Thu Jun 11, 2015 6:43pm ESTComments Off on With Costolo Stepping Down, Investors Will Go Back To Debating This 1 Simple Question
I never understood the contempt for Dick Costolo. He always seems super friendly, which is surprising because he receives a quarterly tirade from my friend. It takes him like 6 tweets because of the asinine 140 character limit Twitter imposes. I find the character limit drives me to truncate my thoughts and separate the chaff. My friend on the other hand just tweet bombs like a madman.
Nevertheless Costolo is out and investors must now attempt to value the vessel and not the captain.
Never discount the value of an interaction. Each one carries an opportunity, which we as humans naturally attempt to evaluate.
What is the value of an interaction?
I’m afraid it’s a too big a question for me. Such a question demands a scientific process with the least amount of assumptions possible. Presented with the right data I am certain any one of you would choose the right answer.
Bear in mind, even the most formidable vessel will wander the seas aimlessly if driven without vision. It’s a shame Twitter can’t be more like iBankCoin, where investors unite the golden coin—stock market excellence.
The growing ranks of Exodus members have made profound strides in operating the new system and are empowering not only themselves but others with their insightful commentary. It’s quite the sight to behold.
If you haven’t taken a look inside the walls of Exodus, do it now. I’ll be your personal guide—just send me an email [email protected]. Better yet, HMU on Twitter @twosmuth, they need you to tweet more, dammit.
A fire broke out in the East Village this afternoon and again, I am not making light this event because it’s likely some people were hurt.
Everyone wants to look at a fire. It’s like a train wreck, humans just can’t turn away. It’s wired deep into our brains to watch these events unfold.
The fire effectively pinned live-streaming apps Meerkat and Periscope against one another. If you recall, Periscope is Twitter’s most recent acquisition. I have an important announcement to make:
Periscope, you passed, barely. Do you know what your grade is? F+
The lack of search ability inside the Periscope app was frustrating on my iPhone. I had to keep going to my Twitter app to click links which would open inside the Periscope app, then they would either suck or be over. Then finding a new link inside Periscope was impossible. So it was back to Twitter.
Am I embellishing this first world problem? A bit, but a fussy user interface isn’t something mankind tolerates here in the future.
Meerkat worked a bit better for me in the moment. When I finally was on a good Meerkat feed, @Lanceulanoff said he had 336 on his Meerkat and only 36 on his Periscope. His commentary was not rubbish like the other clown feeds I was stumbling into. Overall though, I found the UI a bit more pleasant inside Periscope. It had a little more elegance and a little less black and yellow.
AS FOR THE MARKETS. They’re dangling on the cusp here. Hopefully is sucks a bunch of bears in and squeezes them. That would be best case scenario for ‘this guy’.
There’s a new president of the internet, the collective voice of the populace. Adored, respected, the Twitterati go about shaping the direction of global resources with succinct brevity. Therefore despite its heady valuation and premium pricing, it is without doubt I intend to hold equity in this company until it grows into its lanky body and sends share price much higher.
Smaller minds may start feeling ants crawling about their pants to book their gains. I have a whole new vision into stocks as of today. You see, I have been granted early access to Exodus. As a result my computing power has exponentially expanded, and my grasp of micro-drivers is becoming dangerously acute.
On the market front, as long as The [Kurt] Russell continues to comport itself like a leader, its behooves you to take a few steps up the risk ladder.
The market is off to a real grinder of a start as we barrel headlong into a series of high impact economic announcements. And though many traders are focused on asset purchasing pace, interest rates, and oil prices, momentum traders will be watching Twitter.
