Author: Cattolica Investment Club

18th March, 2024 - Portfolio holdings Google (GOOG) (Purchased 0.8 units @ $133.93) and Apple (AAPL) (Purchased 0.6 units @ $183.96) had a positive run on Monday, rising 4.60% and 0.64% respectively. This came following a Bloomberg article outlining the possibility of a partnership between Google’s Gemini AI and Apple’s iPhone’s.  Both tech firms have had a tough start to the year, with Alphabet underperforming the Market and Apple being in the negative year to date. The Cupertino based firm has recently made the shift from building the Apple Car to working on Generative AI, meaning a large amount of funding has rendered itself available to focus on integrating and developing Artificial Intelligence for iPhones. Not a definitive win, but definitely a step in the right direction to commence a…

In a recent Interview, Rolf Habben Jansen, CEO of Hapag-Lloyd, illustrated his views for the rest of the year on global trading. As we all know the Houthi attacks in the Red Sea and Panama Canal drought have driven up ocean freight with rates on key routes up 75% to 150% year-to-date. Despite these problems the CEO of the fifth largest ocean carrier tells that his views improved for the rest of the year after conversations with clients and logistic companies led him to rethink the forecasted projections on demand. This comes in the same week as the company reported a steep decrease in 2023 profits and a drop in dividends which led to a stock decline. The poor results reported were a consequence of the difficult last quarter of…

14th March, 2024 - After reaching its all time high on Wednesday, Bitcoin’s rally ended on Thursday. On Friday the most famous cryptocurrency continued to struggle, losing more than 4% at the time that this article was written (8:30 p.m. CET). The fact that Bitcoin did reach an all time high before its halving, was something unprecedented in the recent history of the cryptocurrency. This was due to the increasing demand for the Bitcoin spot ETF, that we explained in our recent article of the 12th of March that you can read on our website. For those of you that do not know what the Bitcoin halving is, I will now explain it to you. Bitcoin halving is a monetary policy of the cryptocurrency that reduces approximately every four years…

Hotter than expected inflation report Thursday afternoon caused yields to increase, given that the Federal bank might not be cutting rates as soon as markets previously expected. This general negative trend has rendered investor sentiment from positive to mildly negative, as major indices fell.  Meta Platform’s recent performance (up 39.8% ytd), can also be linked to the house approval of a bill that might ban TikTok in the United States. Another bullish factor is Morgan Stanley’s recent analysis, which confirms that Meta is the Internet Coverage company with the highest potential amongst its peers.  However, there might still be hope for the Chinese social media, given that the bill approved by the house of representatives forced the app to either stop operating in the US, or be sold. Former Treasury…

13th March, 2024 - The Dow Jones Industrial Average increased by 0.1% on Wednesday, while the S&P 500 and Nasdaq fell by 0.19% and 0.54%, respectively Tesla's (TSLA) stock price dropped by 5% after Wells Fargo downgraded its rating to underweight from equal weight. They also lowered its price target to 125$ from 200$. Colin Langa, an analyst from Wells Fargo mentioned the cooling EV market and the increasing competition as primary reasons. Langa also cited that despite the price cuts, the demand is not increasing which may lead to a decrease in profitability. Since the beginning of 2024, Tesla has lost 30% of its value, bringing the share price from $245 to $170. One of our portfolio holdings, Eli Lilly (LLY) (Purchased 0.2 units @ $582.99), announced a partnership…

12th March, 2024 - A very important suggestion about how the FED should deal with interest rates’ cuts in the US has been  presented by JP Morgan CEO, Jamie Dimon, during an Australian Financial Review business meeting. At this moment, the majority of investors think the US’ central bank will not introduce changes in March  and May, while the first remarkable cut is expected to be applied in June. Next week the FED will meet, determining if these expectations will be met or not, while Powell stated that they’re about to have  all the sufficient information and confidence it needs to introduce these changes. On the other hand, Dimon is very skeptical about the possible schedule of such cuts, thinking that the FED should step in only after June and…

Mar 12th, 2024 - Bitcoin's meteoric rise continues to dominate headlines as it reaches yet another milestone, surging to a record high of $72,022.16: this latest jump represents a 3% increase from previous levels and underscores the cryptocurrency's enduring appeal to investors.  Driving this surge are the substantial inflows into U.S. spot Bitcoin ETFs, which totaled an impressive $2.7 billion last week; such influx of capital reflects growing institutional interest in Bitcoin as a viable investment asset. Not to be outdone, Ethereum, the second-largest cryptocurrency by market capitalization, also experienced a significant rally: breaking the $4,000 barrier for the first time since December 2021, Ethereum's surge is fueled by its close correlation with Bitcoin's performance. Additionally, anticipation surrounding the upcoming Ethereum network upgrade, known as "Dencun," has contributed to investor…

On Friday, Eli Lilly and Company (LLY) (Purchased 0.2 units @ $582.99) announced that the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has postponed approving its Anti-Alzheimer’s drug “Donanemab'' to further evaluate the safety and efficacy of the drug. The date of the advisory committee meeting has yet to be set by the FDA, and the timing of expected FDA action on Donanemab will be delayed beyond the first quarter of 2024, as Eli Lilly itself reported. As a result of the news, the company fell around 2%.  Nvidia (NVDA) (Purchased 0.24 units @ $471.73) was protagonist of an interesting session on Friday. The stock was up around 5% intraday, and then it changed its course and plumbed to a -4% performance-ish. The last time this happened to Nvidia was more…