Markets Live Recap: Our Experts Cover Job Losses, Tech Stocks, and Bitcoin

By Money Morning Staff Reports, Money Morning • April 16, 2020

This morning, the U.S. Labor Department revealed that another 5.2 million Americans filed for unemployment over the last week.

That brings the total monthly loss to 22 million people.

The consensus among our experts - Chris Johnson, Tom Gentile, D.R. Barton, Jr., and Shah Gilani - is that things are likely to get worse before they ultimately get better.

Today, they focused on tech stocks to buy and shared their opinions on Bitcoin and the future implications it may have on the global economy.

Here's what they had to say on their live streams today, April 16...

Chris Johnson (8:45 a.m. EDT)

• Chris is watching the VIX closely and thinks volatility is about to break out to the upside as earnings season unfolds.
• The fact that oil and Treasuries are both going down is a negative sign for stocks.
• Chris is looking for a double bottom to buy back into the market because it's one of the strongest technical indicators that we're in for a "W-shaped" recovery.
• As we move though earnings season, Chris expects Netflix Inc. (NASDAQ: NFLX), Amazon.com Inc. (NASDAQ: AMZN) and Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ: GOOGL) to emerge as winners relative to the broader market.
• Chris' No. 1 options trade right now: Buy the Oct. 16 2020 SPY 260 puts trading for about $20.

Tom Gentile (11 a.m. EDT)

• Tom is still short-term bearish on the market.
  • He thinks investors can still make money shorting oil, buying gold, and buying volatility.
• Tom is also concerned about the airline industry.
  • He relayed news that six out of every 10 seats on airplanes are now required to be empty.
  • Today, he showed investors how to place a put spread on Boeing Co. (NYSE: BA) that he thinks has a high likelihood of paying off.
• Tomorrow, Tom is going to talk about Bitcoin - how he got educated in cryptocurrency early on and how he sees the industry growing in the future.

D.R. Barton, Jr. (1:30 p.m. EDT)

• D.R. thinks there's money to be made buying Micron Technology Inc. (NASDAQ: MU) for a short trade.
  • Shares could easily jump from $45 to $50 per share and possibly go a little higher.
• D.R. also covered Bitcoin.
  • He likes how it's not correlated to any other asset in the world.
  • But he doesn't see the nascent cryptocurrency serving as a reliable hedge to inflation like gold does with its $9 trillion market cap today.
  • D.R. thinks Bitcoin may be able to help investors fight fiat inflation in the future, but its $130 billion market cap is much too small for now.

Shah Gilani (3:45 p.m. EDT)

• Shah is focusing on the economy today and is trying to determine when it will reopen... and what it will look like when it does.
  • He won't feel fully comfortable just because government agencies say businesses can reopen.
  • Shah also knows that throwing money at the problem does not solve everything but doesn't know what else the Fed can really do to keep assets propped up.
• Here's what Shah is concerned about today and what he thinks all investors should be watching closely moving forward:
  • The huge drop in bank earnings and historically low interest rates.
  • The inability for Americans to collect unemployment - Shah said only two of the 30 people he knows personally have been able to collect their unemployment benefits from the government so far.
  • Housing starts were down 22% today, and that's the worst in 40 years.

Catch us tomorrow - starting LIVE again at 8:45 a.m. EDT with Chris Johnson, right here.

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