Left Brain Thinking

An awful lot happened over the past week in the markets. The week started with another banking wind down in First Republic Bank. But by the end of the week, markets showed excellent resilience, especially after a very strong Friday.

In this week's Jarvis® Update, we briefly cover the macroeconomic events of the banking crisis and this week's Federal Reserve rate hike announcement.

From there, CEO Noland Langford and Director of Research, Brian Dress, dig into the week's torrent of earnings reports. We talk through a handful of earnings reports and our thoughts, along with a pattern that we have seen in a number of the releases.

Many companies we have reviewed announced pretty solid 1st quarter earnings, but decreased guidance led to a number of negative reactions in companies with strong businesses. The takeaway is that stock reactions to earnings are often random. What matters the most is the ongoing trajectory of a business, more than a snapshot in time.

If you still have cash sitting in the bank, now is the time to act to get something locked in with a higher return for a longer duration. Reach out and we can set up a time to talk in more detail!

Topic 1: The Macro Comes Roaring Back into Focus Topic 2: Earnings Season Rages On

Get signed up to our mailing list to receive all of our investment content (video and written) to your inbox every Saturday morning: https://leftbrainir.com/jarvisnewsletter

For a portfolio review and to learn more about our growing list of fixed income investment opportunities that we are locking in as interest rates start to fall https://leftbrainir.com/free-portfolio-review

Get on Brian's calendar directly to discuss a plan for market recovery at https://calendly.com/briandress

This week's market action was pretty boring.

But after a volatile first three months of the year, we are actually happy to see calmer waters in the stock market seas!

All the major indexes were up at least a fraction of a percent this week, with the small cap Russell 2000 index showing outperformance and gaining more than 2% in value over the last week. What's more, we saw the VIX (the volatility index) tick below 18 this week. We haven't seen that low of a volatility print in some time now, suggesting that investors are becoming more comfortable with the market environment.

On this week's episode, CEO Noland Langford and Director of Research, Brian Dress, discuss the week's market events. We have noticed that despite the volatility of the year, where we are seeing steadiness is in the bond markets. Credit spreads have remained narrow in the face of all the recession talk you hear in the media, which suggests to us that things are looking up for 2023 and beyond.

We are moving swiftly into the teeth of earnings season, which began with earnings reports from the world's major banks. Noland shares with us some of the areas he will be watching as we process the deluge of earnings -- tech (specifically the "FANG" stocks), along with financials and small to mid-cap stocks.

Topic 1: A Boring Market -- But Boring Can Be Good Topic 2: Preview of the Q1 Earnings Season

Get signed up to our mailing list to receive all of our investment content (video and written) to your inbox every Saturday morning: https://leftbrainir.com/jarvisnewsletter

If you still have cash sitting in the bank, now is the time to act to get something locked in with a higher return for a longer duration. Reach out and we can set up a time to talk in more detail!

For a portfolio review and to learn more about our growing list of fixed income investment opportunities that we are locking in as interest rates start to fall https://leftbrainir.com/free-portfolio-review

Get on Brian's calendar directly to discuss a plan for market recovery at https://calendly.com/briandress

The first quarter in the markets has been anything but dull.

We've seen volatility in interest rates, Federal Reserve rate hikes, and a mini-banking crisis, but we've still weathered the storm. We are as optimistic as ever, but also with the understanding the prices may not move up in a straight line from here.

The opportunities both in growth stocks and in fixed rate securities are still plentiful, but we see interest rates starting to fall, which means the chance to lock in 7-8% annual return in quality corporate bonds won't be here for much longer.

Take a listen to our first quarter review and the thoughts of CEO Noland Langford and Director of Research, Brian Dress, for the rest of 2023 (and beyond). We welcome your thoughts in the comments and we'd be happy to answer any questions.

If you still have cash sitting in the bank, now is the time to act to get something locked in with a higher return for a longer duration. Reach out and we can set up a time to talk in more detail!

Topic 1: First Quarter in Review

Topic 2: Outlook for the Rest of 2023 (and Beyond)

Get signed up to our mailing list to receive all of our investment content (video and written) to your inbox every Saturday morning: https://leftbrainir.com/jarvisnewsletter

For a portfolio review and to learn more about our growing list of fixed income investment opportunities that we are locking in as interest rates start to fall https://leftbrainir.com/free-portfolio-review

Get on Brian's calendar directly to discuss a plan for market recovery at https://calendly.com/briandress

It's March Madness, but with this week's news, it's hard to tell if we are talking basketball or the banking industry!

On this week's Jarvis® Update, CEO Noland Langford and Director of Research, Brian Dress, discuss the failures of Silicon Valley Bank and Signature Bank, along with the troubles at First Republic (FRC). We first give our thoughts on how investors with money particularly in regional and community banks should proceed in light of the news.

The most important thing is first to make sure your bank is FDIC insured and second, if you have cash over and above the level of FDIC insurance, you should consider decreasing the concentration of your savings in one institution.

