The Fear & Greed Index is finally back into the “greed” zone, but buyers were more circumspect yesterday, leaning into Consumer Staples (XLP) and Industrials (XLI).

Sticking to Quality

Large-cap quality was the best-performing factor in the session. Essentially, investors are just buying big-name companies that have been well-run for years, often decades. 

Quality Constituents

Diverging Paths

 

With all due respect to Robert Frost, he was my late mother’s second-favorite poet. When it comes to investing, talking about the worn road we are currently traveling is often the right move.

There comes a time when the road less traveled becomes appealing, but missing out on gains while waiting for such a turn of events is frustrating, unless you are a money manager getting paid regardless of results. Right now, that means semiconductors (SMH) and hardware, even at these lofty levels, are being bought, and software during freefall is being provided.

Yes, I almost want to cry after we made profits on Teradyne Inc (TER) in the model portfolio last Friday.  The Street's value proposition was missed entirely, so relying on its estimates gave us the wrong impression. I’m not too upset since it was a hefty gain. Meanwhile, the software (IGV) implosion has reached a critical mass.

Project Vault

Everyone is talking about rare earths, and it looks like the administration will do something about it. It's not a moment too soon.

China has clear advantages over the U.S. in proven zinc and rare earth reserves.

The White House has launched “Project Vault” to stockpile critical minerals, including rare earths.

Initial seed funding:

• $1.67 billion private capital
• $12.0 billion from Export-Import loan

The clock is ticking, but that flimsy excuse about how long it would take to stockpile this material and eventually mine and refine it ignores that demand will climb 477 times between 2025 and 2050, according to Morgan Stanley (MS).

Today’s Session

Drivers for today’s session include the US and India trade deal.

Palantir (PLTR) earnings reaction saw a pop in shares (it needs to break $170 to erase the impact of recent bear campaign).

The memory and storage trade continues full steam ahead with Samsung having its best session since 2006, up 11% overnight.

Our report on Critical Minerals has been added to our site at the bottom of the homepage.

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