Blog

Could This Be a Brutal Earnings Season? If So, How Should One Be Positioned? July 11, 2019

By Steven Vannelli, CFA in Markets

Yesterday BASF, the largest chemical company in the world, announced its earnings would fall well short of analyst estimates in the second quarter. Earnings season in the US begins in a few weeks. So, we ran through our charts to harvest any insights about how…

Spotlight: Etsy’s Virtual Marketplace Has Created 1.5 Million Jobs June 26, 2019

By Knowledge Leaders Team in Knowledge Leaders

Internet retailers are a much-watched sub-industry in the stock market for good reason: worldwide retail ecommerce is predicted to generate double-digit growth each year through 2022, reaching total sales of $3 trillion by the end of that year, according to Euromonitor. For those of us…

Mid-Quarter Update & Slides: Escalation June 04, 2019

By Knowledge Leaders Team in Economy, Markets, Portfolio Management

In this mid-quarter update, entitled “Escalation,” we discuss the backdrop of escalating trade wars and our belief that the environment is more favorable for US Treasury bonds relative to stocks. The trade war is escalating at a time of weakening global growth, thereby weighing further…

Spotlight PharmaEngine: Streamlining R&D to Deliver Cancer Treatments Sooner May 24, 2019

By Knowledge Leaders Team in Knowledge Leaders

In 2003, Taiwanese generic drug leader TTY Biopharm and other Taiwanese venture capital firms funded a new type of drug company. PharmaEngine was launched with the specific mission of getting to market faster with drug treatments. To reduce the time between drug discovery, the first…

Spotlight Ferrari: Under the Hood at the World’s Most Innovative Car Company May 14, 2019

By Knowledge Leaders Team in Knowledge Leaders

For all the buzz, it would be easy to guess Tesla is the most innovative car maker in the world. But as our intangible-adjusted data reveals, Tesla invests less than half as much on R&D as the most innovative car company in the world. Invention…

Manufacturing Weakness Continues: A Review of US Economic Data April 16, 2019

By Steven Vannelli, CFA in Economy, Markets

So far this week, we’ve received a few data points that reinforce the manufacturing slowdown taking place in the US. Below is a calendar of events for the last couple days. On Monday, we got the Empire State Survey, a survey of manufacturing in New…

Spotlight Cadence: Tip of the Spear of Moore’s Law April 15, 2019

By Knowledge Leaders Team in Knowledge Leaders

When Lyft went public on the last trading day of March, investors learned the firm has staked its future to the street-level adoption of autonomous vehicles. Aside from the legal and ethical concerns, social anxieties and scandals, driverless cars still have major technology hurdles to…

Are We on the Same Page Yet? Tailwind for US Treasuries April 10, 2019

By Steven Vannelli, CFA in Markets

The IMF made news yesterday by announcing its latest updates to 2019 GDP growth around the world. It guided global growth down and made an especially large cut to Eurozone growth estimates, bringing them down 30bps since January to 1.3%. They also took their estimates…

Throwing Cold Water on the Excitement Around Foreign Economic Data April 02, 2019

By Steven Vannelli, CFA in Markets

Yesterday’s stocks reacted to a raft of overnight foreign economic data that it perceived positively. In this note, I’ll run down the data and my doubts about that reaction. The hits began with China’s Markit manufacturing PMI jumping to 50.5. While the media seems to…

A Precarious Environment, a Mid-Quarter Update (VIDEO/SLIDES) March 08, 2019

By Knowledge Leaders Team in Economy, Markets

Stocks have been on a tear. Manufacturing has contracted, bringing down GDP and earnings estimates. Was the stock bounce real or just a short covering? Sentiment on stocks has shifted to bullish while sentiment on bonds has moved bearish. In this special video report, CIO Steve…

Disclosures

The information presented here is for informational purposes only and is not to be construed as an offer to sell, or the solicitation of an offer to buy, securities. Some investments are not suitable for all investors, and there can be no assurance that any investment strategy will be successful. Hyperlinks may be included in this message that provide direct access to other internet resources, including web sites. While we believe these links are to reliable sources, Knowledge Leaders Capital (“KLC”) has no control over the accuracy or content of information contained on these sites. Although we make every effort to ensure such links are accurate, up to date and relevant, we have no control over pages maintained by external providers. The views expressed by these external providers on their own web pages or on external sites they link to are not necessarily those of Knowledge Leaders Capital.

The information provided on this blog is for illustrative or example purposes only and should not be construed as KLC’s opinion or investment outlook. As of the most recent quarter end, the named companies may have been held by KLC. For full information including additional policies and full disclosures, please visit our website: KnowledgeLeadersCapital.com.

Any reference to Index performance does not represent the performance of any investment product offered by Knowledge Leaders Capital, LLC. An investor cannot invest directly in an index. The performance of client account may vary from the Index performance. Index returns shown are not reflective of actual investor performance nor do they reflect fees and expenses applicable to investing.

Companies are selected for “Spotlights” based on high levels of innovation activities in their respective industries and illustrate innovation being employed across all sectors and geographies. Spotlight selection is separate from stock selection by the investment team. Spotlights are not necessarily representative of investment opportunities and can be selected regardless of investment performance or inclusion as a KLC holding.