[CNBCfix Fast Money Review Archive — April 2019]
How come ‘60 Minutes’ hasn’t done anything recently on HFT and Michael Lewis’ rigged-game findings and Brad Katsuyama’s exchange ...
Judge flew United Airlines to San Francisco for a special edition of Monday's (4/29) Halftime Report, heavily focused on tech stocks.
Brad Gerstner basically gushed about FB and Silicon Valley.
Judge at one point mentioned IPO or potential IPO valuations and even said "Party like it's 1999."
There was some crisp conversation, but basically, this show didn't help anyone execute a successful trade.
Judge promised Andy Chase on Tuesday.
Karen Finerman: ‘The Fed is gone’
"I have a very strong opinion on the Fed," said Karen Finerman on Friday's (4/26) 5 p.m. Fast Money.
"They are gone. The Fed is gone," Finerman said, explaining, "They're not even saying 'data-dependent' anymore."
Grandpa Guy Adami grumbled, "There is inflation. There's asset inflation; ridiculous asset inflation."
On Friday's Halftime Report, Joe Terranova offered that the "important metric" for AMZN is the margins; then he called Amazon a "country," then he said it's a "company that's becoming a country."
Actually, the "important metric" is streaming.
Bryn Talkington, stunning in black, said, "Ultimately, Amazon just continues to deliver what the consumer wants." Actually, AMZN continues to deliver what Wall Street wants, which is streaming.
Mike Wilson is seeing
‘similarities’ to 1999
Honestly, we can't fathom who besides the folks at CNBC cares about this fellow's stock market predictions.
But CNBC for some reason really, really cares, so guess we've gotta post something on it.
Mike Wilson returned to the Halftime Report set on Tuesday (4/23) to claim, as always, that he was still kinda right despite being massively wrong.
"I mentioned the great earnings that came in today. You been too negative?" asked Judge in an extraordinary understatement.
"Yeah, well look, I've- first off, I'll just say, we've been too conservative on where we could go this fast," Wilson said. "Now the range this year doesn't surprise me. 2,400 to 3,000 has been our range forever, uh, for the last 18 months."
Ah. So no we're back to the "3,000" call instead of the "2,750" with Sara Eisen a couple weeks ago (see below).
Anyone who followed Mike's advice to sell at 2,600 in January and wait for the December retest should take heart — there's still more pain ahead.
"We're a little bit more, you know, cautiou- not cautious but we're like just realistic about is (sic grammar), the 2nd half expectations now are too high, and they need to come down," Wilson explained, even though he also claimed "We're gonna probably go to 3,000 at some point in the next couple weeks."
Wilson curiously explained his job description — we've wondered exactly what it is beyond making TV appearances — this way: "I'm tryin' to steward a lot of assets in a positive risk-reward manner, and at 3,000, the risk-reward is just not as attractive."
Pitching more softballs than Eddie Feigner, Judge at least mentioned that a big part of Wilson's recent thesis was crumbling margins. Wilson suddenly protested that — despite everything he's been saying on TV for a year and a half — he's riding the bull.
"We've participated in a lot of these stocks, OK. We're, we're overweight equities, OK. We're not shying away from the equity market," he said.
He added, "We've participated fully in this, OK. Our clients have participated fully in this because we've been overweight equities since 2013."
So he says on TV that stocks will pull back while keeping his clients overweight stocks.
Interesting.
Judge, apparently slowly starting to figure out this vaudeville act, actually said, "No, I got it, but it feels to me like you almost want it both ways."
We were wondering which year Mike was going to bring up during the conversation. We figured it probably wouldn't be 2008 but figured the other usual suspects were possible. Mike didn't disappoint, at one point stating, "I think there are people believing this is 1999. I can see the similarities."
Joe thinks streaming viewers actually care about content libraries
Also on Tuesday's (4/23) Halftime Report, Joe Terranova accused Jim Lebenthal of dismissing the value of Disney's content in creating a streaming model.
