Matein Khalid
My mystical vegan-pivot makes Christmas goose taboo for the rest of my life but my quest for those rare geese that lay golden eggs for me on the stock exchanges continues unabated.
Alibaba (BABA) was despised/dissed by everyone I respected, from CNBC honcho Jim Cramer to my Indian luminati (but never Illuminati) friends in the DIFC and even hedgies in New York and London who told me that Chinese Big Tech was a no-no because while Ma was Ma, Xi was Pa, the Big Daddy of the Dragon Empire. Yet the contrarian streak in me sensed blood in late autumn when BABA traded at 85 or a 7.6X val for the preeminent e-commerce/cloud infrastructure franchise in the PRC. This was no Mickey Mouse schlock outfit in some bankrupt kleptocratic Third World Banana/Samosa Republic but the AI engine for the 5,000 year old civilization created by the Han Chinese, the world’s biggest tribe and its future masters post Trump.
I wrote about the Alibaba rocket only a week ago when the shares traded at 118 and predicted that the BABA rocket’s moon landing would take place at 150. Bingo, earnings were a blowout and BABA traded at 145 this morning. Any stock that goes from 85 to 145 in 3-months as the lifeblood of momentum hits the Mag-7 is pure spiritual bliss, a 70% gift from the Middle Kingdom’s Lord of Ten Thousand Years. Roger Moore’s James Bond was the Man with the Gold Gun but Xi Jinping (Agent-001 for life) of the PRC is my Emperor with the golden eggs.
Citigroup (C) was my banking Cinderella, the ugly duckling in the pond who would never morph into a white swan as no fairytale prince dare to touch her after her sordid past under Sandy Weil, Chuck Prince, Vikram Pandit, Mike O’Neil and Mike Corbat, all exited or ejected by regulatory diktat. I had not reckoned on a fairytale princess who would emerge from the netherworld of McKinsey to lead Citi into the post Glass Steagall banking boogie wonderland. Jane Frazer did exactly that. I had dissected her strategic moves in a post and article I wrote in early autumn when Citi traded at 60. 4-months later, Citi began this week at 84.60 and ended it at 81.50 as I write. A 36% return in 4-months if you heeded Matt’s money rant and embraced me as your Pied Piper of equities is not a bad outcome. Or, as we say in the business, a happy ending.
Wells Fargo (WFC) was a no-brainer at 57 as the smart money told me the asset cap would soon be history and the macro trends were finger lickin good. This California fallen angel wannabe money center bank was gold dust at 57 as I argued in my post. Yet even I did not expect a parabolic run from 57 to 80 as the leveraged gunslingers of Wall Street accumulated WFC. We hit the jackpot here too with a 40% move in 4-months.
My investment philosophy, the falsouf of faloos, is simple. East is East, West is West, but Value is best. Feels good to cash the golden eggs while Mr. Market goes berserk on Wall Street.
Also published on Medium.
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