As we have grown accustomed to during “down months,” our strategies both outperformed the S&P 500 index, even though we too finished the month down slightly.
This is nothing to get excited about…

Aside from pandemics and mandates, September is historically the worst month of the year for the stock market. The following chart from our friends at Sentimentrader makes visualizing the tendency for poor returns this time of year as obvious as I have ever seen…

The Federal National Mortgage Association (FNMA), or, Fannie Mae, is about to open their mortgage loan approvals to folks with poor credit scores, but good history of paying their rent over the past 12 months…

Since my last letter, we have covered 2,803 miles and logged around 50 hours of “windshield time” on our way from Eagle, CO, to Gulfport, FL, by way of Hinckley, MN… and so, that is the primary reason for my tardiness with this letter…

On February 28th, 2019, I was traveling home from Belize (with my beautiful wife) via Southwest Airlines (LUV). When we landed in Houston to make our connecting flight, the flight attendant revealed a “secret” to all the passengers on the airplane…

We built Elevate on the simple idea that we would always tell you, dear reader, exactly what we would want to know if our roles were reversed. And then, see what happens from there…

Last month when I wrote to you the Nasdaq was in the midst of a proper correction with the technology index down nearly 11%, and many of the best performing constituents over the prior year down much more than that…

Since peaking on February 16th, the S&P 500 was down about 5.7% at its lows on Thursday. The NASDAQ was down 12% over the same period and is fully in correction territory (down more than 10%.)…

By now, I think most of you have an idea of what went on related to shares of GameStop (GME) stock over the past few weeks…

I am pleased to report that 2020 was a very successful year of growth for our firm and your investment account values.

We have beat the market on both the upside, and the downside – a testament to our process which is highly disciplined. Our goal with the Appreciation Strategy is to match the market on the upside – so, I am extremely pleased with these results…

At Elevate, we take our cues from prices, not from our politicians or newscasters. We let the market tell us when things have changed, we don’t try to predict when regimes will change - which is basically just guessing anyway….

The big problem with all the stimulus is that it inflates the respective currencies, making them worth less and making goods and services cost more. The only way to maintain purchasing power is to own assets before the stimulus comes.

Can you imagine what would happen if they had to have rolling blackouts in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia?
It would probably make our riots look like a friendly petting zoo. And we produce more oil in America than they do in Saudi Arabia… think about that for a second.

We just witnessed the fastest, most violent stock market crash in the history of the American stock markets. And frankly, we crushed it.

June was an exceptionally strong month for the Elevate Strategies. Both Appreciation and Income did well overall but what really outperformed were the stock selections in each strategy which far surpassed the returns of the S&P 500 index (SPX) for the month.

This morning the monthly jobs numbers came out and the market loved them. The weekly unemployment reports over the past 4 weeks showed an average of 2.5 Million new unemployment claims per week – 2.5 Million x 4 weeks = 10 Million for the month. But, the monthly numbers (which are subject to revision) came in showing that the economy somehow added 2.5 Million jobs in May.

In a word: nonsense.

Happy Cinco de Mayo! And, it is even Taco Tuesday! Let’s hope that your favorite local authentic taco joint is open for business – go have a few tacos and dare I say, a Corona with lime – hold the virus.

It’s also the day after which rent is late for May – likely the second month of missed payments for many businesses and the normal point at which eviction notice would be given. With any luck, many business owners have received funding from the Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) which allows for some cash to be used to pay rent. Unfortunately, the program has had its share of issues with distributing cash to those who need it most. This is just one of the many wildcards out there right now.

No matter how you count the cases at the beginning or today let’s just assume that 172 and 312,249 are relatively accurate, or at least scalable. The rate of growth in confirmed infections would be 181,440% in 1 month. These kinds of numbers sell lots of newspapers and many people (whether right or wrong) now fear going outside their homes. They fear interacting on any level with loved ones, let alone strangers. Even those who are not afraid of personally becoming infected and showing symptoms are afraid of carrying the virus and then passing it on to their elders.

This is a “Crisis of Confidence” type situation. And the markets, I fear, have only begun to reflect the reality.

The S&P 500 finished the month of February down 8.41%. This was after posting a loss in January. So, 2020 is not off to a great start – even though there have been more than a couple of new highs posted along the way.

In fact, this recent correction – defined as a 10% pull back from highs – was the fastest in history from an all-time-high. This fact has gotten quite a bit of attention in the media. But not as much as the corona virus, or COVID-19… I have personally received more emails related to this than any other topic in my career. Easily.