The Justice Department is poised to sue Apple Inc. as soon as Thursday, accusing the world’s second most valuable tech company of violating antitrust laws. The Justice Department is already suing Alphabet Inc.’s Google for monopolization, while the Federal Trade Commission is pursuing antitrust cases against Meta Platforms Inc. and Amazon.com Inc.
Yahoo Finance Wednesday
There are numerous technical and qualitative clues that a stock market top is looming. The Feds sued RCA in 1930, IBM at the 1966 top and Microsoft at the 1999 high. All those instances became important market tops.
Friday update, Massachusetts Senator Liz Warren wants the SEC to investigate Tesla for lack of board governance. Good for Musk that this is a company making cars she likes!
Social mood dictates social action, and that action is most extreme at the end of a move. Of the 5,000 NASD points recorded by March 2000, 3,500 occurred in the last 18 months prior to the high. The NASD then lost 75% of its value in the next two years.
The Dow Industrials have gained 11,000 points since October, 2022, a 38% jump. The SPX is up 1,700 points or 48%. The NDX NASD 100 is up 8,500 or 81%. Such parabolic rises are near always reversed during the correction.
A real estate ad in the WSJ features two Realtors boarding a jet claiming ‘our reach is across Texas.’ He is wearing cowboy boots. Such boasting is another topping signal.
Biden’s war on the oilfield continues. This week the EPA supposedly relaxed EV timelines. In fact the move to eliminate internal combustion engines which power oilfield vehicles marches on, untouchable by voters.
However, our predictions of higher oil and energy share prices has worked well this past week. April oil futures broke the $80 level a week ago. Price peaked this week at $83. Price has now pulled back to $80.50, now $81 to test that break out level.
Judging by share prices the test is successful. Apache (APA) has risen pretty much every day since its gap up March 13. Other picks include DIG, Halliburton (HAL), and Newpark Resources (NR). Prices are extended short term but unless oil itself drops further the rally is ongoing. This is real and also a long term prediction.
Gold and silver also broke out. Given our $7.3 trillion budget which is mostly on borrowed money, no wonder. My pick is SLV, a silver bullion ETF.
A 25-year-old becoming a financial planner in 1982 (start of new bull market) is now 67. This means there are few to no ‘planners’ who experienced the 1972-1982 era market when stocks never exceeded the 1972 high. Today’s group has only experienced two-year bears like 2000-2002, or 2007-2009, just hold on they will say. Kevin Hassett, former Chair of the Council of Economic Advisers, thinks we are entering another period like the 1970s, I do as well. China’s bear market is well underway. Check our blog at www.themarketperspective.com for updates.
