Finance Trends Letter

Gold stocks ( GDX , NUGT ) have been firming up and moving higher in recent days.  This trend is especially evident if we pull up the chart of one of the world's leading gold miners, Franco Nevada ( FNV ). Sporting a $14.8 billion market cap, FNV is the 3rd-largest US-listed gold miner by market cap , behind $20 billion Barrick and Newmont Mining. FNV just made a new all-time high above $81.16, the prior high from August 2016. You can see these price points on the updated chart below (the stock was just below the ATH price when I shared the FNV chart on Twitter ). The stock has cleared resistance and has only "blue skies" above. So the recent strength in gold mining stocks and utilities is reminiscent of early 2016 , when these two industries were among the best-performing groups in the market. The gold miners and utilities enjoyed a strong run through the summer of 2016, then pulled back sharply into early 2017. While utility stocks ( XLU ) have already gon...

Looked at a list of the best performing stocks this year? If you have, you've probably noticed a big concentration of large-cap defensive stocks, gold miners, and basic material stocks among the list of top performers. Continuing the themes outlined in my January 2016 posts , defensive groups such as food stocks, REITS, and utilities have shined throughout the first half of 2016. Snapshot of these leading groups' ETFs with their year-to-date performance below. Click to en large (charts via Finviz.com ). Gold Miners ETF, GDX up 112% YTD. Consumer Staples ETF, XLP up 10% YTD. Utilities ETF, XLU up 23% YTD. Now that we're heading into the summer and the second half of the year, will these trends persist? Here's our update to email subscribers on gold stocks from Finance Trends Newsletter #2 : "...Let's look at a group that is shifting into a dynamic new uptrend. Gold and silver mining shares have been among the year's top perf...

Earnings season underway plus a volatile, declining market equals few real opportunities on the long side of the stock market for active investors and position traders. Today we'll look at some of the stocks that are outperforming in this weak market, as a n update to our recent defensive stocks post. 2016 began with a global stock market rout , but this weakness in the major US stock indices was preceded by a deteriorating picture for individual stocks in the broader market several months earlier . One key statistic to highlight this trend: back in late 2015, researchers at Strategas Partners found that the 10 largest stocks in the S&P 500 had accounted for more than 100% of the index's gains that year.  Narrow market: 10 largest stocks in the S&P 500 account for > 100% of 2015's gains. $SPX $AAPL $GE $MSFT pic.twitter.com/iwZDiqd6rh — Finance Trends (@FinanceTrends) November 20, 2015   Now, as we look at the market in 2016, we see an environ...