Just one scant year into public trade and this stock has seen its fair share of drama. Yet, the company has seen very little change to its overall value—it has traded flat over the time. Flat, mind you, is relative because along the way have been rotations fit for a king. As we head into the first birthday of trade, and earnings after the bell, here are some basic price levels to have in mind:
Being a long, long since day one to some varying degree or another, I am certain this will be Twitters ‘coming out’ day where it proves doubters of the concept to be introverted clown babies. This company has become one of the primary cogs of human existence. It is trading like crap today, another solid sign for the chuckle hut. Twitter has the added bonus or reporting after the Yelp and the Amazon face plants where a notable shift in investor perception occurred in the growth complex. Put simply, both companies were punished for being weak. Here is the relative performance of TWTR, YELP, AMZN, and FB since the BABA top:
Twitter is hovering in the middle of the pack, just slightly under-performing FB who reports tomorrow. Will these two social media juggernauts join the ranks of our other two internet pillars? Absolutely not, both will crush and guide sending shorts to run to the hopium pipe. My bed is made, long of TWTR in common terms, willing to risk to zero if need be to see this company ride to glory.
Yes yes, I know, Twitter is absurdly overvalued. The insiders are nerdy scumbags (the worst kind of scumbag) and are liquidating in droves as they no longer here the music. The whole business is plum toxic, what with the easily replicated service and all. I heard they even stopped offering free Cliff bars in the break room. Here comes a glasshouse revolt!
These jackoffs can’t even make money. Pathetic.
Traders who took the obvious position of shorting into lockup expiration were rewarded handsomely this week after shares of TWTR plunged. Mom and pop saw the headline and trampled one another the following day to liquidate the ticker away from their person.
Now the questions start because we all know Twitter is some kind of media phenomenon. After all, it was only two Super Bowls ago that ads never featured the hash tag. Celebrities have accepted the product one-by-one, and most breaking news originates on Twitter. CEOs use the service to promote and defend their companies. Politicians drum up support and test slogans. Robots follow hundreds of thousands of humans and then tell odd jokes. This service is broadly used, useful for reaching likeminded conversations, and essential for branding.
Therefore I consider the company a going concern. I have been long Twitter since IPO, at times larger than others and I have sold some shares along the way. My position was full size going into this downturn, so you could consider me biased. However, I will ride Twitter to zero. That being said, I see this weakness as an opportunity to buy more shares.
Am I buying the current weakness? Absolutely not.
What we are seeing is a news driven reaction in the market. There is no telling how far this move can go. We will only know it is complete when prices have gone much higher. However, being a news driven move, it is very likely to be retested. And when we retest these lows, either in weeks or months, I will be keen on buying more shares. Until then, I brood.
If you really want to scare the last strong hands out of momentum, then blow the bird hole to smithereens. The scene in most momentum stocks currently resembles Alfred Hitchcock horror. Thousands of angry algos are intent on fleecing you of your favorite shares. This was a very public dismantling and it is very effective in returning shares to their proper owners—banksters.
Tomorrow is a big day for the social media industry. Tomorrow we get to see how the market reacts to our first Twitter earnings announcement. Twitter will be joined by special guests YELP! Together the pair makes up a big piece of the social media space.
We have absolutely no way of knowing how the market will react to this news. We do know that up unto this point TWTR has behaved almost exactly the opposite of FB during the first three months of public trade.
Facebook pretty much bottomed after their first call. Will Twitter pretty much top?
It deserves a consideration. On the eve of what promises to be a special day for the market, I have decided to raise some cash and buy popcorn rations. I want to be a casual observer of the action, not a red eyed madman trading the fallout. I want to instead casually observe the action and pick a spot to pounce and eat.
Social media is the ultimate disrupter. Solid state lighting and eCigs and reefer and big, but social media is HUGE. Thus we must continue to find ways to profit from it.
I still hold my $40 cost basis shares in Twitter, and these $57.50 February calls in Facebook. I sold out of the YELP calls for a handsome gain.
With these actions my book is now 30% cash. Cash rich, if you will, and resisting my junky urges to get another fix.
Facebook is up big after hours since reporting earnings. We are getting sympathy moves in GRPN, TWTR, ANGI, and YELP. I have a big heaping pile of exposure to all of these names, as well as many others, in a book of risk I can only describe as an autonomous, morphing blob hell bent on consuming all internet traders into its belly.
I continued my buying campaign today, chugging down calls in AMBA and common in CUDA like a raver six molly deep. I have consumed a disgusting amount of caffeine over the last 48 hours, toiling over market charts and building my next empire, something much bigger than anything you see on these interwebs. I smell like a Monster and old ladies are scoffing at me while I walk around in deep-V t-shirts in the arctic north. I do this because it reminds me I am still a living entity and not a zombie robot.
