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.

Now, we're also highlighting lagging stocks on a recurring basis.

Welcome to the Short Report.

This is the video recording of our September 21, 2022, Inside Scoop Weekly Strategy Session.

The most significant insider activity on today's list comes in a Form 4 filing by Douglas A. Pepper, director of Braze Inc $BRZE.

Pepper reported a purchase worth roughly $14 million.

The largest insider transaction on today's list is a Form 4 filing by the CEO of Ivanhoe Electric Inc $IE, who reported a purchase worth roughly $3.3 million.

The only 13G on our list today was filed by Boxer Capital, LLC. The investment firm revealed an initial 5.70% ownership stake in SpringWorks Therapeutics $SWTX.

From the Desk of Steve Strazza @sstrazza

This is one of our favorite bottom-up scans: Follow the Flow.

In this note, we simply create a universe of stocks that experienced the most unusual options activity — either bullish or bearish, but not both.

We utilize options experts, both internally and through our partnership with The TradeXchange. Then, we dig through the level 2 details and do all the work upfront for our clients.

Our goal is to isolate only those options market splashes that represent levered and high-conviction, directional bets.

We also weed out hedging activity and ensure there are no offsetting trades that either neutralize or cap the risk on these unusual options trades.

From the desk of Steve Strazza @Sstrazza.

Welcome back to our latest Under The Hood columne, where we'll cover all the action for the week ended September 16, 2022. This report is published bi-weekly and rotated with our Minor Leaguers column.

What we do here is analyze the most popular stocks during the week and find opportunities to either join in and ride these momentum names higher, or fade the crowd and bet against them.

We use a variety of sources to generate the list of most popular names.

There are so many new data sources available that all we need to do is organize and curate them in a way that shows us exactly what we want: a list of stocks that are seeing an unusual increase in investor interest.

From the desk of Steve Strazza @Sstrazza

Our Top 10 Charts Report was just published.

In this weekly note, we highlight 10 of the most important charts or themes we're currently seeing in asset classes around the world.

New Lows for Big Tech

When it comes to the most important stocks, it’s all about tech. Mega cap technology companies dominate the US indexes and are in just about everyone's portfolio. The chart below illustrates just how paramount their performance is for the broader market. We have overlaid the relative trend between technology stocks and the S&P 500 with the Nasdaq 100 on absolute terms.

From the desk of Steve Strazza @Sstrazza

Check out this week's Momentum Report, our weekly summation of all the major indexes at a Macro, International, Sector, and Industry Group level.

By analyzing the short-term data in these reports, we get a more tactical view of the current state of markets. This information then helps us put near-term developments into the big picture context and provides insights regarding the structural trends at play.

Let's jump right into it with some of the major takeaways from this week's report:

* ASC Plus Members can access the Momentum Report by clicking the link at the bottom of this post.

Macro Universe:

The largest insider transaction on today’s list is a Form 4 filing by two members of the Starbucks $SBUX board of directors, chair Mellody Hobson and member Richard Allison.

They reported purchases of SBUX worth a combined $5.9 million.

From the desk of Steve Strazza @Sstrazza

Our International Hall of Famers list is composed of the 100 largest US-listed international stocks, or ADRs. We’ve also sprinkled in some of the largest ADRs from countries that did not make the market cap cut. 

These stocks range from some well-known mega-cap multinationals such as Toyota Motor and Royal Dutch Shell to some large-cap global disruptors such as Sea Ltd and Shopify.

It’s got all the big names and more--but only those that are based outside the US. You can find all the largest US stocks on our original Hall of Famers list.

The beauty of these scans is really in their simplicity.

We take the largest names each week and then apply technical filters in a way that the strongest stocks with the most momentum rise to the top.

Based on the market environment, we can also flip the scan on its head and filter for weakness.

Let’s dive in and take a look at some of the most important stocks from around the world.

Here’s this week’s list:

The largest insider buy on today’s list comes from Sarepta Therapeutics $SRPT Director Michael Andrew Chambers.

Chambers reported the acquisition of roughly 57,100 shares, equivalent to $5.9 million.

From the Desk of Steve Strazza @Sstrazza

Although volatility has returned to equity markets this week, we continue to see pockets of strength in a variety of areas and individual stocks from our Inside Scoop universe.

While many of the strongest names continue to struggle in terms of breaking out and sustaining new highs, just as many are showing impressive resilience despite the broad market weakness.

Here we’ll outline a trade setup in a small-cap stock that’s coiling near fresh highs.

In lieu of this week’s Strategy Session, we’ll also run through some of the names from our Inside Scoop universe that stand out.