the upper end."
The person above did NOT say, ‘You don’t have the earnings upside you do over the next 12 months’
Monday's enabler of Bear Market Buffoonery was not Judge but Melissa, who welcomed Mike Wilson (does he ever do anything besides make TV appearances) to the 5 p.m. Fast Money to tell us more about ... absolutely nothing.
Wilson is the Bungle of the Year; he started insisting for no reason last December that 2018 was going to be a lousy year, and to justify this stoooooopid call, he goes on TV as often as possible to insist a big correction is just ahead and that we're somehow in the middle of a 2-year bear market.
CNBC, a news organization, actually continues to put this fellow on the air and even at times claims "he's been great" (Pete Najarian, Aug. 15).
On Monday (10/1), on the notion of chase for performance, Wilson offered some of the most embarrassing commentary since Robert Duvall mentioned Shelley Winters at the 1973 Oscars:
"People like to chase kinda what they own," Wilson first said.
Seconds later, he claimed, "You're gonna get chasing in areas people don't own, because they're gonna work."
Finally, he said, "Uh, but I think what they're gonna wanna buy are the things that have worked all year."
So there will be a chase of stocks that are already owned ... and a chase of stocks that aren't owned.
Got it.
Wilson addressed Melissa Lee and Karen Finerman, stating he's "not really worried, I'm not hand-wringing over this, but you mentioned the right thing Karen, the rates now are 3.10 ... so that does put valuation constraint (sic grammar)."
OK. A few weeks ago, we were going to have a liquidity crash. Now we're looking at an interest-rate-driven stock cap.
Wilson also stated, "You don't have the earnings upside you do over the next 12 months."
Not quite sure what that means. #grammar
He claimed, "The market's confused. It's looking for new leadership here."
Tim Seymour and Steve Grasso actually asked this guy a question with a straight face.
Eventually, Missy asked Karen, "Are you with Mike? In terms of limited upside here?"
Karen answered, "Um, well, I think his job is to sort of make market calls, which I feel like is the opposite of my job. It scares me a little when he- when, you know, he talks about multiple, whatever." (Translation: No.)
No need to be scared, Karen.
Referring to media stocks, Tim Seymour said "CBS needs a big brother," and Karen said "that's ironic with their show, good." But it's not ironic, Karen.
Much of Monday's Halftime Report was preempted by Donald Trump's press conference. Joe Terranova spoke of the bark being worse than the bite and predicted the EU would be the "next deal" announced on trade.
Jon Najarian said he doubts there will be a trade deal with China until "well into 2019."
Shannon Saccocia said she's more concerned now about November elections because it seems like it's down to "2 sides," trade and Brett "Road House" Kavanaugh. (OK. Shannon didn't say "Road House"; that's from this site. Just having some nickname fun there based on recent tavern headlines. Not criticizing Brett or anything about the process.)
Shannon said it'd be "actually positive" if GE cut the dividend.
Joe pronounced "Chipotle" correctly.
The best line of the day was not from Scott Wapner or Melissa Lee; rather it was Donald Trump saying of Democratic senators, "You know what? They are NOT angels."