TIB: Today I Bought (and Sold) - An Investors Journal #449 - Oil Production, Bitcoin, 56 Percent Club Update (July)

Markets breathe a sigh of relief and track up a little. I am staying on the sidelines apart from a small add in oil (a very much hated sector) and continuing to trade Bitcoin reversals. Update to 56 percent Club shows big changes on warrants and options from the May list (no update or June)

Portfolio News

Market Selloff

Market takes a breather for the 2nd day and tracks a little higher. Basically market analysts are watching the Chinese currency to see what is going to break. If it holds around the 7 level, markets show some relief.

Big moves of the day are in gold and US treasury yields making new highs not seen since July 2016 for treasuries and 2013 for gold.

This move has been brewing since July - see the 56 percent club update below. The surprising feature of the market is that dividend yield on S&P 500 is now higher than 10 year treasury yield. This gets markets moving in tandem for a while as investors switch to stocks to find yield.

European Banking

3 European banks (Commerzbank, ABN Amro and Unicredit) reported poor earnings - negative interest rates are beginning to work their way through to killing any earnings growth.

The European Central Bank has got itself into a bad corner. They rely on the banks to keep lending to get cash into the economies. Banks are simply not able to make profits and before long there will be a big failure. Commerzbank (CBK.DE) earnings show the pain most clearly. In my portfolios, my holdings are seriously under water though I have recouped any capital losses through writing covered calls for more than 18 months now.

Bought

BP PLC (BP.L): Oil Production. Averaged down entry price in one portfolio following Jim Cramer to add to his position. Attraction is high dividend yield (6.37%) and strong free cash flow. I used the London listing as I had spare British Pounds in this portfolio. The holding is a Pound hedge as most of BP earnings are in US Dollars.

56 Percent Club

Update for month of July - skipping June update.

Each month, I review all my portfolios and tabulate the 56 percent movers from all time and highlighting the ones from the last 12 months. I review stocks and options separately. Why 56%? A friend was spruiking an investment scheme on Facebook and asked if anybody could point to a 56% investment - yup - I have a few.

First is the table of stocks. I have also marked up whether they have gone up or down since last time. New entrants marked in yellow

What stands out?

• No newcomers and return for Wisdom Tree Japan Small Caps ETF (DFJ) (8 vs 7)
• Bank of America (BAC) retains its top slot with a big rise of 31%
• Biggest riser is again EML Payments (EML.AX) - everything else rose.
• Japan and European Mid Caps still feature
• Two Australian payments provider, EML Payments and Afterpay (APT.AX) were bought in the last 12 months.

On the options side same deal - all new entrants

A massive change over in two months with a completely new list

• Sold or rolled up were Advanced Micro Devices (AMD), Cisco Systems (CSCO) and puts on US Retail (XRT)
• Consumer Staples ETF (XLP) puts dropped off the list with a strong month for stocks like McDonalds and Coca Cola.
• Surging gold price propels Van Eck Gold Miners (GDX) to the top of the list followed closely by Silver.
• Other new entrants are a mixed bag in US telco, AT&T (T), European insurer, Allianz (ALV.DE) and French waste management company, Veolia (VIE.PA).
• All but Veolia and Allianz were bought in the last 12 months
• Notable faller was iShares 20 Year Treasuries ETF (TLT) - off the list but by August 2 was back to the top rung as yields plummeted.

Cryptocurency

Bitcoin (BTCUSD): Price range for the day was $757 (6.6% of the low). Price pushed through the resistance level at $11730 and closed above BUT failed to make a new high.

One trade closed on a trailed stop loss for $47 per contract profit (0.4%). Replaced that trade with new trades on reversals on 4 hour chart and 30 minute chart.

Ethereum (ETHUSD): Price range for the day was $11 (4.8% of the open). Pretty much a sideways day with the close above support at $222 but a new low made for the day.

Ripple (XRPUSD): Price range for the day was $0.00926 (3% of the open). Pretty much a sideways day on the level price has been for a while

CryptoBots

Profit Trailer Bot No closed trades

Currency Trades

Outsourced MAM account Actions to Wealth closed out 6 trades on WTI and AUDNZD for 1.2% profits for the day. WTI trade is a new departure - and was the big driver of profit. Trades open on AUDNZD (0.96% negative)

Cautions: This is not financial advice. You need to consider your own financial position and take your own advice before you follow any of my ideas

Images: I own the rights to use and edit the Buy Sell image. News headlines come from Google Search. All other images are created using my various trading and charting platforms. They are all my own work

Tickers: I monitor my portfolios using Yahoo Finance. The ticker symbols used are Yahoo Finance tickers

Charts: http://mymark.mx/TradingView - this is a free charting package. I have a Pro subscription to get access to real time forex prices

August 7, 2019