Michael Ballack

When I am asked who has been the biggest influence on me trading the market it has to be William O'Neil, David Ryan, Mark Minervini, Jesse Livermore, Nicholas Darvas, Stan Weinstein, Gerald Loeb, and Richard Wyckoff all Masters of the Universe and proven World Class Traders.

Homebuilding stocks have our attention. We like $Tol, $Phm, and $Len. This is really about supply/demand. Since rates have ballooned, most homeowners are locked into their existing mortgages with 3-5% rates. So essentially there is very little inventory of old homes on the market. The demand is going to be made up by the homebuilders. There is a healthy job market, consumer sentiment is good, resales muted,and the Fed will be lowering rates later in the year. Bodes well for the secular trend.

Rotation is healthy here. $Mdy and $Iwm improving. The weekly charts are quite constructive. These indexes are loaded with Canslim stocks so a continuation move here bodes well for growth.

$Cava breaks to all time high and recovers from its first IPO base and then the corrective, due diligence process that many IPO's go through. Initiating a pilot position.

Wonder who knew $Four was in takeover talks yesterday? Someone made a lot of money buying the gap down yesterday after the earnings report. Fiserv and Amadeus in takeover battle bodes well for a deal being completed very soon. Often, you can get the thesis right but shakeouts get the best of us. I was more concerned about being down 20% after the report with no cushion than leaving a 20% profit on the table. So it goes.

$Mmyt bouncing off the 21 day esa with outside day to the upside. We are initiating a tiny pilot position here. It recently formed a "Green light breakout". Not really getting aggressive as the PCE inflation report is in front of us tomorrow morning at 8:30est. Would prefer to fill the position out going sideways or coming in some tomorrow.

Fantastic Interview. Before you blast Bill, listen to this interview. Also, listen to him on CNBC in March 2020. Before you accuse him of something unscrupulous listen to all his comments. He has been 100% transparent. It's ok to change your view of something or someone when the information changes. This is a billionaire who had his clock cleaned in Valeant Pharma and recovered. The elite performers do this the best. They can reverse their view in a moment and flip flop if the stock's price is not corroborated by their view.

investors.com/news/technolog… Interestingly $Googl is Bill Ackman's top holding in Pershing Square. $132 is support. I like it long term.

Palantir $Pltr is exhibiting bullish action today and appears to be turning. A $24.08 pivot is setting up. Added incrementally today.

A nice, sideways constructive base on $Mmyt is just what the doctor is ordering.

Two to watch: $Celh and $Lly. Celh reports on Thursday and Lilly has already reported an astronomical quarter because of it's anti-obesity drugs Mounjaro and Zepbound. Both of these stocks and companies are easily understood and can be enormous winners 12-18 months from here. Lly on a pullback and Celh after their report may provide opportunities to get re-involved. It is quite possible we will.

I see very, very few setups here. Most stocks are extended way above their moving averages. This might lead to massive, profit taking, or simply sideways action that sets the stage for another upside breakout. Right now, the action is picture perfect. What Wes and I have done is reduce the number of stocks we own from 20 to 13 in the last month as we circle the wagons with our best performers. I personally only own 4 stocks (50% invested) in my swing trading account: nvda, pltr, ibit, and uber while we are 75% invested (13 positions) in our long term growth accounts. We are Bullish and buying a pullback but taking it one stock at a time for new accounts.

Taking a small loss in $Four here as earnings are reported tomorrow and have no cushion. A move above $80 on volume after the report would be enticing and might get us back on the bandwagon. With a bad report, it becomes irrelevant.

We are adding to $IBIT for the 3rd time averaging up again today above $30 as Bitcoin breaks out.

$Meli had a noisy quarter impacted by a couple of one time tax charges and currency translation. Two firms upgraded their price target to 2000. Quarter was not good enough. We are exiting with a 4.5% average gain except for a few people who we added a 2.5% position yesterday. This stock could not have looked better going into the number. This could be putting in a shakeout but the volume is extreme and warrants selling breaking the 50day ma decisively.

We are adding $Msft here as a new 5% position to employ some of the cash we have recently raised with recent sells. We don't view $Msft as a barn burner but we do think it and $Nvda are the most obvious AI leaders that have a long runway ahead. $Msft, $Googl, $Nvda, $Amzn, and $Meta are the large cap leaders in this AI space currently and should be appreciably higher in 2024 and should outperform the $SPY.

Nvda delivers.

The quarter by $Vrt was less than expected and we are exiting here on this intraday bounce at the 21 day ema with a profit of 30%. Perhaps the management is being very conservative with their guidance and the recovery is warranted. Time will tell.

If you are waiting for someone to shout climatic run and sell $Smci at $1077, you need to evaluate your exit strategy.

We are selling our entire QQQ position here realizing a 18.6% profit from a purchase on the Follow through day in November. That raises our cash position to approximately 20%. We own 14 stocks now,all at a profit, and are continuing to narrow our focus as we plow through earnings season. Please note every one of our recent buys and sells since November have been listed real time here on this feed.

$shop Selling the intraday bounce and exiting the position with a 11% gain. The reaction to earnings was disappointing.