The market has pressed the boot deep into my stomach, yet it cannot make me regurgitate the libations boiling in my gut. I have no interest in ending the party. If I must, I will BE the party.
If my prophecies prove correct, educated guesses built on the knowledge and labor of elder generations, then I stand to make a great sum of money in February. I stand to make a great deal of money and it all starts with tomorrow’s sit. I will sit here, sucking down chili dogs and guzzling flaggarts of ale while the little bitches get their quick fix and take profits. Hell, I may even take out the lever and buy some MOAR.
IMPORTANT SIDE NOTE: LinkedIn is for old men with the poopy trousers to rub one another off. That being said, I have tuned up my profile as part of my continued quest to infiltrate and dominate the business community.
I have already divulged too deeply into my plans. Now I must go spoil my body with iron work designed to create perfect symmetry and posture. Hide your wives and tell you kids about a brave man who roams the internet, in a loin cloth, trading these stocks.
Tue Jan 28, 2014 4:48pm ESTComments Off on The Social Experiment Continues
I have been trading these social media stocks, the fire, names like FB, TWTR, Z, YELP, TRLA, ANGI, and GRPN since I started blogging here back in the cussing days. I would cuss and trade these stocks, like an internet villain of sorts, for my profit and your entertainment.
I was trying to get people excited about my little blog, over here.
I bought weekly calls in YELP and TWTR this afternoon, which prompted distinguished 12631 trader @ckelly44 to question what I was seeing, and also to explain a bit more about the trade. First, what I was seeing is this:
Second, we have Facebook earnings out tomorrow, and I have no idea what they are going to report. However, many social media stocks are in alignment into the earnings. Therefore, I expect a very binary response from the names once Facebook reports. I had a hard time choosing between TWTR and YELP, therefore I picked both—like a good American.
Here’s the YELP:
While we’re looking at charts, here’s FB:
This same look can be seen in Zillow too. ANGI is trading a bit radical, but nice too. Here’s the kicker, I have exposure to all of the above names like some kind of crack head. Should the names bounce, I will have exposure to said names, all of them, until Friday.
Here’s the exposure catalogue:
Z – Feb $95 calls and common stock
GRPN – Feb $12 calls
FB – Feb $57.50 calls
TRLA – Feb $40 calls
TWTR – weekly $65 calls and common
YELP – $80 weekly $80 calls
ANGI – Feb $17.50 calls
Via the above pot of positions, I have a ton of exposure to social media. More exposure then I have ever had in my life, as a matter of fact. The crazy part is, only one of those call positions needs to cooperate and I will profit. Options, when bought with halfway decent timing and proper sizing, offer a much more modest risk profile then I previously understood. Should they all lose after a big FB upset, my book will sink about 3.3% from here. That is losing ALL of the premium. I know, bananas.
I have a short term expectation for movement higher, you see?
MOVING ON…I had some AAPL call exposure left that scalped me today, yet I am still up 1.6% on the day. Leading the way was LEDS. The stock went #BEASTMODE into the bell on heavy volume. Someone wants some LED exposure. I still hold 25% of my risk in the LED industry. I have not sold anything yet. Today it became clear they are making another attempt to take my shares from me. They will fail, again.
I am most bullish on the LED industry. Next is social media, and third is natural gas. It is so freakishly cold here in Michigan, colder then I can remember. Also, they are limiting the propane deliveries to the hilled billy folk, telling them to, “get with the times and hook up to a natural gas pipe.” I was going to get something exotic, like UGAZ, but I opted to follow The Fly into AREX.
I did not sell anything yet, therefore my cash is down below 10 percent. I think we still trade lower from here, but it is also my expectation that individual stocks will be allowed to behave on their own merit. This could be seen today in volatility, which was crushed.
Here’s my plan, we stuck to it today, albeit slightly weaker than expected. Let’s see what tomorrow may bring:
My time is very limited so I will make this message brief. I had to sell some of my Twitter shares today. I did not want to, in fact, I want to be long Twitter until I am a salty old dog and then pass said shares on to my unappreciative decedents.