What nobody on this illustrious panel mentioned was that 1) Wall Street loves streaming even though 2) Streaming doesn't make much, if any, money and 3) that's all you need to know about the sector.
On the 5 p.m. Fast Money, Karen Finerman said she liked the fact there were "broad beats" in Tuesday's earnings reports. Karen also suggested the market might be moving a little too fast and said she sold some upside Google calls.
Vaudeville act returns Tuesday
Monday's (4/22) Halftime Report had barely gotten going when Steve Weiss uncorked a minor bombshell.
"I was talking to Rick Rieder, and, and, he's calling actually for the ECB to buy equities," Weiss said. "He thinks that's a real possibility."
See, we were glad to hear that, not because we might endorse it (we have no opinion on this idea) but because it further demonstrates the ludicrousness (or is it ludicrosity?) of when these know-it-alls on CNBC try to insist "the Fed's out of bullets." As far as we can tell, central banks can buy shares of Enron if they think it'll help the financial markets.
Regardless, Jim Lebenthal wasn't impressed by Rieder's idea.
"That'll turn Europe into Japan," Jim said. "They better not do that."
Meanwhile, Judge announced that Judge's Buddy, who, in an ongoing, ghastly, epic stumble has practically completely missed a near-record 4-month run, would return to the show Tuesday and gave the panelists ample warning.
"He's gonna make his case to all of you in person ... says we're in a very speculative, very late phase of the rally, he's skeptical of the rebound, skeptical that it's gonna remain robust," Judge explained.
Judge's panelists are still gullible enough on this subject to continue rewriting history; "he's been right, you know, for most of the last 12 months," said Jim Lebenthal, before Jim correctly did a U-turn and breached protocol in the process.
Jim actually said Judge's Buddy "sounds like a permabear."
"He was right about the pullback," Judge practically bellowed.
"I said he's been right for 12 months," Jim clarified, which 1) isn't true and 2) isn't what Jim previously said.
Weiss said he disagrees with Judge's Buddy because biotech is traditionally speculative, and it's been "crushed."
We hope we hear more about the mighty "earnings recession" on Tuesday.
Jim for some reason actually said the banks are finally turning the corner, a claim we've heard probably hundreds of times in 10 years.
But Weiss shrugged, "They're a pure proxy for bonds."
Jim said he resists the temptation to buy RIG "every day."
Oops — ANTM not quite way-way-way overdone yet
Sure, she looked great. But Karen Finerman made a call that's not exactly going to be trumpeted by Jim Birdsall at the top of Tuesday's (4/16) Fast Money.
On Monday's (4/15) Fast Money, Finerman touted ANTM.
"I bought some Anthem today, I mean, we know managed care has just gotten annihilated over the last few weeks, this just seemed way-way-way overdone," Finerman said. "We'll see in 2 weeks. I don't think earnings will be so indicative of anything, but maybe they'll talk about what they're seeing in policy front (sic grammar last 3 words)." (Snicker on "policy front.")
Well, you know that sound of a lost game on "The Price Is Right"?
Yep.
Looks like Karen should've waited a day for a $20 discount.
A day later, Jim Lebenthal on Tuesday's (4/16) Halftime opined that "Health care is getting really into deep value here on everything coming out of Congress."
This entry was posted during trading hours 4/16.
What nobody says is that the business of streaming movies and TV series isn’t exactly very profitable
They say imitation is a sincere form of flattery, which is why folks were beaming around CNBCfix HQ on Tuesday (4/16) when the Halftime Report crew practically picked up this page's text from a day earlier.
Specifically, we're referring to DIS vs. NFLX (see headline below).
Sizing up the situation, Pete Najarian said Tuesday, "I think competition is OK. I don't think they necessarily, you know, square each other out Scott."
Even Judge said, "I don't view this as one vs. the other."
Pete added, "I know, but everybody (um, that would be Tim Seymour and "tectonic plates shifting" Karen Finerman) seems to want to say that."
