Category Archives for Michael Comeau
Not Even Trump Can Help Twitter!
Yesterday after the close, Twitter (TWTR) announced yet another disappointing quarterly earnings report. On the surface, Twitter has the wind at its back. We just had the craziest Presidential election in history, and the most active global news flow I’ve ever seen. Black Lives Matter. Migrant crisis. Syria. The Brexit. Italy’s No Vote. Right wing nationalist movements rising worldwide. There’s never been more stuff to talk about! Heck, President Trump Tweets so often that you’d think he owns the stock. Plus, Twitter gets a staggering amount of exposure from the media. Athletes and celebrities’ feeds are constantly promoted on the mainstream media. Yet Twitter’s ad revenues DECLINED year-over-year in Q4. Facebook (FB) grew ad revenues by 53%! And Facebook has a revenue base that’s 10 times as big! So what’s the deal here? Aside from the fact that Twitter is not user-friendly and offers little in the way of instant gratification — Facebook has the greatest advertising platform the world’s ever seen. It has in-depth personal information on almost 2 billion people. Think about it. Odds are, Facebook knows: 1) Your full name, age, location, marital/family status, and employment history 2) All of your hobbies and personal interests 3) Your political affiliation 4) What websites you visit 5) What companies you buy from 6) Who you talk to 7) Where you go Twitter surely has some of this data, but it also has some major disadvantages: 1) A smaller user base, and smaller data set 2) More anonymity Speak to anyone in the Internet marketing world, and you’ll know that businesses are tossing huge sums of money at Facebook and Instagram ads. Twitter? Not many folks seem to care.
Continue Reading -->There Are More Bears Than Bulls Out in the Wild
Permabulls always say everyone’s bearish. And permabears always say everyone’s bullish. Neither side provides evidence for their views. So let’s see how traders are feeling into today’s inauguration: 1) VIX Spread – Bullish The 3-month VIX spread is at +4.51, which indicates traders are pricing in very low near-term volatility. This means traders are bullish. 2) CNN Fear & Greed Index – Neutral The Fear & Greed Index is at 49. F&G operates on a 1-100 scale, and 50 is neutral. So we’re right in the middle. 3) AAII Sentiment – Bearish The latest AAII Sentiment Survey shows that 32.8% of individual investors are bullish, which is below the long-term average of 38.5%. 4) CBOE Equity Put-Call – Bearish The CBOE Equity-Put Call ratio is at 0.71 with a 3-day moving average of 0.74. This indicates higher-than-average bearishness. 5) ISE Sentiment – Bearish The ISE Sentiment Index is at just 79 (79 calls for every 100 puts) this morning – which is a bearish reading. And the 10-day moving average is 81.3. This also indicates bearish sentiment. Conclusion Out of 5 sentiment indicators, we have 1 bullish, 1 neutral, and 3 bearish. I’ve been hearing a lot of chatter about how bullish the crowd is. But if anything, traders are leaning against the market, hoping for a fall.
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