But my steam is completely transfixed upon the name. It could keep climbing tomorrow but technically I am not liking today’s print. It suggests buyer exhaustion.
Will they exhaust today or tomorrow? Perhaps.
Or this run will continue. With most “traders” taking the rest of the week off, the patterns they typically form may not exist today. I read that this morning. I disagree. Order flow is order flow, and I smell buyer exhaustion.
If it goes higher, I continue to ride with a ¼ long. Hopefully I can buy some retail liquidation in January.
It turns out the NASDAQ printed what is called a normal day in market profile theory and the fun thing about normal days is they are anything but. In fact, they are rather rare.
And I must say I do not particularly like normal days, at least not up here at swing highs, because they tend to occur at or near inflection points. A normal day is described as having a very wide initial balance (first hour of trade) which is not breached for the remainder of the session. It suggests indecision, intraday, mostly signaling directional conviction is low.
That context makes sense if think about gapping higher, in a hot (too hot?) bull trend, into a short holiday week. Short sellers do not want to get steamrolled in the thin trade, buyers are hesitant to initiate additional exposure at these elevated levels, and current longs are likely mulling taking profits.
Add to that the narrow pockets of market momentum and you have a solid recipe for indecision.
I have my book about 90% long at this indecisive juncture. AMBA finally went to work, crushing the hopes and dreams of Morgan Stanley analysis hoping to make a name in the technology space. I like to think this guy who downgraded AMBA will read the Raul blog, so I have a special message for him: this chipset powers the GoPro, it is on the X-mas list of every adventurer. Short interest, albeit modest, will start to get icy hands as we approach December 5th earnings. Then they will start making mistakes.
The chicken trade adhered to the November seasonality statistics, naturally, unlike the unnatural meat produced in PPCs new streamlined robot facilities. December brings a tad bit more seasonality mojo, and we still have national eat 1-to-3-birds-at-once day Thursday. I took an obligatory 1/3 scale today, but I like my prospects with the net.
I bought AAPL back right near the closing bell. If you recall, I was in this trade a few weeks back and bailed with a little 2 percent gain. It is an easy vehicle for me to lever long exposure up and down, as it consolidates along gently.
I now hold large positions in the following names, listed largest-to-smallest:
GOGO, RVLT, BALT, YELP, and CREE
These are all full size positions. As you may imagine, this type of book requires attentiveness. It has the capability of lopping 10% off my person rather effortlessly.
My ¾ size positions are as follows, listed again largest-to-smallest:
AMBA, AAPL, PPC, LO, and TSLA
Note: AMBA was by far my largest position prior to taking a scale near today’s high. Tesla and their innovative CEO Elon Musk are in the house of pain. Much like any successful individual, the media will frame Elon with a skeptical eye. Innovators hunt profit and self-gain after all, which is inherently evil. The issue most closely watched at TSLA is the battery technology. If it is to usher in the era of zero emission commuting, it needs to hold up to rigorous scrutiny. If Telsa intends to roll out a model for the middle class, they need sound battery technology established. The chart is just basing out, below my favorite moving averages, suggesting acceptance of these lower prices. What likely comes next is a new exploration lower by price. This will scare most of you. But I will be casually observing the action, minding the drawdown to my books, and meticulously selecting an opportunity to ratchet up exposure because I love me some sweet baby Elon.
I have dog and pony positions in the following stocks. These positions are practically placeholders and some are relics from prior trades:
F, FXY, ONVO, TWTR, MJNA, and O
I thought I would turn a clever trick in MJNA. Now I am -40% on this stupid, STUPID, holding. It will enjoy a fake pump service or go to zero otherwise I will continue to hold this dumbness.
ONVO needs to die for a while. It trades poorly. I will keep my toe in the water to keep my eyes on the name.
TWTR is another name I will hold until zero. I use twitter more than any other social media service in the world, why wouldn’t I own it? One day I will have huge size, but right now there simply is not much to base my risk on. Therefore I wait.
This post has gone on far too long. These are my holdings and some reasoning behind them. Let’s see how they perform this week.
