More year-end trimming — big gains and managing 2017 capital gains
KEY POINTS FROM THIS ALERT:
- Following the continued surge higher in the shares of Cashless Consumption company USA Technologies (USAT), we are trimming back our position by selling one-third of the position, which will produce a gain of more than 85% over the last seven months, and leave ample exposure on the Tematica Investing Select List. As we make this trade, we will also set a stop loss for USAT at $7.50, which will lock in a gain of roughly 65% on the remaining shares.
- We are also trimming back our position in Disruptive Technology company Universal Display (OLED), which closed last Friday up more than 240% from our October 2016 entry. Similar to the USAT trade, we are selling one-third of the position, which lets us book some fantastic gains, but also ensures meaningful exposure to ramping demand for organic light emitting diode displays. We are also boosting our stop loss on OLED shares to $125 from $100.
- As we book these gains, we will also offset these gains for tax purposes by matching them with losses. As such, we are exiting our positions in Nuance Communications (NUAN) and the ProShares Short S&P 500 ETF (SH) shares, which are down roughly 7% and 27%, respectively since being added to the Select List in 2017 and 2016.
A week ago I shared that we would be doing some year-end house cleaning on the Tematica Investing Select List as well as looking to minimize 2017 capital gains. We are back at that today as we look to match both short and long-term gains with short and long-term losses. Here we go:
Trimming back USAT shares
Last week I boosted our price target on Cashless Consumption company USA Technologies (USAT) to $8.00 from $6.50, and the shares proceeded to go on a tear following an upbeat presentation at the Craig-Hallum Alpha Select Conference. I’ve been a long-time fan of the company’s business model that focuses on mobile payments, particularly for vending applications, for some time. As much as I am a fan, with the shares up roughly 85% in the last seven months and having blown past our new price target into overbought territory, it means now is the time to be a prudent investor.
In keeping with the Wall Street saying — bulls make money, bears make money, but pigs get slaughtered — we are going to sell one-third of the USAT position on the Tematica Investing Select List, which will harvest a significant win. Given that we are in the early stages of mobile payments around the globe, the remaining USAT shares will offer us ample exposure to our Cashless Consumption investing theme. Again, we want to be prudent, which means setting a stop loss at $7.50, which locks in a gain of roughly 66% on our remaining USAT shares.
- Following the continued surge higher in the shares of Cashless Consumption company USA Technologies (USAT), we are trimming back our position by selling one-third of the position, which will produce a gain of more than 85% over the last seven months, and leave ample exposure on the Tematica Investing Select List.
- As we make this trade, we will also set a stop loss at $7.50, which will lock in a gain of roughly 65% on the remaining shares.
Following the same strategy with Universal Display (OLED) shares
Much like USAT shares, the position in Disruptive Technologies company Universal Display (USAT) has also been on a tear this past year, soaring roughly 280% over the last 12 months compared to more than 27% for the Nasdaq Composite Index and 19% for the S&P 500. Again, while we know the ramp in organic light emitting diode display demand will continue in coming quarters, as investors we need to remain prudent.
Therefore, we are employing a similar strategy with OLED shares that we did with USAT shares – we will sell one-third of the position and book a hefty win, while keeping the balance in play to capture additional upside in the coming quarters. We will also boost the positions stop loss to $125 from $100, which will lock in a profit of 135% on the remaining shares.
- Similar to the USAT trade, we are selling one-third of the Universal Display (OLED) position, which books a gain of roughly 240% from our October 2016 buy-in.
- We are boosting our stop loss on the remaining OLED shares to $125 from $100.
Cleaning up the Select List and optimizing year-end capital gains
It’s not lost on us those two trades will deliver some meaningful short and long-term gains. While we’re fans, big fans in fact, of such gains, we’re also fans of minimizing capital gains. As such we’re going to further clean up the Tematica Investing Select List by offsetting those gains with losses as we make the following trades:
- We are exiting our position in Nuance Communications (NUAN), which is down 8% since it was added to the Tematica Investing Select List in January of this year.
- We’re also exiting ProShares Short S&P 500 ETF (SH) shares, which are down 27% over the last 20 plus months.
Booking losses are never fun, but in this case, it does serve to soften the 2017 tax bill. Not a bad thing at all, especially since it adds back, even more, capital back to the war chest. Given our positions in Amazon (AMZN), Apple (AAPL) and Alphabet (GOOGL), we have ample exposure to voice technology and interfaces that are part of our Disruptive Technology investing theme. And while we are shedding the inverse ETF position, given our concerns with the other overall market that appears to be stalling amid tax reform, we’ll examine other hedging strategies to utilize when the time is right.
