Tag: First Trust NASDAQ Global Auto Index Fund (CARZ)

General Motors Announcement Changes Everything

Posted on by Matt Thalman

We all know Tesla (TSLA) is a run-away train, but what if I told you General Motors (GM) could soon be not only chasing down Elon Musk but maybe passing him?

OK, all of the Tesla fanatics need to take a deep breath and calm down. The thinking that another “car” company could pass Tesla is not a negative comment against Tesla; it’s the reality that we are now living in a world where electric and other alternative energy vehicles are not “pipe” dreams but reality.

The late January announcement from General Motors that they will no longer sell internal combustion engine vehicles in the United States by 2035 is the writing on the wall that gasoline is ending and EV’s will dominate the road. In 2020 Tesla delivered 499,550 vehicles, which shows that we have demand for EVs even now. Perhaps not like the demand that GM still has for gasoline-powered vehicles. GM sold 7.7 million in 2019, down from the 8.3 million it had sold in 2018 and way off its high of just over 10 million in 2016. These are worldwide sales figures, but regardless GM sold 2.5 million vehicles in the US in 2020.

What’s the point of these figures? Continue reading "General Motors Announcement Changes Everything" →

How To Own Tesla While Reducing Your Overall Risk

Posted on by Matt Thalman

Shares of electric car maker Tesla Inc. (TSLA) are down nearly 50% since December of 2018. That is quite a fall and one that attracts the attention of investors looking to buy a stock after it has shed a large amount of its value in the hopes that the stock price will rebound in the future.

We have seen Tesla’s stock crash before and bounce back even higher. This gives hopes that the company can turn things around and the stock will once again see the $300 handle. Regardless though of what the stock has done in the past, anyone considering investing in Tesla today should be cautious and try to limit their risk as much as possible.

One way of doing this is by simply buying an Exchange Traded Fund, which has a position in Tesla. That way if the stock continues to crash and eventually burns, your investment doesn’t take as much of a hit as if it would if you directly purchase shares of Tesla. On the flip side, if Elon Musk stabilizes the company and investors begin to believe his story, causing Tesla to climb higher, you reap the rewards, and the ETF will also move higher. While the move higher in an ETF may not be as substantial, it would still increase in value if it held a large portion of the auto-maker.

With that in mind, let us take a look at a few different ETFs that hold varying sizes of Tesla in their portfolio’s.

The first ETF is the ARK Innovation ETF (ARKK), which has Tesla as its top holding. Tesla represents 9.96% of the fund’s assets. The fund has 38 different positions, which are companies that focus on disruptive and innovative firms. Despite Tesla’s poor recent performance, the fund is still up 11.64% and down just a half of a percent over the last 12 months. ARKK would see a massive move upwards if Tesla regained the value it has lost, but due to its exposure to the electric car company, if Tesla does continue to decline, ARKK will certainly take a substantial hit. Continue reading "How To Own Tesla While Reducing Your Overall Risk" →

Investing Before Or After A Natural Disaster

Posted on by Matt Thalman

Matt Thalman - INO.com Contributor - ETFs


Similar to investing in "Sin Stocks," i.e., alcohol, tobacco, casino, weapons companies, investing with the mindset of making money before or after a natural disaster, such as a hurricane like Harvey that hit Texas a few weeks ago is often a touchy subject.

But, if you are someone who is alright with investing in this 'morally gray' area, or just want to learn about how others pursue it, together we can take a look at how it is accomplished and a few things to be aware of before deploying capital.

First, while every natural disaster can be incredibly devastating, hurricanes typically seem to account for the bulk of the damage here in the US. In most cases, they are the only real disasters which you can invest around because of their predictability, which gives investors a chance to make investments both before and after the disaster occurs.

Since hurricanes occur along the coast, and more often in the gulf coast region, the one industry they seem to affect is the oil industry. This is because a significant amount of oil is drilled for in the Gulf of Mexico and because a large number of the US's oil refineries and oil shipping ports are found in this region. Continue reading "Investing Before Or After A Natural Disaster" →

The Debt Storm Is Coming

Posted on by Matt Thalman

Matt Thalman - INO.com Contributor - ETFs


While we can debate until we are blue in the face the actual ins and outs of what causes recessions, most would agree that high debt loads play a significant role. If we look back at the 2008-2009 recession, this is very true. Or the dot.com bubble bursting, debt played a large role. Even go a little further back into history and look at the 1929 stock market crash and subsequent recession, mostly fueled by margin trading (investors trading with borrowed money, i.e., using debt to fuel larger trades).

At this point, not many people are talking about the United States current debt levels. Not only is the U.S. government's debt level out of control, but more importantly consumer debt levels are also out of control, and that is likely the more concerning issue.

When consumer debt gets out of hand, first we begin to see increased levels of defaults. That leads to reduced levels of credit as the institutions who lend credit begin to tighten their requirements to borrow. With less available credit, consumers begin spending less on discretionary purchases because they either can't get credit or have maxed out what credit they did possess. Lower spending leads to lower profitability for consumer facing companies, which then leads to a reduced number of jobs in those sectors. Continue reading "The Debt Storm Is Coming" →