Apple’s next partner may be hiding in plain sight

Good morning!

Stocks are mixed to slightly lower as I type this morning and Wall Street is feeling the heat from the first losing quarter in 2 years.

The curmudgeons are pointing out all the reasons the markets will go lower – rising rates, increasing inflation, failed political leadership, China, Daniel Craig is done as James Bond … oh wait…

Keep your eye on where the world is going and use the situation to your advantage. Buy low, sell high is how you play the game.

Here’s my playbook.

1 - Oil reserves: Right idea, wrong move

President Biden may make an unprecedented reserve release of up to 180 million barrels. Oil prices are down on the news because it sounds like a big number but that’s just 2 days of global demand. It’s less than 1/3rd of the Russian shortfall. His announcement strikes me as a pointless move designed to create political points, not something that’ll help lower prices long term. (Read)

Might be a great day to add some dinosaur juice to your portfolio.

2 – Apple’s next partner may be hiding in plain sight

Walgreens turned in EPS of $159 and revenue of $33.76 billion versus $1.40 and $33.4 billion expected. Same-store sales rose 14.7% YoY to produce the largest increase in 20 years. (Read)

I think the numbers get even better going forward.

Walgreens is focused on becoming a more health-oriented store, investing heavily in robotics, creating “health corners” where customers can meet with a nurse or pharmacist and more … all to provide more medical care.

Might make a logical partner for Apple now that I think about it.

3 – Robocalls are bad enough, now this

Big tech can control what we see to the pixel but companies like Verizon can’t control robocalls. I mean how much car warranty insurance do we all need … really??!!

Now there’s a new wrinkle.

Spammers are using same-number texting … so if you look at your phone when one comes in, the number appears to be your own. Most of the junk is followed by some sort of “free gift” offer or other phishing. (Read)

The first company that figures this out will make $$$$$ … but it’s probably not going to be Verizon.

4 – Apple: resistance is futile

Fintech shares got hammered when rumours hit that Apple wants to take the tech that drives Apple Pay, Apple Cash and Apple Card inside. That’d be Green Dot (-5%) and Goldman Sachs (-1.2%). (Read)

5 – Metaverse is BS but Wendy’s is opening a restaurant there anyway

Strap on your headsets and VR goggles people!

Wendy’s is reportedly going to open their first restaurant in the metaverse… on April 2nd. Presumably, that’s so people don’t dismiss it as a joke.

This catches my attention because Wendy’s was the first company to take Twitter seriously. The company waded in during the mid 2010s and now has 3.8+ million followers, not to mention a pretty spicy feed!

Never mind that nobody can precisely define what the metaverse actually is or why a pretend world will be the bomb, plenty of real people think that’ll be the case.

Invest accordingly.

Oh, and pass me the virtual sauce while you’re at it. (Read)

Bottom Line

It's very easy to say that so and so is "lucky" when it comes to the stock market and that may be true.

Really though, what it comes down to is that they're doing something differently.

You got this – I promise!

Keith