(New York)

Goldman Sachs put out a pretty serious statement today. The bank said the surprising and “unloved” rally since stocks bottomed in March will not continue. The bank thinks that the market has set very high expectations for the recovery, and that waters are currently troubled with China. Furthermore, the huge gains have largely been driven by 5 stocks, and their needs to be much broader-based price increases for the market to rise. This will be tricky because the other 495 stocks in the index are more economically-sensitive. “Broader participation in the rally will be needed for the aggregate S&P 500 index to climb meaningfully higher. The modest upside for the largest stocks means the remaining 495 constituents will need to rally to lift the aggregate index”, said the bank.

FINSUM: This makes complete and total sense and helps explain why the rally has slowed in recent weeks.

(New York)

If you survey advisors—which many have done—they will tell you that the hardest part of the forthcoming Reg BI rule from the SEC is how to handle all the requirements of the new Customer Relationship Summary form (Form CRS). With that in mind, Pershing has just launched an interesting new end-to-end Form CRS product that helps advisors comply with the rule, as well as a Tracking and Reporting Solution. According to Pershing, “We recognize that account opening is not the only [thing used], so we’ve rolled out a new forms management system where the CRS can be directed and stored digitally, and married that system with a number of trigger points that require the delivery of a Form CRS … We’ve given our clients the opportunity to both deliver forms in paper where it’s still necessary, or digitally to the extent that the investor has opted into electronic delivery”.

FINSUM: Compliance with Form CRS is a challenge, and one that is being exacerbated by COVID and people working from home. This sounds like a great solution.

(New York)

May was a rough month for dividend stocks. Many companies announced the suspension of dividends or at least a cut. However, 11 companies in the S&P 500 announced dividend increases. That is an interesting group to look at because it likely means their businesses are thriving. Ten of those are: Medtronic, PepsiCo, Clorox, Cardinal Health, Chubb, Expeditors International of Washington, Baxter International, Northrop Grumman, TE Connectivity, Ameriprise Financial.

FINSUM: Pepsi and Clorox are the most interesting of the bunch for us. Both are consumer staples and because of their unique positioning, both seem likely to thrive.

(New York)

Morgan Stanley put out a very direct research report this week. In it, it tells investors which stocks they definitely should not buy. The bank selected 22 “Secularly Challenged Stocks” which it says no one should own right now. Here is a selection: Alcoa, AMC Networks, Abercrombie & Fitch, CenturyLink, Macerich, Cheesecake Factory, H&R Block, Michael’s, and Molson Coors Beverage.

FINSUM: A lot of names one would expect here, but some that are a bit of a surprise. We certainly would not want to own Macerich given the state of commercial retail real estate, but CenturyLink would not seem nearly so dangerous.

(Seattle)

One of the things that makes Amazon such an extraordinary company is that it is always on the look out for the next great business opportunity, and always seems to be one step ahead in executing it. AWS anyone? Now the champion of Seattle may be eyeing a new target—ride-sharing. Amazon is considering the acquisition of Zoox, a well-known autonomous vehicle company. If it were to acquire Zoox, it would immediately be in competition with Uber and Lyft in the soon-to-be autonomous ride-sharing market.

FINSUM: We assume Amazon also has some yet-to-be-understood purpose for this beyond just competing with Uber and Lyft. For instance, autonomous delivery/logistics vehicles?

(Atlanta)

Some stocks seem to be rallying for no apparent reason. The only underlying logic being that they got badly beaten up during the COVID meltdown and now look cheap relative to the market’s rebound. Call it the loser’s rally. Delta, for instance, has seen some significant gains in its price despite the fact that the airline business continues to look very bleak. Delta could be considered best-of-breed though, having a much healthier balance sheet than American Airlines.

FINSUM: This is a dangerous game—when stocks that look weak rise for no apparent reason. They will fall sharply when sentiment swings back.

(Seattle)

Investors might be growing a little uneasy if they have been paying attention to market leaders. A number of stocks that have led the big market rally are starting to falter, and that could be a sign of a major pullback to come. Amazon, Zoom, Netflix and other leaders of this rally have recently plateaued or dipped, which could be a sign that the rally has lost strength. If those stocks start to lose ground, a lot of the gains the market has seen are at risk because of the chance that investors could capitulate once the indexes loses leadership. One equity strategist at BTIG put it this way, “We’d suggest that the ability for the broad market to build on its recent gains is contingent on names like Zoom, Moderna, Netflix and Amazon and other highflying ‘shelter-in-place’ names whose momentum has waned in recent days, to at least sustain their meteoric advances as leadership passes off to the more cyclical areas and themes”.

FINSUM: We think there is a degree of truth in this. If the big gainers start to fade, it is hard to imagine the laggards will suddenly start holding the market up.

(New York)

Dividend stocks do not seem like a bad bet right now, so long as they are names with reliable dividends. Interest rate risk seems very minor, and stocks with decent cash flow appear likely to do well as yields stay ultra-low. These value stocks are favored by analysts because they are priced with much less bullish outlooks, meaning they have an additional margin of safety versus growth stocks. Here are the stocks: CenturyLink, Unum (UNM), Westrock (WRK), AT&T, HP, Xerox, Principal Financial, MetLife, and Tyson Foods.

FINSUM: This is a nice mix of stocks that should naturally be un-correlated to one another.

(San Francisco)

Twitter took a very big step in its ongoing confrontation with President Trump this week. Over the last couple of years, the social media site has taken some steps to block Trump tweets that were barred under its policies. However, yesterday it took what feels like a monumental step—it started putting warning signs and links on posts that it said contained misleading information. Trump has exploded in his response, saying he could shut down social media companies.

FINSUM: We are of two minds about this. On the one hand Twitter was founded as an alternative source of news and a way for people to express their opinions outside the filter that mainstream news provides. On the other hand, it does not seem right that various social media platforms are being used as unchecked fake-news propaganda machines by both parties.

(Seattle)

You may or may not have heard of Shopify, but if you haven’t, it is probably time to take a hard look. Shopify is a Canadian e-commerce company—a fact which has meant it has been somewhat overlooked by those outside the tech space—that makes offering ecommerce and in-store payment collection easier for small businesses. The idea is to offer the scale and robustness that large companies have to small businesses selling online. It makes its money from subscription fees and add-on services. After initially falling during the lockdown, it has nearly doubled in value and is now worth around $100 bn.

FINSUM: This has been a big run higher, but Shopify sits at the intersection of ecommerce and fintech and may be the long-term competitor to Amazon.