'Fast Money' Recap: Brazil Booming
The market wasn't sure which direction to take Wednesday following relaxed government restrictions on mortgage buyers Fannie Mae (FNM) and Freddie Mac (FRE) and testimony from Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke. The Dow and the S&P 500 both rose by less than 0.1%, and the Nasdaq edged 0.4% higher.
On
CNBC's
"Fast Money," Tim Seymour pointed to asset inflation, and rising prices in commodities and emerging markets. He noted that consumer durables had performed terribly and that the producer price index was discouraging, but the market doesn't seem to mind.
Jeff Macke advocated benign neglect of a falling dollar because it is advantageous to be the only country with deflating currency. On rising commodity prices, Najarian noted rising wheat futures and a sharp increase in copper. He reminded viewers of
Freeport McMoRan
(FCX) - Get Report
as a copper play.
Tim Seymour discussed plays on oil. He included
Petrobras
(PBR) - Get Report
and
Petrochina
(PTR) - Get Report
. Seymour mentioned speculation that OPEC would cut production at an upcoming meeting.
Chart of the Day
"Fast Money" featured the
iShares MSCI Brazil
(EWZ) - Get Report
, due to its 20% one-month run to the upside. Seymour noted that with a budget surplus, Brazil is now a net creditor to the world. He expected a pullback in the short term but advocated buying for the long term.
Sotheby's
(BID) - Get Report
posted profits ahead of expectations today. Finerman called the company's revenue numbers "really good." Macke cautioned that the stock would be hampered by recession fears. He recommended going elsewhere.
Biogen Idec
(BIIB) - Get Report
sold off on news that one of its Tysabri drug may cause toxicity in the liver. Najarian said the stock was oversold on the news.
In advance of
Sears'
(SHLD)
earnings tomorrow, Macke said the conference call would be "90 minutes of fury." He called Sears the worst of the big box retailers. He nevertheless recommended buying the bad news for a trade.
Another company reporting tomorrow,
Dell
(DELL) - Get Report
, is rumored to be due for an earnings beat.
The crew welcomed Jim Goldman to the show to discuss the news. Goldman said pessimistic estimates may engender a beat. Najarian added that
IBM
(IBM) - Get Report
,
Hewlett-Packard
(HPQ) - Get Report
and Dell are all great names, and Dell is the cheapest.
Macke refuted the notion that Dell is completely out of the woods, saying that its new high-end "PC version of an iMac" won't survive in a tough economy. He suggested Hewlett-Packard as an alternative.
After oil hit $102 a barrel today, speculation that the metal was due for a breakout sent the Street atwitter. To explain the situation, Joe Terranova, director of Trading at MBF Clearing, joined the traders. He said that the chart looked poised for a technical breakout and that there is a lot of speculative buying interest.
Macke reiterated his view that investors are overthinking oil. With the dollar at all-time lows and international strife buoying costs, he recommended buying the
U.S. Oil Fund
(USO) - Get Report
ETF.
Najarian suggested
XTO Energy
(XTO)
and
Conoco Phillips
(COP) - Get Report
as plays on rising oil. Seymour said to get into offshore drillers and explorers such as
Transocean
(RIG) - Get Report
.
The "Fast Money" team took a moment to commemorate the first anniversary of the Shanghai Swoon, a huge drop in U.S. markets that coincided with tumultuous stock activity in China. Najarian said China stocks had pulled back, and he predicted a move higher. Macke argued that China is a levered play to the U.S. He recommended getting long.
Finerman suggested
Flowserve
(FLS) - Get Report
as a play on China, thanks to a new deal with
Sinopec
(SHI) - Get Report
.
Seymour also counseled viewers to look at several Taiwan stocks, including the
iShares MSCI Taiwan
(EWT) - Get Report
ETF,
United Microelectronics
(UMC) - Get Report
and
Chungwa Telecom
(CHT) - Get Report
.
After the close,
Apple
(AAPL) - Get Report
reiterated a 10 million iPhone sales target at a Goldman Sachs conference, and the stock soared. Finerman called the stock a value story at this level.
Najarian said that the tech stocks have gotten slammed and that Apple's price-to-earnings multiple is likely too low if the company can come close to matching the Street's projections.
Flowserve's after-hours earnings statement was very strong, beating earnings per share expectations by 13 cents. Finerman called the results a big beat and added that she likes the company's reaffirmed guidance, which she called too low.
Chartology
Carter Worth, chief market technician at Oppenheimer, appeared on "Fast Money" to discuss the technicals behind an expected breakout for crude oil. He said that when a price increases very rapidly from the bottom of a range to the top of that range, it usually doesn't signal a breakout. Rather, he predicted some consolidation around the $100 mark.
Worth went on to suggest utilities' inflation-related troubles. A chart of the 100 largest utilities has shown a bad break to the downside after testing lows multiple times. He called the price increase in utility stocks overdone.
Finally, Worth pointed to
Weatherford
(WFT) - Get Report
and
Mittal
(MT) - Get Report
as two stocks due to rise.
The Consumer Mind
Macke took a look at consumer sentiment and offered several trades on recession fears. He recommended entertainment stocks as plays on cheap diversions that people will be willing to spend on even in hard times. He recommended
Netflix
(NFLX) - Get Report
on a pullback. At current levels, he suggested
Sony
(SNE) - Get Report
,
Nintendo
and
Disney
(DIS) - Get Report
Fast Messages
One viewer wrote in to ask about options activities in
CNet
(CNET) - Get Report
. Najarian said that call activity was shifting out of March and into April. After an upgrade of the stock by Stanford, he liked CNet.
A second "Fast Money" fan wrote in to ask Seymour about India. Seymour replied that India is more recession-proof than Brazil and China. He liked the
WisdomTree India
(EPI) - Get Report
ETF's broad exposure to the local market, but also approved of IBM and
Infosys
(INFY) - Get Report
.
A final viewer asked about
J.C. Penney
(JCP) - Get Report
. Macke said he's not crazy about the stock. He prefers
Nordstrom
(JWN) - Get Report
or
Wal-Mart
(WMT) - Get Report
. Finerman said she sold some J.C. Penney yesterday but would buy it at $45.
Final Trade
Macke praised Wal-Mart.Seymour vouched for the
Market Vectors Russia
(RSX) - Get Report
ETF.Finerman proposed Fannie Mae.Najarian boosted Cisco.
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