Giserman Group News: 🎅Santa Stock Rally Back For Now 🎅Merry OnLine Christmas Shopping 🚦Help Wanted? 🏚 Why Renting is In
🎅Stocks Turn Higher🎅
Here we go again Dow rallying, boosted by reports the U.S. and China are edging closer to a trade deal. This after the Dow lost 300 more points, endangering the Santa Claus Rally Tuesday as President Trump said it might be better to wait until after the 2020 election to strike a trade deal with China. It all comes just as the S&P 500, Nasdaq and Dow notched their biggest one-month gain in November, since June. The Nasdaq has rallied nearly 30% year to date, on pace for its best yearly performance in 6 years. The Dow is up about 20% year to date, its best annual gain since 2017.
- Giserman Group Translator: A Santa Claus Rally is Wall Street’s nickname for the unusually strong stock-market gains typically seen during the final five trading days of the year.
Cyber Shopping Christmas
Cyber Monday sales setting records, as Black Friday sales for brick-and-mortar stores dropped 6.2%. Cyber Monday Online sales hit a record $9.4 billion. It comes as a survey finds this holiday season, the majority of consumers will go online to handle most of their gift shopping; and the winter weather keeping many at home will certainly boost online sales.
Meantime: activist investor Carl Icahn stands to make $400 million or more if mall owners can’t pay their debt. The bet comes as retail store closures have hit record highs this year.
Uber to Take on Amazon?
Uber could extend its food delivery service to other retail businesses. Chief Executive Officer Dara Khosrowshahi says “We can extend that to essentially every single local retailer, so that anything you want in New York City can be delivered to you, hopefully in under 30 minutes." It was not immediately clear whether such a business could be expanded to other metropolitan areas, but Uber in October bought a majority stake in Chilean online grocery provider Cornershop as it seeks to widen its fast-growing food delivery app to include groceries and other goods.
Housing $ales Up
Existing Home Sales increased more than expected in October and house prices rose at their fastest pace in more than two years. The National Association of Realtors says used home sales rose 1.9% to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 5.46 million units last month.
Mortgage applications dropped even as rates fell. Applications fell 2.2% on a seasonally adjusted basis for the week ended Nov. 15, according to the Mortgage Bankers Association.
Current Mortgage Rates 30-year fixed-rate mortgage averaged 3.66% 15-year averaged 3.15% 5-year adjustable-rate mortgage averaged 3.39%
Could we soon see negative mortgage rates like Europe? >Tim Rood, Managing Director, SitusAMC on CNBC via Giserman Group:
Renting Is In
As more Americans find it harder to afford a home, rental demand is soaring. But, the supply of rental homes is shrinking, and that continues to push rent prices higher.
And, just over 12% of millennial renters plan to "always rent" — more than the 10.7% that said the same last year, a new Apartment List survey found.
Giserman Group Client Larry Heller, President Heller Wealth Management says Millennials often prefer renting to buying
With the Holidays Here - Many of the usual 'Talking Heads' are taking time off - TV needs guests and it's a perfect time to GET YOU ON - Giserman Group Will Get YOU NOTICED. Contact us now!
All About Jobs
We get those all-important Jobs Number for November on Friday. The just released monthly report from payroll-processor ADP shows that employers added just 67,000 workers in November, a much weaker reading than analysts had forecast, made worse by cuts to earlier months. This comes as other recent data paint a picture of a job market that is weathering the storm of trade tensions and a cooling global economy. Consumers are still spending, employers are still hiring, and fears of an imminent recession, which reached a fever pitch over the summer, have quieted. >Analyst TV wants to hear from YOU on this!<
Google Guys Gone
Google co-founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin, who have mostly stayed out of the spotlight since restructuring their company four years ago, are relinquishing control of parent company Alphabet to current Google CEO Sundar Pichai, the duo announced in a joint letter published to Google’s public blog. The two men will remain employees of Alphabet and retain their seats on the board, but they will no longer oversee the company’s sprawling, almost trillion-dollar empire they created while at Stanford University more than 20 years ago.
