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pre-jobs report news flush ?3

19:04 04-Oct-18


eMagin has made two promotions in order "to support growth initiatives."  The CFO will take on the role of President in addition to his CFO duties, and the Senior Vice President, Research and Development will now be referred to as CTO.  The press release cites a resurgence in the military business, and the importance of those projects could build revenue.  Nonetheless, I am somewhat skeptical as I see new entrants bidding for and developing similar equipment.  I could be wrong, but this sounds more like employee retention than preparation for developments that will immediately benefit shareholders.

Fluence was awarded the second stage of the energy storage project in the U.K.  The full project is the largest energy storage contract in the world so far.  With Fluence operations ramping up in earnest now, I expect a steady stream of media, which may help to buoy AES pricing.  However, in-line with recent well-timed comments, the higher they go above $14 (4% yield after pricing in an anticipated dividend bump early next year), the more inclined I will be to take profits.  To put that in perspective, though, 20% over-valuation would mean a price of $16.80, which I would regard as an upper limit to my willingness to hold.

Fitbit also announced that its Charge 3 device will be available next week and that a Sleep Score beta program will begin in November.  The accompanying data about pre-orders and hours of sleep tracked did little to mitigate my concerns about the price of the device and value of the data.  However, FIT has traded even more feebly than I expected, and if it drops below $5 per share, I could see the company as a takeover target, though I am almost never willing to gamble on that alone.

Obviously none of this news is overriding macro concerns at present.  So, I did not see any need to rush it out, but I did want to clear the queue before what could turn out to be an important jobs report.  For those who are looking to raise cash, AES is a decent candidate, assuming nobody has any INTC, GOOG, IDTI or AMSC left.  For those wishing to deploy it, VOD, BGCP, CTL, and to a lesser extent, CVA and CWEN, look undervalued amongst dividend-paying stocks.  The combination of rising Treasury yields, hydrocarbon and market prices shouldn't be able to coexist for long.  Hydrocarbons have given back a little ground this evening, but the Brent/WTI spread is now over $10.50 despite the theatrics.  Even so, my read of currencies leads me to guess that, for the moment, at least, we're still seeing choppiness and not the beginning of a sustained change in market direction just yet.  I doubt the jobs report will change that, in which case there may be no note tomorrow morning.  However, the fear in the market is real and I wanted to have the stage set just in case I need to write quickly in the hour before market open.