Notes From All Over -- The Pre-Market Edition -- September 2, 2020

F: job cuts -- breaking news from CNBC --

• early retirement offered
• goal: to trim 1,400 salaried jobs; will make involuntary cuts if necessary
• had already cut 7,000 salaried jobs over the past year; still not meeting financial goals
• again, discussion devolved into unit sales for automobile manufacturers; again, Phil LeBeau missing the point;
  
• last year, 44 million automobile sold worldwide
• Tesla last year: 385,000 vehicles delivered (0.875%) 
• whatever
  

Pre-market:

• indices all very green, but very high numbers seen earlier this morning are dropping back
• Peloton: one-year wait for Peloton orders; Peloton will open at a new high;
• WMT: astounding; is anyone watching?
• Dow 30:  up 128
• S&P 500: up 22
• NASDAQ: up 140
• individual companies
  
• AAPL: up almost $4; pre-split dollars, up around $15; forward P/E of 10; do the math -- price of AAPL based on a forward P/E of 30;
  
• WMT: huge surprise -- huge run-up yesterday; today up another $3.30 or 2.25%
• TSLA: folks cautious; down almost 5% yesterday; green but flat today;
• UNP: most fascinating stock to watch right now; not trading yet; was up $3.36/share yesterday or 1.75%
• JNJ: surprises me; down a bit yesterday; down slightly today but mostly flat; may be related to ex-div date; I don't know;
• McDonald's: currently getting a lot of interest over at CNBC; somewhat flat over last two days; P/E 34 (compare with P/E of AAPL pre-split: about 35)
• SBUX: up again today; P/E 76
• T: struggling
• SLB: don't even want to look
• ENB: up a bit the last two days, but still within a trading range; pays almost 8%:
• EPD: flat; pays 10%
• AMGN: after negative yesterday, up today;
• QCOM: doing well right now 
• Bank of Nova Scotia: a no-brainer but a Canadian company and Canadian taxes;
  

The major index numbers are simply incredible, especially the NASDAQ. The Dow 30 will catch up and the S&P 500 is already doing just fine.

It is obvious that Covid-19 telescoped the next ten years to this year. 

"Black swan" stories? Where are they? Pretty amazing. Who wudda thought?

By the way, is it possible that President Trump should be given a lot more credit for the market?

Wow, CNBC senior financial analyst continues to talk down the market; seems very frustrated with AAPL, TSLA, and the at-home mom-and-pop investors-turned traders. Doesn't get it. 

CNBC senior financial analyst says the jobs number today was disappointing. Again, missing the point. We're seeing a huge bifurcation, and Jay Powell spoke to it. Perhaps the huge pre-market numbers did drop a bit after the jobs number came out this morning, but the pre-market numbers always seem to change significantly once the market actually opens. 

As for the jobs numbers: I saw them in passing, won't bother to look them up now, but expectation was something like one million jobs would have been added in August; in fact less than half that number, about 450,000.