Judge continued, "Disney's pain- uh, gain is not Netflix's pain or vice versa" and actually scowled at the idea of anyone possibly thinking so.
Pete concluded, "Right. But we hear of that. Right, I mean, is that what we hear on the network all day long? I- I hear that all the time."
Honestly, what's bizarre about Wall Street's obsession with streaming is what a bad business it really is. Check out Netflix's net income.
Jon Najarian even said DIS is planning to "bleed for 5 years to break even" in this venture.
Elsewhere, panelists, like everyone else these days, were enthusiastic about the stock market as Judge tried to reconcile Larry Fink's melt-up thesis with Judge's buddy's "earnings recession"/sell at 2,600 and wait for December retest thesis. (That was only a joke. Judge didn't actually try to reconcile that.)
Jim Lebenthal stressed "we haven't had euphoria," stating we "almost" had it a year ago in January, "but then that rolled over."
Sarat Sethi quietly touted the "large-cap liquid names" and went on to name a few.
Then there was an update on everyone's favorite subject — how far out in the future is the options buying occurring. Doc said that, believe it or not, now "they're pushing out to September." But moments later, Pete said, "We still don't have a lot of long term quite frankly."
omigod!!!! Nobody’s gonna subscribe to Netflix anymore because DIS went up $16!!!!!
Everyone on the Halftime Report (4/15) loves the stock market.
Without naming names, Shannon Saccocia nevertheless noted that some people think there's an "earnings recession upon us."
But Grandpa Steve Weiss, despite acknowledging good fundamentals and technicals, repeated his refrain that stocks go up 80% of the time and said it's "too early" to declare there's no "earnings recession."
Joe Terranova said he spent "much of the weekend" (snicker) researching health care stocks in search of alpha.
Joe proclaimed mighty C (snicker) "is probably 67 going above 70, maybe even towards 75."
Judge devoted a large chunk of the program to over-its-skis DIS, which, according to some of the panelists, is suddenly killing it in absolutely everything it does, streaming, theme parks, ESPN, Marvel/Star Wars movies, etc.
Josh Brown, who just a few days ago made a tremendous bull call in this name that is possibly a front-runner for Call of the Year, rightly cheered the stock, but it was Joe Terranova who was fresh on the bandwagon, explaining he bought DIS Friday.
Joe actually claimed DIS "is a 3- to 5-year secular story that's gonna take this company, to Josh's point, well above 150 towards 175."
Joe explained that sports wagering will "take care of ESPN."
On the 5 p.m. Fast Money, Tim Seymour, like a lot of folks actually, is somehow obsessed with this notion of NFLX and DIS being some kind of zero-sum trade, as if people won't subscribe to/watch both.
Even Karen Finerman, despite looking dynamite in Times Square, stated, "I think the tectonic plates are really shifting in this business" (which is basically an argument against CNBC's parent, Comcast) and that she can't see how DIS couldn't at least "make a dent" in NFLX's operations. Of course, she could not be long NFLX "at this valuation." (Helpful tip: P.E. ratios are not a catalyst for stock movement.)
Karen said the fact that TSLA has a "sort of weekly or every 10 days strategy change" is a sign of management in "disarray."
Kari Firestone wonders why steel-stock downgrades merit time on the program
Thursday's (4/11) Halftime Report, guest-hosted by Sully, spent way too much time on the most boring subject, the banks.
Meanwhile, Kari Firestone actually questioned if X is still a publicly traded company.
"I honestly don't even understand why we would spend any time on this," agreed Josh Brown, which is exactly what they should be saying about the financials.
Joe Terranova observed, "There are- is a tremendous amount of muted, if not depressed, expectations when you're looking at financials."
OK. Whatever.
As for the broad market, Brown predicted "more upside surprises to come."
Joe said he offered his 13-turning-14-year-old son a Yankee game (fine) or "hockey playoff tickets" (Zzzzzzzz), but all he wanted was "Instagram." (Someone who possibly recently was complaining that either A) There's no growth in Instagram or B) That Instagram is getting loaded up with too many ads pointed out that Instagram is free.) (This writer is long FB.)
