Category Archives: China

Tariffs Are the Headline—But These 3 China Risks Are the Real Market Threat

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Dear Mr. Market:

What If Tariffs Are Just the Beginning?

The tariff headlines are back, and as usual, they make for great cable news debates and political talking points. But beneath the surface, there are far more serious considerations. Recent commentary has raised three key concerns about the escalating tensions between the U.S. and China—and none of them are as simple as price hikes at Walmart.

Let’s break them down:

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Inflation Myths, Market Realities, and the Tariff Scapegoat

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Dear Mr. Market:

Ah, tariffs. The misunderstood villain of the economic world, blamed for everything from rising grocery bills to why Uncle Bob’s imported car parts now cost a fortune. But let’s set the record straight—tariffs are not always a pure cause of inflation. At least, not in the way most people think.

Read more: Inflation Myths, Market Realities, and the Tariff Scapegoat Continue reading →

March Madness: Final Four Investing Bracket 2024

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Dear Mr. Market:

If your alma mater or favorite college team did not make the tournament on Selection Sunday, we’ve got another option for you!

Even if you don’t like or follow college basketball, we think you’ll enjoy what we pioneered and have put together.

My Portfolio Guide, LLC was the first investment firm to publish a March Madness investing bracket where we share our picks and match them up against each other.  We break down and assign each of the four “regions” with an asset class and then pick teams (stocks) that we think have the best chance at doing well relative to others. 

Not only is this “exercise” a way for us to share our ideas from a macro perspective, but it offers a fun platform to dig into a couple specific investments and themes we are following or excited about in the year ahead.

Click here or below to see or enlarge the entire bracket for 2024. 

Our Final Four Investing Bracket slots 48 positions against each other and we mainly want to show why we see one investment doing better than another over the course of the next year. One caveat to keep in mind is that while there are 48 total investments within our bracket, it does not mean we like them all; some are there for illustrative purposes or to discuss a certain theme playing out in the stock market. Lastly, the way these are initially “seeded” does not reflect our current confidence in them. For example, a #1 seeded investment could lose right out of the gate just as a #12 could potentially win it all. In other words, these investments (or “teams”) are ranked and seeded on a number of factors but one of the main drivers is how hot they recently performed within the past few months or recent year.

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Going Long in Two Fields: Why TLT Could Be Your MVP During Recessions

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Dear Mr. Market:

First off, if you want to know how amazing Artificial Intelligence is, the following list of article titles were generated for this article in the matter of four seconds! (we picked the first one and the rest of this article is typed with regular human toiling!)

FYI: If you’ve never used ChatGPT, before try it! Much of its delivery is on what and how you ask things and in this case here is the prompt/reply that we asked of it:

Certainly! Here are a couple of article title ideas that play on the “going long” football reference while discussing extending bond allocations, especially in a recessionary context and using the TLT ticker symbol:

  1. “Going Long in Two Fields: Why TLT Could Be Your MVP During Recessions”
  2. “Huddling Up for Stability: TLT’s Game Plan for Going Long in a Recession”
  3. “Scoring Big in Bonds: Going Long with TLT Amidst Recession Signals”
  4. “Touchdown for Investors: TLT’s Playbook for Going Long in Uncertain Markets”
  5. “Bonds and Touchdowns: TLT’s Strategy for Going Long in Recessions”
  6. “From Gridiron to Portfolio: Going Long with TLT’s Defensive Play”
  7. “Executing the Long Game: TLT’s Endurance in a Recessional Season”
  8. “Tackling Recession Risk: Going Long with TLT’s Defensive Line”
  9. “The Bond Field Advantage: Going Long with TLT Amid Market Turbulence”
  10. “Scouting for Opportunities: Going Long with TLT’s Recessional Defense”

Now…on to business and what we’re talking about today, which is not related to football but rather recession worries, market strategy, and in our opinion how one should consider adjusting the bond piece of their allocation to hedge what we see coming. If you’re in the growing and increasingly popular camp of preparing for a stock market crash or just a general recession, here’s one adjustment and hedge that you may want to consider.

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March Madness: Final Four Investing Bracket 2023 

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Dear Mr. Market:

March Madness is back!  