Back to the Future: 2008 Financial Crisis Again?
Some of the biggest names in finance are warning that the government’s plan to return Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to private ownership risks disrupting a market critical to the housing system. The investors, including BlackRock Inc., Fidelity Investments and Pacific Investment Management Co., have told the Trump administration that any move to privatize Fannie and Freddie should include an explicit guarantee of the $5 trillion in mortgage-backed securities they issue. The Trump administration, by contrast, says it is willing to move forward without such a guarantee, arguing that it is past time for the government to reduce its role in housing.
Coffee Brews Higher
Coffee prices have jumped more than 20% in recent weeks, lifted by signs of shrinking production in Latin America. Coffee futures have climbed to $1.157 a pound on the Intercontinental Exchange, surging from a recent low around 93 cents a pound in mid-October amid concerns of a sup-ply glut. Prices soared a total of 12% over two trading sessions last week alone.
Tesla CyberTruck Unveil Shattered
Tesla stock now moving higher after CEO Elon Musk’s unveiling of an all-electric pickup, the Cybertruck, didn’t go so well. The vehicle, which looks like a large metallic trapezoid made in a Shop Class, will start at $39,900 and go all the way up to $70,000. Deposits of $100 are being taken for the truck available in 2021. But, at the unveiling, a demonstration of window strength did not go well, when a metal ball was thrown at the supposed shatter-proof windows they cracked. “Oh my f***ing God,” Musk erupted as the audience gasped. “Maybe that was a little too hard.” Big question: Who will buy it? Some analysts are doubtful that the vehicles will appeal to traditional truck buyers and how many tech-savvy early adopters really need a space-age pickup? But Musk tweets, 250,000 people are already in with deposits.
Disney Winning Streaming War
Two weeks after its glitch-filled launch, Disney+ is averaging nearly a million new subscribers a day, new data shows. The $6.99-per-month streaming service’s mobile app has been downloaded 15.5 million times, according to numbers from research firm Apptopia. And people are forking over money to use the service rather than just ride the wave of its free trial, the data shows. The new streaming platform — which features content from Disney as well as Disney-owned properties like Marvel and the Star Wars franchise — raked in $5 million through in-app purchases in its first 13 days, according to Apptopia.
Walmart's Major Gun Policy Shift
Walmart saying it will stop selling ammunition for assault-style rifles and handguns, after two deadly shootings in Walmart stores. Meantime, CVS, Walgreens plus Wegmans Food Markets have asked customers to stop openly carrying firearms in stores.
>Lee Mandel, CEO of IntraLogic Solutions uses Technology to Help Businesses and Police Detect Possible Mass Shooters. He Spoke with the Jim Bohannon Radio Show via Giserman Group:
Giserman Group Will Get YOU NOTICED. Contact us now!
Mega Stock Merger
Charles Schwab on Monday announced plans to buy discount brokerage rival TD Ameritrade in an all-stock deal valued at $26 billion. The merging of the two biggest publicly traded discount brokers will create a mammoth with more than $5 trillion in client assets. Consolidation in the brokerage industry is expected given the massive amount of disruption occurring with all the major brokers dropping commission fees for trading in recent months.
Little Blue Box Firm Goes for Big Bucks
Louis Vuitton owner LVMH has reached a deal to buy Tiffany at $135 a share, that's $16.3 billion. The boards of the luxury firms have been discussing a potential deal since last month.
Uber Driven Lower
Uber shares fell by 6% in premarket trading after the global ride-hailing app was stripped of its London license.The company lost its license to operate in England’s capital after the transport regulator discovered more than 14,000 journeys had been taken with uninsured drivers. London is Uber’s UBER, +0.34% biggest market in Europe and key to the company’s top line. It has said it will appeal the ruling and is allowed to continue to operate during the legal challenge.