Who writes this stuff? Judge opens show stating, ‘As stocks march towards new highs, does a deluge of downgrades mean it’s time to take a rework of your own (sic redundant) portfolio?’
Judge's 2 favorite subjects: Mike Wilson's latest bear note and the politicization of the Fed. (Then again, at least he's not talking about "Greece is the word" or "the fiscal cliff.")
It used to be that Fed expert Richard Fisher, a longtime CNBC voice, barely got a mention from this site.
A couple years ago, he had a combative interview with Judge (they quickly straightened things out), and ever since, Fisher has rallied into easily one of CNBC's best guests.
On Monday's (4/8) Halftime Report, Fisher basically shrugged off the possibility of Stephen Moore and Herman Cain being confirmed to the Fed; "neither of them has got the right stuff."
Fisher warned that Donald Trump is going to do his "utmost" to "politicize" the Federal Reserve and that while he (Fisher) is fond of Kudlow, "I don't sense his heart is in this."
"This is serious stuff," said Fisher, who dubbed Arthur Burns "the worst Fed chairman in history." (Fisher also claimed again that LBJ "physically beat up" William McChesney Martin when a recent New York Times story merely said Johnson "pushed Martin up against a wall.")
In other matters, Kevin O'Leary suddenly is no longer so hot for BA and suggested it might go to 350. Jenny Harrington lowered the bar, suggesting she might want to buy it around 300.
O'Leary called GE stock merely an "option" against going to zero. Joe Terranova said if you want to own GE debt, you can "go at it."
Jim Lebenthal redid his standard call on ROKU, a stock that gets a new analyst narrative every 3 weeks, saying "just wait" on it because it's going to "continue going down."
Judge, who had a shaky show, didn't even get Jim's facts right, stating, "You're telling people not to sell it," which is exactly the opposite of what Jim said.
"No," Jim said, apologizing for "not being clear" even though he was crystal clear.
Steve Weiss called the MU downgrade "a good call" and gloated about selling at 52. Jim called MU the "quintessential cyclical stock." (This writer is long MU.)
Weiss said he doesn't think it's "endemic" that Morgan Stanley was out urging LYFT shorts. Kevin O'Leary said, "There's a lot of people wanna short this stock and can't."
Judge said Mike Wilson is proclaiming this week the beginning of the "earnings recession." Jenny Harrington said Credit Suisse just came out with a report saying the "exact opposite," not realizing Judge doesn't care about any views running contrary to Mike's.
On the 5 p.m. show, Karen Finerman said she's "very optimistic" about JPM earnings this Friday. Karen said "there's a lot of bad news that's still to come" for BA and that it's no sure thing that the 737 problem gets fixed and all the back-ordered planes get delivered. As for the broad market, Steve Grasso said he'd rather "buy at 3,000" than right here.
If the anti-stall system works on the 747, 757, 767, 777 and 787, why can’t they just put it on the 737?
During a bang-up edition of the Halftime Report Friday (4/5) in which an impressive amount of cogent commentary was delivered, we heard this interesting assessment by Dubravko Lakos on the market's assessment of a possible rate cut:
"If this scenario plays out, let's say the Fed cuts rate (sic) and, you know, does QE, the stock market is gonna balloon even more. It's just gonna shoot right up. Now, yes, we'll feel repercussions at a later point. Uh, no question. But, you know, the initial reaction is gonna be uber-bullish," Lakos said.
Josh Brown butted in, "You think so? I feel like- I feel like QE has proven only to be deflationary, or disinflationary."
Interesting. Rather than Brown's response, we would've been questioning Lakos as to these "repercussions" ... what exactly are these "repercussions" ... runaway inflation?
In a stumble, Liz Young said she doesn't expect a rate cut, but "I do think there is a good risk of a policy mistake later this year," apparently because she thinks certain data indications may prompt the Fed to hike.
