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Boring companies – read profitable companies – have generally done less well.

Market Updates

Question for the stock pickers: Would you rather be lucky or smart?

As stocks continue to flip-flop, we look at what it means to be successful in the current market cycle.

It was a topsy-turvy week for tech. After crashing 3% on Thursday, the Nasdaq 100 rose a little on Friday.

The Dow was also up and so was the S&P 500.

As it stands, traders remain ‘neutral’, according to the Fear and Greed Index – but an undercurrent of uncertainty remains.

What are investors so anxious about? The short of it is rising interest rates and inflation fears.

Such anxiety is not without merit. The Covid-19 pandemic, not to mention ultra-low interest rates, has created a market that’s slowly losing its grip on reality. Illustrating that point, between February 2020 and March 2021, the Goldman Sachs Non-Profitable Technology Index has surged more than 400%.

Boring companies – read profitable companies – have generally done less well.

Would you rather be smart or lucky?

Now of course there’s a big difference between a profitable company and a profitable trade. And some high-profile money managers have made a bundle betting on the rising share prices of these non-profitable companies.

Success breeds jealousy though and there has been no shortage of critics for those betting on these kinds of companies.

Cathie Wood and her ARKK Innovation ETF is one such target.

Commenting on ARK’s Tesla research, Thomas Thornton, who writes investment content, opined:

‘Nothing they predicted fundamentally actually happened. Completely lucky and proves it’s easy to choose luck vs being smart. Kudos to ARK.’

Part of Wood’s wild success has come from her uncanny ability to spot investment trends well in advance from other money managers and the market more broadly.

Of course, timing the market can be hard. If you’re not careful you can get taken to the cleaners. For example, the ARKK ETF is down ~20% from its February peak. Investors who bought at those levels and held may very well be underwater right now.

Despite all this commotion – Jaaims has continued to book a string of mammoth returns in recent times.

Here’s our top five realised returns from the week ending March 19:

  • Marathon Oil Corporation (MRO.NYSE) +41.80%
  • Occidental Petroleum Corporation (OXY.NYSE) +28.86%
  • Thyssenkrupp AG (TKA-DE) +24.55%
  • Paladin Energy Ltd (PDN.ASX) +23.62%
  • People’s United Financial, Inc. (PBCT.NASDAQ) +21.11%

Whether markets are greedy or fearful, worried about interest rates or inflation, our AI trading platform is constantly looking for an edge.

*Past performance is not indicative of future returns. You should be aware that the above is intended as an example only of a top performing trade identified by Jaaims. Not all trades are guaranteed to be successful and it is important to hold a number of positions to manage investment risk. Jaaims’ alerts such as the Trade Predictor, Hyper Rating and Power Rating are designed to help you identify upcoming opportunities and increase your chance of a successful trade.

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