Cannabiz: Weed Shares HIGHER
Cannabis stocks mixed on news that the House Judiciary Committee approved a bill that legalizes marijuana on the federal level. But as always, some Republican members expressed concerns that the bill went too far and that it was unlikely to be taken up in the GOP-controlled Senate. Meantime, Cannabis stocks tanked after federal officials showed they haven’t chilled out over CBD. Several publicly traded pot firms saw stocks slide after the US Food and Drug Administration issued a scary new list of health warnings to consumers on Monday. The FDA warned that the cannabis ingredient — said to relieve pain and anxiety without getting people high — can cause liver damage, “changes in mood,” and “gastrointestinal distress,” among other ailments.
Tech Stocks Soar
Tech stocks soaring to their best year in a decade. Investors’ pouring into computer-chip companies to social-media platforms. The S&P 500 Technology Sector’s 41% gain for the year has put the group well above the S&P 500’s 25% climb, and on course for its biggest one-year advance since 2009.
Shep Smith Defends Press Freedom
Former Fox News anchor Shepard Smith calls for a steadfast defense of independent journalism and announced that he would donate $500,000 to a group that advances press freedoms around the world. The money will go to the Committee to Protect Journalists, a nonprofit organization.“Our belief a decade ago that the online revolution would liberate us now seems a bit premature, doesn’t it?” Mr. Smith said at the group’s annual dinner, “Autocrats have learned how to use those same online tools to shore up their power. They flood the world of information with garbage and lies, masquerading as news.”
Billionaires Running For President
There are 705 billionaires in the U.S., at least four of them with Presidential ambitions (Michael Bloomberg, Tom Steyer, Donald Trump, and Howard Schultz-though he's not in the 2020 race). So if you’re an American billionaire, there's a 1-in-200 chance you need to run for President. For the rest of us, it’s about 1-in-20million. Late word: Bloomberg’s officially in and is reportedly preparing to spend over $30 million for a TV ad blitz. That's more than some campaigns have spent on ads all year.
Kylie Jenner: Billionaire
Kylie Jenner is the first member of the Kardashian clan to add “billionaire” to her résumé after selling part of her Kylie Cosmetics line to Coty — parent company of CoverGirl — for $600 million.
Vaping Ban?...What Vaping Ban?
Massachusetts will ban e-cigarettes and the New York City Council has voted to ban flavored e-cigarettes. President Trump has stalled a planned national ban on flavored e-cigarettes, after hearing it could alienate voters and hurt his chances of reelection next year. The president backed off from vaping restrictions after political advisors and lobbyists warned him of potential pushback from his supporters. The big winner here is Juul, but not so fast New York and California are investigating the company.
The Check is NOT in the Mail
Just in time for the Holiday mailing rush: The U.S. Postal Service reports it took $8.8 billion hit this year. About $3.4 billion of that loss was due to an increase in workers' compensation costs.
Christmas Trees $hortage
Christmas tree prices are going up as supply is going down. In fact, some longtime Christmas tree farms in Oregon have shut down because of lack of trees. It's the result of a shortage of seedlings eight to 10 years ago and the dry, hot summers of 2017 and 2018, which destroyed thousands of younger trees.
Taking Holiday Re-Gifting to a New Level
Whether it's to save money or reduce their carbon footprint, almost 50% of Americans said they would give used clothing as gifts, according to Accenture data. Even more said they would welcome such presents themselves. This trend is being mainly driven by young consumers. Eighty percent of Gen Z shoppers said they plan to give thrifted gifts, according to a survey from online thrift giant ThredUp.
DAYBOOK
THURSDAY, DEC. 5
8:30 am Weekly jobless claims 11/30
8:30 am Trade deficit Oct.
10 am Factory orders Oct.
FRIDAY, DEC. 6
8:30 am Nonfarm payrolls Nov.
8:30 am Unemployment rate Nov.
8:30 am Average hourly earnings Nov.
10 am Consumer sentiment index Dec.
10 am Wholesale inventories Oct.
3 pm Consumer credit Oct.
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