Steve Weiss questioned Young, "How is that a policy mistake" if data tell Powell to hike.
Young answered, "The market would see it as a mistake because right now the market is, is pricing in a cut."
That doesn't make any sense to us as far as being a "mistake," but whatever.
"So any hike is a mistake then," Weiss concluded.
Weiss brought up "Being There," the first reference to that movie in many months.
Steve Liesman, brought in again to condemn the carnival atmosphere of the White House (and somehow express disbelief about it), suggested that Donald Trump firing Powell would bring "3rd world risk into the United States."
Judge claims ‘the only real risks’ to the stock market are international
Aside from a spirited discussion about the Fed, Friday's (4/5) Halftime crew put together an excellent assessment of how fast food/fast casual names are faring in the app space.
Of course, there was praise for Domino's. But Josh Brown, who handled much of the dialogue, compared SBUX's "literally magic" online ordering favorably to that of Chick-fil-A, which he said requires checking into a kiosk before the cooking starts. (That hasn't been our own observation at Chick-fil-A, but fair enough.) (Had producers been super-quick, they might've gotten someone from Chick-fil-A on the line to address Brown's points, but that didn't happen.)
Brown said he doesn't want Uber Eats on the delivery side. Clearly, there's a transition underway as to which food/drink retailers are going to be popular for home-delivery requests or advance mobile ordering, and which ones are going to struggle.
Brown said MCD has an "absolutely incredible" chart and said you could get long with a 188 stop.
As to the broad market, Liz Young said you can find data to support either a bull or bear case; Young thinks that for the rest of this year, it's "probably a little bit of Goldilocks."
Judge kept trying to say that the risks are from outside the U.S., even mentioning Brexit (snicker), and dared Josh Brown to say whether the greater risks are in China or the U.S.
Eventually Judge told Brown, "You misunderstood my point, I think. I'm not saying we're underestimating the risks coming from international. I'm simply saying the only real risks seem to be from the international. OK. So, you argue the point, but it's the same point."
Seeking a negative view from somewhere, Judge and Weiss both mentioned Mr. Wrong's latest call and how some people have the "point of view of, 'Here comes the earnings recession.' (snicker)"
Karen’s tips for overcoming the 4 excuses for not investing: ‘It’s probably better if you’re not a stock-picker’
Things perked up around CNBCfix HQ on Thursday when, during Kelly Evans' The Exchange, we realized that Karen Finerman was actually at Englewood Cliffs.
Karen was in the house to discuss her Acorns-affiliated op-ed at CNBC.com about overcoming excuses against investing. Kelly went through the article's 4 points.
"This is fun," Kelly said at the outset.
So here are the 4 excuses, as read by Kelly, and Karen's responses:
1. I don't have enough money to invest.
"It isn't an excuse," Karen said. "With these kind of products now, you can invest even really small amounts of money, even something as low as $50 a month, even less than that ... You pick an index fund ... you don't need to be a stock-picker, in fact, it's probably better if you're not a stock-picker."
2. I'm so young, there's plenty of time later for me think about and deal and work on all of this.
"The biggest reason to not do that is the power of compounding," Karen said. "And that's exciting ... it feels good to do that. ... Einstein said compounding interest is the most powerful force in the universe."
3. I'll start to invest when I make more money.
"I hear that a lot," Karen said. "And it seems to make sense to people when they say it. But in reality, it's like saying, 'I'll go to the gym when I'm in good shape.' Right. It makes no sense. ... I've always been a stock-market person, so I love equity exposure, but I think that, over time, that is the place to be. And, don't overthink it. And really, don't let your emotions guide you, 'cause when you hear 'oh the market's really bad so I shouldn't buy now,' that is when you should buy."
4. I'm too old for this to make a difference.
"You are as young today as you will ever be for the rest of your life," Karen said.
If we can be allowed to summarize our own observation of this topic, it would be Live within your means, and Living within your means includes saving at least a bit of money.
Karen's article at CNBC.com can be found right here.
