On Thursday after the market close, President Trump announced on Truth Social that the U.S. was pausing strikes on Iran’s energy sector for ten days, to April 6th, so peace negotiations can take place.
Ideally, a ceasefire will emerge, and the Strait of Hormuz will reopen from these negotiations. Since the U.S. shut down Iran’s deep-water port on Kharg Island, which accounts for about 90% of its crude oil exports, I suspect that is the primary leverage the U.S. has on Iran, since that is where the IRGC gets much of its revenue. It will also be interesting if U.S. Marines take control of Iran’s deep-water port on Kharg Island. In other words, the fog of war persists, but ironically, global economic issues are becoming the primary reason to implement a ceasefire.
I think it is safe to say that President Trump wants lower crude oil prices and that the Trump Administration will continue to strive to reopen the Strait of Hormuz. It is also imperative that fertilizer shipments through the Strait of Hormuz resume, since food prices are expected to remain high if fertilizer cannot boost crop yields during the planting season.
Our best defense remains a strong offense of fundamentally superior stocks that are reporting stunning sales, earnings, surprises, and positive guidance. Stocks like Micron Technology (MU) and Nvidia (NVDA) remain the market leaders. Even my weakest stock, namely Super Micro Computer (SMCI), has 171% forecasted sales growth and now trades at less than 10 times this year’s forecasted earnings, so I think it may be acquired in the upcoming months. This is a good time to remind all investors that good stocks bounce and that I expect my fundamentally superior stocks to quickly resurge.
As an example, Argan (AGX) surged over 30% on Friday after announcing that its fiscal fourth quarter sales rose 12.7% to $262.1 million compared to $232.5 million. The analyst community was expecting sales of $255.3 million and earnings of $1.98 per share, so Argan posted a 2.7% sales surprise and a 75.3% earnings surprise. Since Argan is a data center-related stock, it is now helping to lift other data center stocks that continue to exhibit relative strength.
Source: Investing.com
