Abercrombie took the pipe, Foot Locker was predictably lousy. Where I'm looking now as we grind through Mall Store Earnings,

Some of the best trades I make are the ones I pass on entirely. So it was for $ANF which into earnings this morning already down 40% for the year and somehow managed to disappoint investors. The teen darling and recent 10-bagger reported numbers slightly ahead of expectations for Christmas but guided the current year well below expectations. 

Needless to say Wall Street focused on the negative, sending ANF shares all the way down to the low $80s or 50% below where they were trading as recently as January.

I love ANF. I shop there with my son, it's made me a lot of money and the aggressively suggestive catalogs from the '90s were an endless source of delight when I was a younger man. Here's a little secret: consumer stocks are where love goes to die. If you hold your winners forever you usually end up broke. Love the game, date the stocks. Long-term ANF investors should have known better.

Which doesn't mean you need to forget about the companies entirely. Quite the opposite. Shares of the Gap have been public...

Today's trade is a similar bet to yesterday's trade. With $VIX in the 20s and big caps putting in short term bottoms at key pivot points, these are opportunities for opportunistic put spread sellers.

Thanks to everyone who joined us for today's Hot Corner Insider Weekly Strategy Session.

In today’s Daily Digest, we’ll review the following:

1. No new positions today.
2. Rolled XOP to April options.
3. No exits since the last report.
4. Current status of open campaigns.
5. Volatility Snapshot.

Let’s dig in!

From the desk of Steve Strazza @Sstrazza

Welcome to The 2 to 100 Club.

In this scan, we look to identify the strongest growth stocks as they climb the market-cap ladder from small- to mid- to large- and, ultimately, to mega cap status (over $200B).

Once they graduate from small-cap to mid-cap status (over $2B), they come on our radar. Likewise, when they surpass the roughly $30B mark, they roll off our list.

But the scan doesn't just end there.

We only want to look at the strongest growth industries in the market, as that is typically where these potential 50-baggers come from.

Some of the best performers in recent decades – stocks like Priceline, Amazon, Netflix, Salesforce, and myriad others – would have been on this list at some point during their journey to becoming the market behemoths they are today.

When you look at the stocks in our table, you'll notice we're only focused on Technology and Growth industry groups such as Software, Semiconductors, Online...

One of the largest discount stores in the world, Target $TGT just reported earnings. It wasn't good...

Yesterday, we told you this report was front and center for our retail analyst, Jeff Macke. It wasn't so much about being interested in buying or selling the stock as it was about the information they provided.

And they gave the market a ton of information, very little of which was positive.

The company reported a 3.1% decrease in sales year-over-year, and its profit margin fell to 4.7% from 5.8% in the previous year.

In addition, they issued softer-than-expected guidance. This added fuel to the fire.

Overall, the market hated this report, which doesn't bode well for the broader retail space.

We have a lot to unpack today, so let's talk about what else happened 👇

*click the...

We have more insider activity by top executives to talk about today.

📌 Kevin Tang just made a $12.7 million bet on Aurinia Pharmaceuticals $AUPH, filing a Form 4 that shows strong conviction in the biotech space. 

📌 Moderna $MRNA CEO Stéphane Bancel stepped up to buy 160,314 shares, equivalent to $5 million.

When company presidents and CEOs personally buy millions of dollars worth of stock, it speaks to their high conviction in a business's long-term prospects.

Here’s The Hot Corner, with data from March 4, 2025:

Click the table to enlarge it.

📌 Meanwhile, director Martin Tuchman backed FTAI Aviation $FTAI with a $283,000 buy.

📌 Carl Icahn’s $6.7 million buy in CVR Energy $CVI is another one to watch. 

Icahn is one of the most legendary activist investors of all time, so this...

Today's number is... 10%

Over 10% of stocks on the NYSE+NASDAQ are making new lows.

Here’s the chart:

Let's break down what the chart shows:

• The blue line in the top panel is the S&P 500 index price.
• The black line in the bottom panel shows the percentage of NYSE+NASDAQ 52-week new highs minus new lows.

The Takeaway: We have a saying here at All Star Charts… The stock market can only decline with an expansion in the new lows list, it's simple math… and you know what… The number of stocks making new lows is higher than the number of stocks making new highs.

Yesterday, among the 7,422 stocks listed on the NYSE and NASDAQ, 997 made new 52-week lows, while only 101 achieved new 52-week highs.

That's 11.8% relative to new highs and over 13% new lows on an absolute basis.

...

The past couple of weeks have been rough.

Volatility is rising, and key groups are testing major levels—making me question just how bullish this market really is.

It feels like decision time.

Either this bull market holds, and we continue to spend our time looking for stocks to buy…

Or sellers take control and change the market’s character, and we start looking for stocks to sell.

When markets reach an inflection point, it’s always a good idea to check in on the biggest names.

These are the stocks investors want to own. The ones hedge funds anchor their portfolios with.

These are the bellwethers and the roadmap for everything else.

This post was originally for paid members only. It has since been unlocked for informational purposes and does not constitute financial advice.

If you're not a member, sign up here.

Precious metals are shaping up, and silver looks ready to play catch-up.

One good way to add some exposure here is through Pan American Silver $PAAS.

The stock has been carving out a nice base since last summer and is pushing toward the top of its range. 

If silver moves, PAAS will move—and it should come with a lot more juice.

The setup is clean, our risk is well-defined, and the upside potential is solid. If we’re right about silver, PAAS will be one of the best ways to play it.

Here’s the play:

We’re buying the $PAAS 4/17 $27 calls for approximately $0.45-0.55 per contract....

Today's trade is a bet that today's lows are going to stick for a little bit. Time is of the essence, so let's go...

From the Desk of Steve Strazza @Sstrazza

When investing in the stock market, we always want to approach it as "a market of stocks."

Regardless of the environment, there are always stocks showing leadership and trending higher.

We may have to look harder to identify them depending on current market conditions. But there are always stocks that are going up.

The same can be said for weak stocks. Regardless of the environment, there are always stocks that are going down, too. 

We already have multiple scans focusing on stocks making all-time highs, such as Hall of Famers, Minor Leaguers, and the 2 to 100 Club.

We filter these universes for stocks that are exhibiting the best momentum and relative strength characteristics. 

Clearly, we spend a lot of time identifying and writing about leading stocks every week, via multiple reports.

...

Every stock in the mall is getting obliterated on Tariff headlines and slow spending. Finding dips to buy and places to hide. 

We wanted clues as to how consumer stocks were going to handle the News when reporting earnings over the next couple weeks and, for the most part, the answer seemed to be "poorly", at least when it came to the Big Box names which continue to be plagued by Tariff headlines and ambivalent customers.

As more or less anticipated, Target and Best Buy posted ok numbers and guided cautiously (see: "Beat and Guide Lower" from earlier this week). On which is the only name of the three I own turned in a glorious quarter and outlook (sees ~35% Q1 growth!) but was only rewarded with a rather anemic bounce:

What Did We Learn:

• The risk is still to the downside. ONON could have bounced higher. In fact, it really should have gotten a bigger bump from today's report, which was about perfect. Best Buy arguably could have seen a gain on slightly better than expected news and Target hasn't seemed this lost in years but not in a surprisingly way. The net result was negative returns on the...

In today’s Daily Digest, we’ll review the following:

1. No new positions today.
2. Rolled XHB to April options.
3. No exits since the last report.
4. Current status of open campaigns.
5. Volatility Snapshot.

Let’s dig in!