Steve Liesman remains irked over how Donald Trump is running the Federal Reserve
Judge had the Najarii on hand on Thursday's (4/4) Halftime Report to trumpet all the short-term call-buying and whatever's left in the China-deal trade.
Joining the Najarians were Jenny Harrington and Steve Weiss, who questioned, if only 25-30% of the China deal is priced in, whether there's "another 120% in ASHR."
Doc said, "Um, well, I- I would be more selective."
Pete went on to talk about October ASHR calls even though he'd just been saying (as he always does) that all the options activity is short term in nature.
Weiss said FB is like "weebles, wobbles" and that regulation would actually help FB in comparison with its competitors. He said he'd buy it but is long Alphabet instead. (This writer is long FB.)
Later, Steve Liesman sat in to (yes, complain about what the Trump administration is saying about the Fed) opine that Herman Cain is just another political choice for the Federal Reserve.
Judge noted comments from Nixon, George H.W. Bush and LBJ about what the Fed should do. Liesman bashed this "what-about-ism of other presidents" and claimed it's "not even comparable" to what this president does, even mentioning "Nixon on Merv Griffin."
"It's off-the-charts different, Scott," Liesman said.
Weiss said Trump's picks are out of step with the "proper decorum of the Fed" (snicker).
Providing an update on his bad LYFT trade, Weiss explained that when the stock started to rebound around 68, "I bought a lot more. Now, I haven't come out of it even, but I've come out pretty damn close."
At one point in the show, Weiss had 'em howling when he conceded, "I sometimes make mistakes."
Weiss impressively concedes
blunder with LYFT shares
Steve Weiss wasn't on Tuesday's (4/2) Halftime Report, but he did dial in with an update on his recent experience with LYFT shares, which this page chronicled below.
In what could be a model for owning up to a bad trade, Weiss revealed he "stopped myself out at deal price on most of the position. What I bought higher though is what I still have."
He explained why he originally liked the trade, apparently because he thought Jamie Dimon wanted to make a big deal of it, and explained that the cost of shorting it would be "99%."
"Clearly I overestimated the trading, how well this would trade in the after-market," Weiss said.
Judge noted that plunging into LYFT sounds like "sort of the anti-Weiss trade." Weiss said he agrees, and "this is a great lesson to stick with your discipline, no matter how tempting it is. Uh, just don't stray. We all do stupid things."
Showing the broker how it’s done: Weiss’ LYFT buy at 87 is early front-runner for Bust of the Year
On Monday's (4/1) Halftime Report, Judge briefly took up the subject of LYFT's post-IPO plunge.
But he didn't bother to mention that Steve Weiss, who wasn't on Monday's show (picture above is a file photo), freely admitted Friday that he received Lyft IPO shares, and, "I actually bought a little more, just a little more at 87. It's always good to show, uh, show the broker that you're an after-market buyer, for IPO- for IPO health, in terms of getting more, uh, stock in future deals."
Well, Weiss really showed 'em. Monday's frightening disaster in this stock suggests that not only should people maybe start hitting the exits ... but maybe they never should've requested shares of this IPO in the first place.
On Monday, Judge brought in CNBC's Leslie Picker, who said, "I've been making calls on this all morning. I have not been able to find any evidence of support coming from any of the underwriters at this point in time."
Joe Terranova observed, "I don't know if the motivation to defend the green shoe is what it was 15, 20 years ago.
Judge cited TWTR, BABA and SNAP as IPOs that fizzled after the first few days. LYFT was already fizzling at the time Weiss plunged in Friday to impress his broker.
Jim’s prediction that ROKU would keep falling through 60 also looks like a bungle
It was back on Feb. 22 when ROKU surged from 51 to 64, and Jim Lebenthal wisely advised, "You let it continue to run."
But then, on March 14, amid a Loop Capital downgrade that somehow took the shares down to about 60, Jim said he unloaded his entire stake and suggested the stock would keep falling.
It crossed $69 on Monday (4/1).
