Pretty uneventful week in the market at -.004 a virtual standstill In reality it is nice to see volatility come back. Makes for much better trading opportunities. Aug through Oct is generally the most volatile period in the markets.

I did pretty well on Innodata. They say Q3 EBITDA will triple quarter over quarter from this quarter. They have contracts with 5 out of 7 Magnificent 7 tech companies. The market cap is only 500 million. Ill admit I was disappointed the stock was only up 18 percent. I was expecting like a 100 percent move like some of these other small caps do. They have almost no analyst coverage and they are so low profile that I doubted they were even a legitimate company. Had to do a lot of research to make sure the company was actually real.

The CEO is a Harvard graduate and its been in business for almost 30 years. Blackstone owns a 5ish percentage stake in the company. If the CEO would do some interviews and increase the visibility of the company the liquidity of the stock would be a lot better. It trades with chunky price moves and it doesnt take much volume to move the price significantly.

Here is excerpt of ER for q2 that happened Thursday last week:

Innodata Reports Second Quarter 2024 Results; Record 66% Revenue Growth Year-Over-Year

NEW YORK, NY / ACCESSWIRE / August 8, 2024 / INNODATA INC. (Nasdaq:INOD) today reported results for the second quarter ended June 30, 2024.

Revenue of $32.6 million, an increase of 66% year-over-year.

Earnings per basic and diluted share of $0.00, which includes the impact of recruitment costs of $3.6 million, compared to a net loss of $(0.8) million, or $(0.03) per basic and diluted share, in the same period last year.

Adjusted EBITDA of $2.8 million, an increase of 76% year-over-year.*

Won new Large Language Model (LLM) development programs and expansions for a Big Tech customer valued at approximately $87.5 million in annualized run rate revenue.

Notable new customer wins and expectations of others.

Raise guidance to 60% or more revenue growth in 2024.

That was a nice trade man, never even heard of it.

Interestingly the Qs bounced right on the uptrend line since the bottom in August 2022.

Bulls will have to defend it to the death or it could get nasty quick.



Looking at Super Micro some will ask if the AI trade is dead.

The Soxx haven't outperformed on this bounce, which is unusual and may be a red flag because usually they are the ultimate beta trade.

but that's only the uptrend line because you used the aug '24 nadir for the slope? if you used the july high (or low) instead the chart would've broken resistance and then rebounded

what does Innodata do? what are their contracts for? 200 p/e is pretty steep

Technically you should always use lows for drawing uptrend lines and highs for drawing downtrend lines. Same if using paralells (channel) but yeah it did break out the top of the channel then. Always a decent chance for a correction (which we had) when that happens.

Horizontal lines (old highs and lows) always provide better support/resistance than trend channel lines.

Mars has made a deal for Kellanova. The price has rocketed the past month.

Gold had a massive move today now trading at $2500 an ounce. Call me cynical, but it's sending a warning sign that something isn't right in the economy.

Will Berkshire be the next trillion dollar company?

They have $276 billion in cash and $313 billion in equities.

Whether the stock market goes up or down, Buffett is set up to win either way.

Gold is up 21% year to date.

That's the real rate of inflation if you ignore the Feds bogus CPI.

Hedging? 90% of the trading I do these days is simply hedging my personal portfolio. Usually hedging sucks. I put on my put positions and the market rallies away from them and I suck **** on the hedge. Except. Except when they work! This last few weeks is the first time they have worked since last October. The plus side is when they work, they WORK! Despite the fact that my hedges have sucked balls all year I am suddenly up on hedges since we finally had the long awaited correction.

It only takes one real correction to pay for your hedges for the year. This year it was a long time coming. You have to be fluid and not overstay your welcome. When it starts working I will often hedge my hedge and then hedge my hedges hedge. Trading can get pretty fluid but if you do it right you end up with lots of "free shots". And when those free shots come in it feels like it's all worthwhile See my thread on titled "Butterflies are Free". When the market is moving the key is to get free butterflies and free calendars and free verticals in the options market and this is where hedging really pays off.

