Welcome Friends, 

Here’s an assortment of posts shared this week on Trends with Friends. Let’s dive in…

HAPPY SHOPPING DAY

In honor of Black Friday, Howard Lindzon shared his 5 favorite online shops. He writes, 

Happy shopping day.

I want to thank all my readers so today I am offering a 50 percent discount on all your insults to me for this already free newsletter.

If you are in the giving mood, I will always accept gift certificates to my go to shopping places listed below.

I am going to do a little personal shopping today but there are only FIVE places I shop on the internet (2 mostly in store).

DSTNC.com – I will share some personal faves below and there is a big sale today on the site.

Ari Soho (mostly in store in SOHO) – if you ping me and do want the full experience, Moshe the creator/owner/designer will come and style you up personally which is a treat.

ASRV.com – mostly in store in San Diego.

Manscaped.com – 25% off entire site for Black Friday.

AG Jeans – 30 percent off sale for Black Friday.

See Howard’s holiday gift guide here. 

THIS WEEK IN AI

Michael Parekh reviews AI wearables, data centers, TSMC, Microsoft and more in this week’s AI Summary.

It’s a must read.

SLEEPY GIANTS

Larry Thompson is watching the Magnificent 7. He writes, 

The Magnificent 7 have become so influential that there are now ETFs devoted solely to these seven names… 

While bears may use the “sleepy giants” moment to sound alarms, I see it as the ideal setup for the next leg higher. Even if market breadth begins to cool, 30% of the index breaking out of a consolidation could fuel the next leg higher.

To truly understand what’s happening, we need to look at these giants individually. Are they showing reasons to be cautious or signs of opportunity?

Apple is breaking out of a four-month base (or ascending triangle, for the chart nerds). The largest component of the S&P 500 is just now joining the party. A dagger to the heart for the bears.

See more charts here.

THIS WEEK IN CHARTS

Charlie Bilello’s weekly chart review includes dozens of great insights. Here are the notable charts and themes, 

When Javier Milei took office as the new President of Argentina last December, their monthly inflation rate was 25.5%. Today it stands at 2.7%.

How did he accomplish this monumental feat?

By slashing federal spending by 32%, cutting the number of government ministries from 18 to 8, reducing energy and transport subsidies, and freezing public works projects. This generated Argentina’s first government surplus since 2008.

What is the best performing global equity market in 2024?

Argentina ($ARGT), with a gain of over 60%.

THE ARC OF MARKETS

Ted Merz continues to publish his lessons learned from 30+ years at Bloomberg. This week, Ted shared how markets bend towards transparency.

Here’s Merz’s money quote, 

In the 1990s, newspapers ran pages of stock prices called “agate.” That information wasn’t yet available to retail investors. I produced the equivalent of agate for emerging market debt.

This was ridiculously time consuming because I received the prices via fax and I had to retype them all into a word processing document to publish.

But I knew it was something of interest and valuable to the market, particularly the buy side, which didn’t have as much access to the information.

I’ll never forget the first days we published. You could almost hear a gasp. What was Chemical Bank doing giving prices to a reporter at Bloomberg?

Some brokers and market makers were critical. They complained that Chemical’s prices weren’t as timely or accurate as the broker pages.

But the arc of markets bends toward price transparency.

I got the prices. Chemical Bank got PR. Clients got valuable information.

Eventually that fax would be replaced with a live feed.

Read Ted’s full post here.

FRIDAY LINKS

Tadas Viskanta curated Friday FOMO links this week on Abnormal Returns. Here’s a sneak peek… 

TRENDS WITH NO FRIENDS

Trends With No Friends sifts through the noise and discovers stocks above $1B market cap with high relative strength and low social following.

The publication shares 52-Week Highs and Lows sorted by followers on Stocktwits. 

Why is high relative strength and low social following important?

Stocks that are outperforming tend to continue to outperform. Stocks that have a low social following are, by definition, undiscovered by the crowd. Stocks that have both Relative Strength and Low Social Following can really outperform as more investors discover them.

This week, Trends with No Friends featured… 

HealthStream ($HSTM), Commvault Systems ($CVLT), Tempur Sealy International ($TPX), Natural Grocers by Vitamin Cottage ($NGVC) and more. 

THIS WEEK’S EPISODE

And in case you missed it… Howard Lindzon, Michael Parekh, JC Parets and Phil Pearlman are joined by Frank Rotman to review the state of venture capital, AI narratives, speculation, market nihilism and more on the latest episode of Trends with Friends. 

Tune in today.

GET IN TOUCH

If you share insight on the market and would like to contribute to Trends with Friends, send us an email.

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