• Good morning, everyone, and welcome to .
• Tuesday morning, the first trading day of 2024. .
• In the pre market this morning, stock .
• index futures are trading below fair value. .
• Dow futures currently down just under 200 points, while commodities are higher. .
• According to Bloomberg, the TSX 60 is trading down $4 and change right now. .
• We closed up over $2 and change on Friday, .
• so not looking for any major damage to the TSX on Tuesday morning. .
• Now, in today's presentation, we'll start .
• off the year with a quick recap of what happened in 2023. .
• And the TSX did end the year higher. .
• Most of the gains came in the last nine weeks, and I'll just hold my mouse there, .
• but the TSX ended up 8.12%. Compare that to the Nasdaq, which was up over 50%. .
• And it was really not a very productive year for the TSX. .
• Most of the gains came when the VIX reversed and generated a sell signal. .
• And the VIX, or the Fear Index, is something we watch very closely. .
• When the VIX is trending lower, we want to be bullish on the market. .
• When it's trending higher, we want to be bearish on the market. .
• And right now, it's really stopped trending over the last couple of weeks. .
• So we're still on a weekly sell signal that should be bullish for the market. .
• But we're not expecting the market to go much higher from here at the present time. .
• Now, it was a very mixed market. .
• There was only 126 stocks on the TSX Composite that ended the year higher. .
• 98 were unchanged or lower. .
• So getting pretty close to 50% of the .
• stocks on the TSX composite did not do well last year. .
• Now, the focus was in the US. .
• They called it the Magnificent Seven. .
• We added Shopify to that list for our .
• Magnificent Eight, and that's where most of the gains came from. .
• And those gains were also seen in Canada, .
• where the infotech sector was up over 55% on the year, being led higher by Celestica .
• on the TSX Composite and Shopify on the TSX 60. .
• And we also saw Constellation Software up over 50% on the year. .
• So that's where most of those gains came from. .
• Now, the biggest and most important sector .
• of the canadian stock market, of course, is the financials. .
• And the financials ended the year pretty close to the gains that we saw from the .
• TSX heading up towards the highs of early 2023. .
• And again, we made most of our gains in the last nine weeks of the year. .
• At the same time, a couple of the major banks ended the year underwater, and those .
• were the bank of Nova Scotia and the TD bank. .
• And probably the best stock in Canada and .
• the Berkshire Hathaway of Canada is Fairfax, which ended the year up over 50%. .
• So if you have to have one stock in your .
• portfolio for a long term investment, it's probably going to be Fairfax. .
• Now, the marijuana sector was the biggest .
• loser, and of course, the TSX itself has taken away the index, and so people aren't .
• thinking about this sector as much as they used to. .
• We're looking at the Horizons .
• Marijuana Life ETF, which was down over 20%. .
• You can see when Bay street gave up on this sector back here in early 2021, and .
• we're not expecting it to come back to those levels. .
• If you are playing this sector, there's still opportunities here. .
• It's certainly tradable, but your playing .
• field has to be the highs from 2023 and the lows of 2022. .
• That's basically your playing field. .
• You don't want to be having targets above .
• that level because they're very unrealistic. .
• The whole dynamics of this particular sector has changed and you have to deal .
• with being more realistic about your opportunities in this sector. .
• But certainly there's the possibility of .
• 10, 20, 30 or 40% gains in this sector if it's going to trend higher in 2024. .
• Now, looking at commodities starting with .
• gold, gold is on a buy signal right now heading up, and it's in a range between .
• 1875 at the lower end of the range and 2125 at the higher end of the range. .
• And we're above the midpoint at the moment, so that's looking pretty bullish. .
• Unfortunately, gold stocks are not totally in sync with the price of gold and they .
• ended the year up 2.36%. The biggest winner from the major gold stocks we .
• follow, ElDorado, was up over 50% on the year. .
• Looking at the energy sector. .
• Well, crude oil ended the year basically unchanged. .
• Natural gas underwater and energy stocks .
• as a whole were down nearly 1% on the year. .
• The biggest winner in the energy sector was Athabasca. .
• The biggest loser was Birchcliffe for the year. .
• Now, if we're going to buy low and sell high, one of the indicators we can look at .
• is the percentage of stocks currently trading above x. .
• And if we look at the percentage of stocks .
• currently trading above the 50 day moving average, you can see we're up at the top .
• of the range here, and so we're looking at high risk opportunities. .
• If you want to chase stocks up here, if .
• there's new buy signals you're taking on high risk. .
• This is the time and place. .
• We want to be looking for sell signals and shorting opportunities and to buy puts, .
• depending on which market you're looking at. .
• And you can see down at the bottom when the percentage of stocks currently trading .
• above their 50 day moving average gets down near the 20 and below. .
• That's when we look for low risk buying opportunities. .
• And so coming into January, we're at the high risk end of the range and looking for .
• the market to pull back here into the month of January. .
• When we look at the seasonality chart, we look for a tradable high in September. .
• We look for lows in October, and then we look for a year end rally. .
• And that's what we got. .
• Last nine weeks did pretty well. .
• And coming into January, it's usually .
• negative for the canadian stock market with a rise into February. .
• And of course, February gives us RRSP seasons where people make .
• put deposits in, and it's usually in low risk opportunities. .
• You're talking to your bank teller, of .
• course they want to sell you the bank's etfs. .
• And those etfs, of course, include bank stocks. .
• So we usually get a nice buying .
• opportunity into the end of February and then a pullback into March. .
• So that's what we're expecting to happen. .
• Of course, we're going to watch the market .
• and see which way the market wants to go in 2024. .
• Okay, folks, that is all for this morning's presentation. .
• We're looking for some selling at the open on Tuesday morning. .
• Have a great day. .
• Next time you'll hear my voice is on Wednesday morning. .