We think, however, that think banking mini-crisis creates opportunity for investors. First of all, we think this episode marks the end of the Fed's rate hiking cycle. We may see one more rate increase next week, but clearly the pace of rate hikes has created a structural problem in the banking industry that means rate increases cannot go on forever.

With rates moving lower (the 2-year US Treasury rate dropped from over 5% to under 4% in just one week!), we are starting to see outperformance in growth and tech stocks. The NASDAQ has consistently performed better than the other indexes in the past few weeks.

Now is certainly not the time for panic. Rather, we are rolling up our sleeves and looking for opportunities, not only in growth stocks. But also we are liking the chances we are seeing to lock in very generous rates of return in corporate bonds before rates start falling again in late 2023.

Topic 1: A Good Old-Fashioned Bank Run -- Should We Expect Contagion? Topic 2: Growth Finds Its Footing

Get signed up to our mailing list to receive all of our investment content (video and written) to your inbox every Saturday morning: https://leftbrainir.com/jarvisnewsletter

For a portfolio review and to learn more about our growing list of fixed income investment opportunities and to hear how we are responding in client accounts to this banking "mini-crisis" head to https://leftbrainir.com/free-portfolio-review

Get on Brian's calendar directly to discuss a plan for market recovery at https://calendly.com/briandress

Earnings season is so crucially important to investors that adhere to a philosophy of investing in the best businesses.

Sometimes earnings reports come out and disappoint the market, causing a stock to fall 10, 20, 30% or more immediately. When a stock you own does this, it can be such a crushing and demoralizing blow.

The question then becomes: What should you do when your stock flames out after earnings?

On this week's Jarvis® Update, CEO Noland Langford and Director of Research, Brian Dress, cover the some of the latest earnings reports and give you some real world examples of how to answer this question in practice in the context of your portfolio.

We discuss the earnings coming out of some of the companies we follow, including Snowflake (SNOW), Box (BOX), Pure Storage (PSTG), and Teladoc Health (TDOC). In the video, we go through the process we use to determine whether it is time to Buy More, Hold Tight, or Sell, Sell, Sell.

Remember, being a long-term investor means sifting through the short-term noise to find the true trajectory that the BUSINESS is on. If the business is doing well, eventually the stock will follow!

Topic 1: Are Earnings Misses Macroeconomic-Driven or Business Specific? Topic 2: What Should You Do When Earnings Miss the Mark?

Get signed up to our mailing list to receive all of our investment content (video and written) to your inbox every Saturday morning: https://leftbrainir.com/jarvisnewsletter

For a portfolio review and to learn more about our growing list of fixed income investment opportunities, to get more of our detailed thoughts after earnings, and to hear about our stock bounce back list for 2023, head to https://leftbrainir.com/free-portfolio-review

Get on Brian's calendar directly to discuss a plan for market recovery at https://calendly.com/briandress

Are you one of the lucky ones that have had cash building up in your checking or savings accounts over the past few years?

With interest rates on the rise, there are plenty of ways to take advantage to outpace the rate of interest that your bank is paying you in those accounts.

Our CEO Noland Langford and Director of Research, Brian Dress, sat down for a conversation on the best ways you can take advantage of the high class problem of cash building up in your bank accounts.

There is a definite order of operations to how you should put cash to work:

(1) Pay off any outstanding credit card debt (2) Fill your emergency fund (3) Contribute to your retirement accounts (4) The "Beyond" category -- finding investment vehicles to generate a return, especially in the bond market

We end with a bonus discussion of whether it makes sense to pay off your mortgage if you have money burning a hole in your pocket. Spoiler alert: it depends!

We would love to help you answer the question of "What Should I Do with Cash in the Bank?"

Check the links below to learn how to contact us and have a much broader conversation on how to take better advantage of your strong financial position.

Get on Brian's calendar directly to discuss a game plan for how to deploy your excess cash at https://calendly.com/briandress

For a portfolio review and to learn more about our growing list of fixed income investment opportunities and our stock bounce back list for 2023, head to https://leftbrainir.com/free-portfolio-review

Get signed up to our newsletter list: https://leftbrainir.com/jarvisnewsletter

Sign up for our research service to receive this month's "The Chosen" report and access our library of 100s of full length stock reports at https://leftbrainir.com/subscribe

Those of you who have followed us for some time know that we are strict adherents to fundamental analysis. And the most important time for fundamental analysts is earnings season.

We stand smack in the middle of earnings, moving toward the end, and we have some interesting conclusions. In 2022, we saw negative stock price reactions to earnings almost exclusively, no matter if the business developments were good, bad, or indifferent.

What has changed this year is that we are starting to see the opposite reaction to earnings. Even when business is fair to middling, we have seen some very positive earnings reactions. This suggests to us that the bar for results has been lowered by investors. This change in sentiment and reaction is often the signal of a new bull market.

