Megatech stocks report this week, and those names make up 26% of the Nasdaq 100 and 19.% of the S&P. The markets tell us we remain in a manic mood, but are back to April 2 level when Trump announced tariffs. Markets are saying, We had the bump and we've been through it and we're good to go here. Trump is walking back some of this tariffs. Now, markets are 1% from April 2. There's a lot of psychological resistance against current index levels. To go higher, we need to solve the trade war--nobody knows. We're in the early stage of a bear market unless the market rises to the 200-day moving average. The key is resolving trade issues, but he doesn't see that happening any time soon. We will see a memo of understanding from Korean and Japan, but we are not past volatility, not at al.. We will re-test recent lows in the coming quarters.
Invest in money market ETFs or high-interest savings accounts paying yields of 3.5% or higher. ETFs
Questions to ask during tariff threats: How is the customer concentration?
Suppose you have found a company that sustains little impact from tariffs, survived the last recession relatively unscathed, has no debt, and pays a solid dividend and has a low payout ratio. Are you safe? Well maybe, but now you need to worry about other companies. In a recession, many companies experience sharp slowdowns. Some will not survive. If your “secure” company has 65 per cent of its business with another company, now you also need to worry about that other company. Companies with high levels of customer concentration are always riskier but in a recession that concentration risk becomes even more acute. Ideally, you want to own a company with no customer accounting for more than 10 per cent of its business.
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The DeepSeek threat is overblown; we're not seeing mass cancellation of orders at Nvidia, but even an increase--chips are sold out for the year. Alphabet just praised its relationship with NVDA. And yet, NVDA hasn't recovered from January's DeepSeek news. He trimmed his holding, but still owns a lot of shares. However, the White House has made NVDA a political football. Shares should not have fallen in the first place.
Know that anything can happen with any stock. But it's a matter of risk/reward and what scenario is more likely.
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