The week ended with a disappointment in hiring levels which failed to back up lower unemployment numbers from earlier this week. 49,000 new jobs were created in Jan. when forecasts called for 50,000. The US Senate passed the $1.9 trillion stimulus package thanks to Veep Kamala Harris. Classic inflation hedge gold rose after supply chain costs upped the fear of inflation in producer prices. But the pharma sector was hit by profit-taking.

And one of my favorite hedges missed and fell a lot.

Image Source: Pixabay

Financials

*The reporting company which disappointed today is CBOE, the Chicago Board Options Exchange which has expanded internationally. I like to make money with puts and calls but not to place them myself because I think options are a mug's game for retail investors. Its Q4 GAAP earnings missed forecasts badly but its revenues rose 9.6%, to $307 mn. Moreover, there are special features of this stock that offset the 22% miss in GAAP EPS. This stock returned 69% in 2020 to its shareholders, $520 mn with share repurchases at the highest level ever. It expects to see revenues rise in 2021 by 4.6% thanks to recent acquisitions and organic growth, to hit $531-539 mn. The board authorized another $200 mn repurchase program for the current year.

Here is the bad news: revenue in Q4 rose 10% to $307.1 mn vs prior $280.3 mn. Operating expenses were $172.3mn, up from $161.1 mn, although operating income was up at $134.8 mn from $119.2 mn and the operating margin hit 43.9% from 42.5%. Diluted eps came in at 81¢ from 77¢. Earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortization was $176.7 mn vs prior $164.6 mn

But the EBITDA margin fell to 57.5% from 58.7%. So the share fell 5%. This is a mostly pro holding and they are ruthless about earnings.

*Banco Santander opened up 3.11% and SAN is now up over 4%.

*AAIGF, AIA Group Ltd, opened up 1.81% on the China crackdown on 6-year-old schoolchildren and books. It is expected to move elsewhere from Hong Kong. It is now up 2.7%.

*Japanese Sumitomo Mitsui, SMFG, is up 1.1% while Mitsubishi, MSBHF, is up 1.9%.

*Scotiabank is up 0.66%. BNS was written upon seeking alpha.

*Colombia's Ecopetrol, sold too soon, is up 2.5% today. EC is the country's designated state partner in oil and gas. Do I want to buy Bogota?

*Brazil's Cosan is up 2.6% today, to $18.62. CZZ was my pick for 2021.

Miscellaneous

*Trip.com Group, TCOM, rose 6.08% on hopes for more travel to and from China, not necessarily from the US. Other regions with higher COVID-19 infections are less appealing to tourists able to hop around. It was tipped by Deutsche Bank.

*Canadian gold miner Kirkland Lake, KL, is up 0.5%. Inflation hedge.

*Tencent listed Kuaishou which tripled in value in Hong Kong today. This kind of euphoria is very unhealthy.

*Canadian Nutrien is up 1.7%. It makes fertilizer and sells seeds and sprays to farmers worldwide.

*Nintendo, which Abhimanyu Sisodia tips, gained another 2.54% on delays in inoculation in Europe. It makes games and consoles to play them on, a less old fashioned gaming play than Game-stop.

*CAE which trains pilots will assemble and develop air sanitizers. The Canadian shares gained 2.2%.

*MELI, Mercado Libre of Argentina is up 1%.

*NIO is 1.44% lower. It still sold lots of cars in China.

Telcos

*Swedish Ericsson is up 0.23%.

*But Finnish Nokia is down 2% after NOK reported meh earnings yesterday. It is the only ADR that joined the short squeeze against institutions last week and its CEO called for an investigation.

*Vodafone is down 1.04%. VOD is British.

Energy

*Brent crude is near $60 again and oil and gas firms mostly rose along with inflation fears.

*Energy Fuels, a miner of Uranium, UUUU is up 1.9%.

*Dutch Antillean Schlumberger Ltd continued its up moves by another 2.95% today.

*Royal Dutch Shell recovered from yesterday's sell-off but wobbled quite a bit.

*BP plc lost 1.25% today after opening down 0.83%.

*Algonquin Power recuperated by 1.5% at the open. AQN is a green ute operating both in the US and Canada. It rose because its stake in fund Atlantica Sustainable Infrastructure, AY, tipped by Harry Geisel, is up hugely this week. It is up another 2.8% today.

*Azure Power of Mauritius rose 1.71%. AZRE makes solar panels for Indian rooftops, mostly public.

*German ute Allianz rose modestly.

*Swiss ABB fell another 0.81%. I am plotting to average down but not yet.

*Ormat, ORA, is up another 1.34%. I got that one wrong and sold most of it too soon. But that's better than the reverse.

Pharmaceuticals

*Enlivex rose another 12% to $17.35. Israeli ENLV did a tiny trial of its Allocetra in severe and critical covid-19 patients which appeared to prevent deaths for all and improved outcomes in all but 2 patients. This is still very much a work in progress.

*Spanish Grifols rose.

*Johnson & Johnson produced a single jab covid-19 inoculation now being studied for approval

*Dr. Reddy's was another rare winner in the sector today, picked by Abhimanyu. RDY is up 1.84% after being tipped by Barclays with a $70 target price. It is at $64.59 and fell hard last week.

*Beigene lost 0.73% today. BGNE is the nice Chinese drug company that pays royalties.

*Astra-Zeneca revealed that its Oxford vaccine works against the UK corona-virus variant. But it also revealed that its head-and-neck cancer drug Imfinizi failed in trials. AZN fell 0.9% all the same.

*However Israeli Compugen is up 3.75%. It provides antibody products to AZN.

*Merck KgA, the German company, will supply lipids for making the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine. PFE got a long patent extension for its Ibranco cancer drug. But Pfizer removed its emergency vaccine application for India.

*Japan's Eisai, ESALY, gained 1.2% to $73 on Alzheimer hopes, but most drug firms fell.

*Among them is Takeda, TAK, also Japanese, by 0.05% after reporting yesterday. Here is the rollcall: Swiss Novartis, down 0.34%; Israeli Teva -1.1%; Danish Novo Nordisk -1.06%; British Glaxo -1.4%; US Bristol-Myers -1.55%; Swiss Roche -1.76%.RHHBY also reported yesterday.