And so are we… The world stopped pretty much everything at one point during the pandemic and sports were of course no exception. For true sports fans there was nothing more depressing than watching cornhole tournaments or empty arenas void of fans, sounds, and energy. Even if you don’t like or follow college basketball, we think you’ll enjoy what we pioneered and have put together. 

We’re proud to say that My Portfolio Guide, LLC was the first investment firm to publish a March Madness investing bracket where we share our picks and match them up against each other. We break down and assign each of the four “regions” with an asset class and then pick teams (stocks) that we think have the best chance at doing well relative to others.  

Not only is this “exercise” a way for us to share our ideas from a macro perspective, but it offers a fun platform to dig into a couple specific investments and themes we are following or excited about in the year ahead. 

Click here or below to enlarge and see the entire bracket for 2023.  

Continue reading →

Pssst….That was NOT the stock market correction we’ve all been waiting for!

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Dear Mr. Market:

Yesterday seemed like the start of the Great Depression for some pundits and nervous nellies. Fear sells, and negative prognosis appears smarter than positive outlooks for whatever reason. The reality, and key reminder we wish to bring up again, is that the long awaited correction has yet to come. As of this writing, we are literally only -3.91% off of all-time S&P 500 highs in the market.

It should be noted that AAII Bearish Sentiment reading is as high as its been since the last most major S&P 500 sell-off.

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Cargo Ship Gridlock

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Dear Mr. Market:

What’s the first term you think of when discussing the economy? Stocks, bonds, gold? How about Supply & Demand?

On a recent flight to Salt Lake City, Utah, we saw a “picture worth a thousand words”. Matt Pixa, founder of My Portfolio Guide, LLC, took this picture from the air and also went out to pick the brains of some contacts he has in the import/export business to help put more color to the canvas.

Long Beach, CA port

If you zoom in on the picture it almost doesn’t do it justice. There are almost 50 cargo ships waiting to unload but basically stuck out there for weeks. Why are all these cargo ships lined up and floating outside the Long Beach and Los Angeles ports?

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Buy the Rumor and Sell the News

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Dear Mr. Market:

The stock market has provided many sayings and memorable catchphrases that people tend to regurgitate ; some have merit and some are just garbage.

If you’re a regular reader of Dear Mr. Market, or a client of My Portfolio Guide, LLC, you’ll know that our all-time favorite is “The four most dangerous words in investing are …This time it’s different” -Sir John Templeton. Here are some other all-time adages that you’ve undoubtedly heard:

“Buy low sell high” Uh…yeah, but easier said than done.

“The trend is your friend” Sure….until it’s not!

“If you have trouble imagining a 20% loss in the stock market, you shouldn’t be in stocks” -John Bogle

“Markets can stay irrational longer than you can stay solvent” -John Maynard Keynes

So…what does “buy the rumor and sell the news” mean? You probably know that the stock market is full of speculation, great stories, and chock-full of hidden nuggets as well as potential land mines. Even if you’re not an experienced investor or trader, at some point you’ll figure out that by the time your neighbor (you know the guy who never loses and is always up) tells you about a stock tip…the ink on the newspaper is already dry and that idea is likely stale.

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Economic Outlook: The voice and face behind Dear Mr. Market

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Dear Mr. Market:

We’ve written you hundreds of letters over the past decade and on occasion it’s nice to put a face with the name! Last week, Matt Pixa of My Portfolio Guide, LLC, was given the honor and opportunity to present an Economic Outlook to the Seal Beach Chamber of Commerce.

We share it with you here and look forward to your feedback and questions!

PS- Click here to view the entire presentation but the “meat” of the show starts exactly at the 10 minute mark. Enjoy!

Is there any Good News on COVID-19?

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Dear Mr. Market:download

We obviously live in a crazy world with a news cycle that is non-stop. We read this a few years ago but for every piece of “good news” there are 17 being reported of bad news. This is not strictly related to Coronavirus / COVID-19, but with news in general.

Earlier this week a client of ours sent us some articles and pieces of good news with verifiable links to support the stories we perhaps don’t hear enough about.

Finally some better news with documentation…

There is light at the end of the tunnel and here is some news worth taking a peak at: Continue reading →