Judge actually stunned by comments from White House administration
Judge on Monday's (4/1) Halftime Report said Larry Kudlow's comments Friday were "nothing short of, of stunning," even though probably no one was actually stunned.
Judge said the administration trumpets how great the economy is, but "JUST IN CASE," they say we need an immediate 50-basis-point rate cut.
Steve Liesman, who seems to get brought in every day to say something like "What the Fed wants the market to think is ...," observed that we're "deep in the pit of the White House essentially trying to run Federal Reserve policy."
Liesman said what he's concerned about is that "the market gets confused."
Joe LaVorgna, who had to keep defending Larry Kudlow's call to both Judge and Liesman, said Larry's call does indeed make sense to him and that the Fed already did a great job of confusing the markets.
Joe Terranova mentioned that over the weekend, there were a "lot of analogies" being drawn to 1998 (snicker) (because every stock market phase is always just like some calamity from 10/15/20/30/50/90 years ago).
Elsewhere, Judge said some CNBC survey found that 70% are positive about the market, 30% are neutral, and 0% are negative.
"The rug could be pulled out from everybody's feet if you don't get a trade deal on China," warned Jim Lebenthal. Jon Najarian disagreed, stating, "We've gotten here without that ... It is NOT baked in."
"I think a deal, some sort of deal, is priced in to the market," said Liz Ann Sonders.
Sara Eisen to Mike Wilson: ‘You haven’t really been a buyer into this amazing rally’
On Monday's (4/1) CNBC business-day programming, Mike Wilson turned up not on the Halftime Report or Fast Money, but Closing Bell.
Whether that's a promotion or demotion, we're not sure.
Mike is still pounding the table for margin pressure and "earnings recession." (This time, he left off the capex whatever.) He told Wilf Frost, "It's just gonna be hard to grind higher at the index level ... The value is no longer in the growth names."
So it was Sara Eisen who cut to the chase. "Mike I feel like we should just set up your calls for a little bit," Sara said. "So you turned pretty cautious last year when we went into a pretty steep downturn in 4th quarter, and lot (sic) of people started following you (snicker). If I'm not mistaken, I mean, I feel like you've been cautious ever since. You haven't really been a buyer into this amazing rally that we've had in the first quarter. So where does that leave us."
Now, think about that. That's a curious question. "So where does that leave us?" Wasn't she really trying to say, "Why should we believe you now?"
Also, what does it say when "a lot of people started following" someone who'd been predicting a downturn for a year?
Mike responded, "Yeah so our call at the beginning of the year was that we did- we called for a rolling bottom, we thought the weakest links would rally first. And then the market morphed again into the growth areas, and that's when we got more cautious again, saying we thought the market was getting too expensive, particularly some of these growth areas, and yeah, we were too early in that. ... We thought 2,750 would've capped us, and we've been wrong on that."
OK, perhaps Mike (or Sara) should compare notes with Judge, because Judge announced on Jan. 14 that Wilson was warning people to "beware of the retest" and to start selling at 2,600 or 2,650 ... then expect a retest of December lows.
In other words, nothing about 2,750 and then stopping.
Pete Najarian actually said on Jan. 14, "This is a guy who's been right, so we always like to follow those- that kind of a lead." Doc even said, "He's a guy that's right ... again, Mike Wilson has called this much better than I have."
Even CNBC's Jim Birdsall was trumpeting Mike's advice with The Voice.
On Monday, Sara pointed out multiple times that Mike's year-end target is 2,750 and noted with skepticism that we're already beyond that. Mike then explained that the problem isn't the Fed, but Donald Trump's corporate tax cut.
"The mistake was not the Fed tightening last year. The mistake was the fiscal policy mis- uh, timing, of the- the timing of the fiscal policy stimulus, which overheated the economy last year. And that was really our call, was that earnings were gonna disappoint because there was gonna be margin pressure," Wilson claimed. "And so the risk is that the profits recession turns into corporate behavioral change (snicker), which then leads to further economic slowdown."