If you had puts on pre-correction and watched them go nuts and return to worthlessness you aren't hedging correctly. You gotta lock those profits while staying hedged which means understanding the options market. When you hedge your hedge and then hedge your hedges hedge and then hedge you hedges hedges hedge eventually that last hedge won't work but you'll have so much locked in by then it won't matter!

Yes , now before we move on, does anyone have a question?

Simply this:
1. Buy put
2. Sell put against put (now a verticle or calendar spread)
3. Sell a put spread against position #2 (now a butterfly or condor)
4. Since #3 caps downside buy a new put and/or put spread
5. And so on since you are locking profits all along the way because at some point the market will turn and last hedge dies.

The way it usually goes?
1. Buy put or put spread
2. Watch market grind higher like it usually does. Eat **** on the puts.

Who was it that was talking monkey pox before? was just a few years early I guess. Not saying it has much trade value beyond what's happening with the pharma companies. But will be interesting to see what happens with it once it gets here in bigger numbers. Just found it funny because I remember eye rolling it a bit years ago when it came up. Must be two years ago now?

it was either someone's burner that was trolling or some often banned guy trying another go at winning the hearts and minds of bfi with a fresh account

for a moment it looked like it had momentum (he spoke about it months before it became national news) and for a moment i was a little worried that guy would be parading his prediction left and right for the next decade - instead it went away and so did either the efforts to run a monkey pox gimmick account or the guy figured that rep was burned and had to start over again

This monkeypox thing is making the rigth wing rounds, mainly targeting COVID PTSDers. Its getting a tiny bit of broader traction but ultimately I'm guessing this is a nothing burger.

More than just nothing burger, someone making money. I would never touch a high flyer, I know the deal. It will crash and I will be sad.

https://finance.yahoo.com/quote/BAVA.CO/

Market is pricing in a lot of cuts. 25% chance of 50 basis points in September (not gonna happen I don't think) and then a cut at every subsequent Fed meeting up through March. That seems a little excessive.

It's all about the job numbers now. If the unemployment rate keeps edging up, cuts could come quick.

The only part of the puzzle that's confusing me is the number of job openings.

It's extraordinary. You'd wonder how the unemployment rate would be able to go up at all.

The conspiracy theorist in me wonders if a lot of the job openings are even real.

For example, in my local supermarket every time I go in there on the microphone you here we're hiring, but it's always the same old people in there working that have been there for the last 30 years.

Berkshire has crossed 1 trillon in market cap. While it's a time to order a take away and to enjoy a bottle of wine for Berkshire shareholders there is one major caveat.

Shares of Berkshire are now trading above their intrinsic value per share.

Interesting call? Dow has already made a couple of all-time highs, SPY has been teasing but not quite there and Q's are lagging. Decade? I am willing to bet any amount of money that we see new all-time highs in any index (SPY, QQQ, Russell) before 2030.

Way to go out on the ledge. SPY only needs $1.19 (more than 0.21%) to make a new high.

SPY is up $46.30 (8.95%) since Maximus made his call on August 5th end of day/overnight August 6th.

Yeah, but he made his call following the "Crash", which I immediately refuted. Sept and Oct are usually crazy and there is a chance still we don't see new highs this year. But the perma bear mindset is an illness that almost never pays off unless you have impeccable timing and discipline.

I'm not a perma bear, I'm up 14% on the year, which is below the spy, but it's a good result. If the SPY was to have a big correction I'd be beating the index.



I think all of the trades that I posted this year made money.

That other chart it's not meant to predict the top tick, but it's more of a this is where you are on the map, kind of a thing.

Can it be wrong? Of course it can. I think the Nikkei got up to a 70 pe before it crashed.

I'll say this, I can't find anything attractive right now. If you buy people can always make it more overvalued than it currently is, but if that's your philosophy in the long run you are going to get killed

If somebody knows of something that is attractive I'd love to hear it.