Today a recovery came to markets with a particular impact on uranium shares. Our UUUU (Energy Fuels) rose 7.37% on a squeeze play by Canadian Sprott Physical Uranium Trust Fund to corner nuclear fuel. Another U holding, Cameco, rose only 5.21%, CCJ. The biggest rise was in a stock we don't own, Uranium Royalty, up 9.7%. However the attempt to boost all indexes failed to keep Nasdaq up, only the Dow and the S&P gained. 

There was also pressure on oil, gold, and other commodities, notably aluminum, which may be in shortage. Some of this is just guesswork.

Photo by Annie Spratt on Unsplash

I sold some of my ZYME stock today because I think it is getting ahead of itself. My access to my brokerage account is incomplete and I find it hard to produce a full ranking of what is happening every day. But I will give you information on my trades.

State Street STT is selling 22mn of its own shares to buy Brown Bros Harriman.

A figure from the past, Mark Hake, has produced a favorable report on Nokia, a share we own. Mr. Hake was the focus of a favorable report in Barron's 20 years ago, but it turned out that he wrote to boost an Australian company that was in trouble in return for that company employing his management company to handle its pension fund. This led to many difficulties for Hake who was deprived of his CFA license at one point. I believe people can redeem themselves but I would like to know more about what Hake is doing now, and how he came to write up NOK. I like the stock but I worry about manipulation because NOK is below our cost basis and in theory is "cheap". Mr. Hake blamed his wrong-footed recommendations were because he had a girlfriend who wanted a lot of money from him, not exactly an excuse because he didn't have to continue being her squire. Now he is older and I hope wiser, but I would like to know more. So I am asking Mr. Hake for an update. I hope he responds.

Drug stocks revived. Israeli TEVA gained an astonishing 2.5% while Canadian Zymeworks (ZYME) rose 4.94%. Grifols jumped 3.1%. However, Novocure NVCR dropped 3%. Eisai is also down in Japan, ESALY while Takeda is up, TAK. However, Bristol Myers BMY fell 4.4% despite reporting excellent 3-year results from its Opdivo and Yervoy chemotherapy regime, because the market is irrational. The Irish supreme court is hearing a tax appeal over the Shire-AbbVie break fee of 2014. 

Lazard is up 0.29% and its LGI fund gained 0.51%. We bought both last month. LAZ is the fund manager and LGI the global income fund it runs. 

Schlumberger Ltd, SLB, jumped 4.66% in European trading. Royal Dutch Shell B RDS-B gained 2.51% while BP plc rose 2.69%. Albemarle's target price was raised to $296 from 250 by Oppenheimer analysts. ALB was what I bought most recently when in England. 

Gold rose 0.52% and miners tracked higher. Kirkland Lake gained 2.74% at the opening, KL. 

Chinese shares fell again on new fears of Beijing controls on its tech sector. NIO, not really in the target zone, fell by 3.28% all the same. It makes electric vehicles and is not really a tech play or purely Chinese and is therefore worth considering as a buy. The main reason it fell is that it is doing a secondary offering with an open period for completion. Its archrival, Tesla, is also down, but by only 1.5%. 

*Tomra Systems gained 2.22% in Norway and kept this on Wall Street today. TMRAY, TMRAF.