Here’s the transcript to this week’s Live Q&A Chat from TradingWithCody.
Q. Seems like a decent time to add some new short ideas with all of the complacency and bullishness oozing…you working on some? FWIW I cut all of my positions back substantially, taking big gains across the board on your recommended stocks and others on Scutify. Thanks!!
A. Yes, I’m hard at work on finding a couple short trades. I think there’s some good/bad crashes coming this year as usual and I want to be in front to profit from them.
Q. Time to buy June VXX calls?
A. Complacency and bullishness are high as the markets hit new all-time highs once again — and I can think of worse trades than buying June dated call options on the$VIX/VXX/volatility index. That said, I wonder if we might see that 3-5% spike I mentioned a few weeks ago one more time before we get our next fear-based markets pullback.
Q. Oddly empowering to have all of this dry powder.
A. Yes, it’s a good thing to feel like you’re in control of your stock portfolio and that’s what TradingWithCody is all about!
Q. Possible to give a quick assessment of Blackberry? Is it going to hold on appreciably with all that’s going/gone on?
A. Five years ago when $BBRY was a nearly 10x its current quote, I wrote a series of articles on Marketwatch and TradingWithCody that “Rimm is dead”http://blogs.marketwatch.com/c…. I don’t think anything’s changed there and I’d much rather own Revolution Investments than a $BBRY complete has-been with no viable platform or developer community to build on.
Q. If you have a smaller portfolio, say around $100k, and you are keeping your exposure to 10% max of any one stock, you are limited on what you can do with high priced stocks like GOOG, where the most you are going to have is 15-20 sh. In this case, would you say using DITM LEAPs is a good way to get more traction? Or would you still stick with common?
A. First off, $100k is more money that most Americans and way more money than most earthlings will ever see in their own stock portfolios, so don’t consider it “smaller.” Manage it like it’s a million dollar portfolio and it will will be one day. On that note, why does it matter if you own 20 or 200 or 2000 shares? The same principles of scaling in, taking some profits, being patient, and so on all apply. With a $100k portfolio, you might be limited in your ability to invest in a $250k Berkshire Hathaway stock, but not in a $500 or $1000 stock.
Q. Hi, Cody. Back to the subject du jour: AAPL. I hear what you say about the possibility of a 3-5% pullback, etc. For those of us who are “new” to the common and essentially flat — bought at 128 after cashing in on some of the $120 calls – thanks! — is there anything we can/should do for “protection”? Those puts you discussed? A 10% stop? Thanks.
A. I sure wouldn’t put a stop loss on $AAPL as I’ve seen it pull back 20-30% or more at various times in the 12 years that I’ve owned it, which would mean I’d have been stopped out of it many times along the way, instead of just riding it to glory. If you want to own $AAPL, I think you should just resign yourself to the fact that you will have some “drawdowns”/pullbacks in the stock and prepare to nibble/scale into more $AAPL when that happens.
Q. I’m down to about a 25% position of where I’d like to be with AAPL. You’ve been talking about trimming and the possibility of it consolidating at or near these levels. Any way you could update us on AAPL when you think it would be a good time to add another tranche?
A. Sure, I’ll let you know when I see another possible good entry point in $AAPL. If you’re down to 1/4 of a full position on the stock, you might want to just go ahead and scale into another tranche sometime soon, to get it up to at least 1/2 size and then hope/pray you get a 10-20% pullback in the stock sometime this year that you then use to scale into more. Good luck.
Q. Thoughts on BKS and their upcoming earnings report? I’m holding some March $25 puts. Thanks
A. With a March 10 earnings report date, that’s cutting it close with your March puts. I can’t imagine any major good news or beats in the earnings report, so it might work out for you. This time two years from now, I do think $BKS is single digits.
Q. Cody what do you think of TWTR right now after this earnings increase. Would you buy it right now? How about the Google. Looks like google is going higher now.
A. I like both $TWTR and $GOOG for the long term and own both accordingly. Near-term, it’s a bit of a guess as the cross currents in the markets are tough to gauge.
Q. Hi Cody A few weeks ago I asked on the site which shares should i own as i had both c and L. The advice i received was to be in the L shares so I sold my c and purchased the L. Now owning L i noticed on your post re google that you have purchased c shares. Which one should I be in I would appreciate some clarification
A. I don’t think it matters too much in the long run whether you own the Google GOOG or the GOOGL class of shares. Both will basically go up big if the company continues to execute on becoming the de facto gatekeeper to the world’s digital lives. To clarify: $GOOG = Class C Google Shares (non voting). $GOOGL = Class A Google Shares (voting).
Q. Hey Cody. With the intro of the new Scutify hedge fund manager app we’ve now got 3 different branded apps: HFM, Scutify itself, and Scutify Sentiment. I personally think that having so many places to access content dilutes the brand power a little bit. I would hope long term that everything would be available in one big power app/website. Your thoughts?
A. The Scutify site itself is indeed the “one big power website” but @KheangLy and I made a conscious decision to keep the main Scutify app somewhat more streamlined and easier to use/understand than it would be if we compiled everything into it. Further, we are living in the App Revolution and you want to have as many (good) apps as possible in the market place to maximize your value/future/potential for a breakout hit. I don’t think Scutify’s “brand” exists in any broad or deep enough sense to make it “dilute-able” just yet. 🙂
Q. Hi Cody, the new site seems to be working well (finally), and I have a search related question: is there a way to search the chat room posts by ticker (and by date), i.e., to search for all posts related to a particular security for a range of dates? If I were to remember a comment about a security but cannot remember who posted it or when, how can I find that (easily)? Or if I want to see what the community posted related to a security? How about a search for posts by a particular member, also for a range of dates?
A. Great question and good idea. I don’t think @KheangLy has put search functionality on the new TWC site yet, but I’ll ask him to now. You can click on anyone’s name in the chat room and it will take you to their comments on TWC (if you click my name it takes you to https://twc.scutify.com/member…) and you can scroll their all theirs (or you own) comments and find what you’re looking for in the meantime.
Q. Thanks, wise advice!. Well, then, how about some more pictures of the baby?
A. Here’s my daughter giving me the scoop outside on 2015’s first day of warmth a few days ago. PS. We have another daughter due this summer, by the way.
