Stock Market Today: 9 Dec 2021

The stock market rally is on the back foot, while the Nasdaq has lagged the S&P 500 for nearly a year. But Apple is holding up.

Billionaire hedge-fund manager Bill Ackman says the Federal Reserve needs to deliver old-fashioned shock and awe to financial markets with a big rate hike.

Once upon time, HBO sold cable subscribers on the value of a premium paid channel with the slogan, “It’s not TV, it’s HBO.” Today, in an entertainment world dominated by at-home viewing, Netflix is hoping its own prestige will justify the highest monthly price tag in the US among streaming companies. On Jan. 14, Netflix announced its first price increases since 2020, which go into effect immediately for new subscribers and will be rolled out gradually (with at least 30 days’ notice) for existing customers.

Hundreds of Chinese companies are listed on U.S. markets. China is the world’s most-populous nation and the second-largest economy with a booming urban middle class and amazing entrepreneurial activity. Often dozens of Chinese stocks are among the top performers at any given time, across an array of sectors.

In this segment from Motley Fool Live, recorded on Jan. 4, Fool contributors Toby Bordelon and Lou Whiteman discuss several of the industrial businesses that Berkshire Hathaway (NYSE: BRK.A) (NYSE: BRK.B) operates and the benefit of built-in diversification for investors. Forest River, they make commercial trucks, shuttle buses, trailers, pontoon boats, also RVs and what most people know them for, so a big vehicle manufacturer there.

Stop sinking your money in mediocre businesses. Buy the best instead.

While raising the minimum wage in some states is welcome news, one member of the president’s cabinet is unsure of why it hasn’t taken off throughout the nation.

From increasing partnerships to improving margins, this FinTech giant might have double-digit revenue growth on its horizon.

Amazon (NASDAQ: AMZN) announced in November that — at long last — it’s getting ready to roll out its Project Kuiper initiative to provide broadband internet service via satellite. Thanks to the popularity of Starlink, satellite-provided broadband internet has become an idea most closely associated with SpaceX, not Amazon. In the six years since SpaceX announced plans to put a constellation of 12,000 Starlink satellites in orbit, and in the year and a half since it began opening up Starlink for beta service, Starlink has put about 1,800 operational satellites in orbit and expanded its footprint to 25 countries — and 145,000 customers — receiving satellite internet service.

If you’re looking to invest in e-commerce, these three stocks could be underappreciated investments.

The metaverse seems to be the latest investing megatrend that’s caught the attention of investors and the news media. Before you discount this as just another passing fad, ARK Invest founder and respected technology pundit, Cathie Wood, told CNBC in December that the metaverse could be a “multi-trillion dollar opportunity” and that it will impact “every sector in ways that we cannot even imagine right now.” For savvy tech investors, this sounds like an opportunity that could be too good to pass up.

When we think about big names in the investing space, it’s hard to gloss over Warren Buffett. Rather, Buffett is a firm believer in one investment that has the potential to make the average investor quite wealthy, only without the risk that could come with hand-picking stocks in an effort to outperform the broad market. While Buffett may approve of the latter move if you’re an educated investor and know what you’re doing, he’d probably shake his head at the idea of putting money into digital coins.

Netflix’s (NASDAQ: NFLX) earnings report is always closely watched on Wall Street. The subscription streaming video leader routinely wowed investors even before the pandemic put a new global premium on at-home entertainment. Namely, investors are looking for evidence that Netflix can recover from a growth hangover and speed its sales growth rate back up above 20%.

Based on the monthly relative strength chart from 2000, Nasdaq Composite (IXIC) is about to lose its 20-years of leadership to S&P 500.

MercadoLibre (NASDAQ: MELI), the largest e-commerce company in Latin America, nearly tripled its market capitalization in 2020 as its growth accelerated throughout the pandemic. Does that pullback represent a good buying opportunity for investors who missed out on MercadoLibre’s multibagger gains over the past two decades? The bears believe that challenging year-over-year comparisons, rising expenses, aggressive competitors, and macroeconomic headwinds will limit MercadoLibre’s gains this year.

Netflix is one of many big companies stepping up to the earnings plate over the next few trading days.

DNB Asset Management significantly raised investments in some of the most volatile stocks, including AMC Entertainment, Apple, NIO, and Nikola.

Comcast’s NBC, Walt Disney’s ABC, ViacocomCBS’ CBS, and Fox’s –from this year, as compared to 2015, the furthest the report could go back. Eventually, Netflix began to shift its focus away from acquiring older titles to creating its own, Licensing older shows comes with the inherent risk that one day the deal will expire and the owners of the TV shows might sell them to a rival service or start their own platform to monetize their back catalog, as became the case with brands such as Peacock, Disney+, and Paramount+.

Investors will focus on Q4 earnings for stocks that are economically sensitive, which should show better profits than technology stocks.

The victims of the malware include Ukrainian government agencies that provide critical executive branch or emergency response functions, Microsoft said. Also affected was an information technology firm that manages websites for public and private sector clients, including government agencies whose websites were recently defaced. Microsoft did not identify the IT firm involved.