New Month, New Hopes.
Looking back at March, it was an awful month! At least for me. There are probably a lot of smart people out there that have taken advantage of all the hub-bub and craziness of the month, but I was not one of them. My inclination was to just stay where I was at and just let things play out for a while. But I did make a few adjustments during this crazy month that didn’t really work out for the best…yet.
The war in Iran is the biggest news I suppose. I wasn’t too sure where to go with that. I would have thought that Palantir would go up fast because of all the use in the government, but it dropped like a stone. So did Nvidia and several other AI centric stocks. In fact, AI seems to really be losing steam, at least as far as the market is concerned. Most of the S&P500 is made up of a few tech stocks and where they go seems to drive the rest of the market.
With the news stories being about Peace coming one day and No Peace the next, the market swung with every new decision. As we come into April, there are more talks of us getting out of the war, but no real solution to the blockade of oil in the Strait of Hormuz. I know that most people are looking at the price of gasoline (now at 4 dollars a gallon) but having lived through 1973 and the shortage of gasoline, I think that’s worse. For those who weren’t there, we had to get gas on certain days depending on the last digit of your license plate, and you could only get it if your tank was less than half full. Lines at the gas stations could take you an hour or more just to get to the pumps. For me, the lack of gas is worse than the price of gas. So far, they aren’t talking about that here in the US, but I don’t know what it’s like in other countries.
When the president changed the name of the Department of Defense to the Department of War, I kind of knew this was going to happen. The focus was no longer going to be on protecting the world, to attacking the world. And that’s what happened. It started with Greenland, then Venezuela and then Iran and even before he’d done with Iran he is talking about Cuba. But effectively he has recently given Cuba to Russia, by allowing Russia to be the hero and supply them with oil.
Is this really all about avoiding talking about the Epstein Files? To be honest, it wouldn’t surprise me at all if the president and some of his advisors were all doing bad things with young girls. I was never going to be “shocked” if that news came out. Let’s face it, his reputation proceeds him. But I digress….
A couple of changes to my portfolio
I didn’t sell anything. I know that it can be smart to take profits while you have them and use them to buy something else to try to increase profits. But my goals are not to “trade” but rather “invest” so I look only to buy and not sell. As I watched my portfolio value drop 30%, I continued to look for places to invest in that I thought would do well. My only new stock was Kimbell Royalty Partners. which is a Oil and Gas stock. They own land that has oil beneath it and lease out the access of that land to oil drilling companies. It’s a very sideways addition to my oil and gas companies.
Other than that, I added to my Campbells Soup stocks to lower my cost basis. I also increased my shares of the SCHD ETF which is a dividend centric ETF as I look more toward increasing the dividends that I get to take advantage of compounding my investments. I’m happy with the way that SCHD has reallocated their group of stocks this month, and I think it will continue to grow.
Looking Forward
I expect that this month I will see a few more additions, but not sure yet. I am still interested in McCormick (because I like their products) and Clorox and Colgate Palmolive as well. Just not sure when I want to get in and how much to spend on them. If I had a lot of money to throw in, it would be much easier. But I have limited funds, and the way things have been going, I am probably going too slow.
If we get through this war problem, without blowing ourselves up, maybe things will turn around. While the president keeps saying we are ahead of schedule, the timeline keeps expanding. It was supposed to be 3 days, then 2 to 3 weeks, and now 3 to 6 weeks. We are in Week 5 so I guess the next one will be 6 to 10 weeks? Who knows?
April should be an interesting month. Let’s keep watch.