On this week's Jarvis® Update, CEO Noland Langford and Director of Research, Brian Dress, cover the some of the latest earnings reports, particularly in the world of growth stocks. We saw a few double-digit gains in stock price after earnings this week, the types of moves we haven't seen since the last bull market.

In this installment, we cover the earnings from some of the companies we follow closely, including Airbnb (ABNB), InMode (INMD), and The Trade Desk (TTD), all of which impressed. We also cover some of the less impressive reports and the fact that they didn't send the stocks into a tailspin, as they would've in 2022.

Topic 1: The End of the Valuation Reset Topic 2: "Better Than Feared" is Better Than the Alternative

Get signed up to our mailing list to receive all of our investment content (video and written) to your inbox every Saturday morning: https://leftbrainir.com/jarvisnewsletter

For a portfolio review and to learn more about our growing list of fixed income investment opportunities and our stock bounce back list for 2023, head to https://leftbrainir.com/free-portfolio-review

Get on Brian's calendar directly to discuss a plan for market recovery at https://calendly.com/briandress

With the important February Federal Reserve meeting now behind us, it certainly feels like the mood of investors has changed dramatically.

As investors begin coming to the understanding that inflation appears to be in check, there has been a pronounced rotation from the value stocks that dominated 2022 into the types of growth stocks that have struggled in recent years.

On this week's Jarvis® Update, CEO Noland Langford and Director of Research, Brian Dress, cover the market's developments in the wake of the latest Fed interest rate increase and commentary from Fed chair Jerome Powell that indicated that the Fed could potentially slow down the pace of rate increases in 2023.

Noland's take is that as investors, we may be done spending our time worrying about the Fed's next move and we can return to paying attention to actual developments at the business level.

We also discuss some of the earnings reports that are starting to trickle in and take note of the market's reaction to these reports. We observe that regardless of whether earnings reports have been strong or weak, it so far appears that investors are taking these results in stride. When we start to see positive reactions to negative news, that is one sign that we may be close to the next bull market.

Topic 1: The Fed and Inflation Topic 2: A Violent Market Rotation

Get signed up to our newsletter list: https://leftbrainir.com/jarvisnewsletter

Sign up for our research service to receive this month's "The Chosen" report and access our library of 100s of full length stock reports at https://leftbrainir.com/subscribe

For a portfolio review and to learn more about our growing list of fixed income investment opportunities and our stock bounce back list for 2023, head to https://leftbrainir.com/free-portfolio-review

Get on Brian's calendar directly to discuss a plan for market recovery at https://calendly.com/briandress

There is plenty of market uncertainty remaining in the air, as we move into 2023 and turn the page on a putrid 2023.

There are a number of big questions left unanswered with respect to the direction of markets (stocks, bonds, and otherwise).

On this week's Jarvis® Update, CEO Noland Langford and Director of Research, Brian Dress, ask and answer the key questions on our minds as we evaluate the best investment positioning for the coming year.

We also discuss some of our favorite sectors and asset classes for 2023 and beyond. It could be a challenging year for the overall market, but there are plenty of pockets where we think investors can find strong performance over the next 12 months.

Topic 1: The Biggest Investing Questions of 2023 Topic 2: Our Thoughts on Investment Strategy for the Next Year

Get signed up to our newsletter list: https://leftbrainir.com/jarvisnewsletter

Sign up for our research service to receive this month's "The Chosen" report and access our library of 100s of full length stock reports at https://leftbrainir.com/subscribe

For a portfolio review and to learn more about our growing list of fixed income investment opportunities and our stock bounce back list for 2023, head to https://leftbrainir.com/free-portfolio-review

Get on Brian's calendar directly to discuss a plan for market recovery at https://calendly.com/briandress

The momentum the markets had built in recent weeks was derailed over the past few days, as fears again began to creep in ahead of next week's Federal Reserve meeting.

Despite the negative price action we saw over the past five days of trading, we remain bullish for investors' prospects into 2023.

CEO Noland Langford and Director of Research, Brian Dress, discuss the reasons we remain constructive on the markets, both stocks and bonds. As we have discussed in the past few months, market leadership is likely to shift, as investors are clearly valuing profits much more than they are revenue growth at any price.

We cover the opportunity for investors who haven't yet done so to add exposure to energy stocks, which have pulled back significantly over the past few weeks. We think this is the opportunity investors underweight energy may have been waiting for.

Finally, we again emphasize the urgency for people with money in the bank to get the cash invested before the Fed reverses course and starts lowering rates, which we think is very possible to happen in 2023.

Topic 1: The Week in Review Topic 2: A Sneak Peek into 2023

Get signed up to our newsletter list: https://leftbrainir.com/jarvisnewsletter

Sign up for our research service to receive this month's "The Chosen" report and access our library of 100s of full length stock reports at https://leftbrainir.com/subscribe

For a portfolio review and to learn more about our growing list of fixed income investment opportunities and our stock bounce back list for 2023, head to https://leftbrainir.com/free-portfolio-review

Get on Brian's calendar directly to discuss a plan for market recovery at https://calendly.com/briandress