Latest / Strictly Business / The 5 o' Clock Shadow with Schalk Louw
Transcript
- 0:00You're listening to Strictly Business Podcast with Lindsay Williams.
- 0:05The JSC has closed its doors for another day, so it's time for the five o'clock
- 0:08shadow.
- 0:08As always on a Wednesday, I speak to Skulk Lowe, Portfolio Manager at PSG Wealth Old
- 0:15Oak in
- 0:17Cape Town.
- 0:19I've got to do something before we get into the market, Skulk, and that is that
- 0:21I went against my closing advice at the end of last week's show.
- 0:28At the end of last week's show, I said that if you make a good call or you, I use
- 0:34the analogy of a cocktail party.
- 0:36You go to a cocktail party, you're telling a joke.
- 0:37If the joke was successful, you immediately walk away and go and get
- 0:43another drink or pretend to or go to the bathroom, whatever it is.
- 0:45I made a good call on gold, which you kindly congratulated me for also last
- 0:49week.
- 0:50And I said, don't do it again.
- 0:52I'm not going to do it again.
- 0:53But I did it again on Monday with David Shapiro.
- 0:56I said that Friday's...
- 0:57bounce which we saw in many asset classes was a dead cat bounce
- 1:04oh i did not hear that i said it was a dead cat bounce because it was for no good
- 1:11reason and it came from the
- 1:13tech stocks and the gold going down quite sharply etc and
- 1:15i thought well this is just the b leg of an abc correction the b being the up dead
- 1:22cat bounce
- 1:24i still stand by it though you Okay, Monday we had a bit of a bounce, Tuesday a
- 1:28bit steady, today we'll talk about,
- 1:30but anyway, dead cat bouncer, Skulk.
- 1:31What's happened today?
- 1:32We had jobs reports from the United States.
- 1:36Yeah, I mean, the latest sort of job reports that came out, it's not good.
- 1:44It seemed to be missing the mark constantly.
- 1:49So let's first look at the data.
- 1:50I mean, unemployment rate, they were...
- 1:55Expecting 4.4 came out at 4.3.
- 1:58So again, lower.
- 2:01Well, not again lower, but lower.
- 2:03This is good.
- 2:04So people were expecting.
- 2:05And then the non-farm payrolls also came out hotter or better than expected.
- 2:12So today's job data did look a little bit better.
- 2:16But it's sort of good news, bad news, and bad news is good news.
- 2:20Because what we've seen over the past few days was As the job data came out, and I'm
- 2:27watching the CME Fed tool.
- 2:29Now, for the listeners that don't know what I'm talking about, it's something
- 2:35that we've been discussing extensively,
- 2:37but it's the probabilities.
- 2:39It's a probability market where they look at the probabilities of rate cuts for the
- 2:43different
- 2:45Fed meetings.
- 2:46And I looked at it, I would say a week or two ago.
- 2:50Yes, this is interesting.
- 2:52Lindsay, I've just refreshed my screen because I did an interview two hours ago.
- 2:59And two hours ago, it was suddenly that it came.
- 3:05It took two weeks ago, a week and a half ago.
- 3:09I looked at this, and it was close to 90, 80-odd percent unchanged.
- 3:15And then with the previous weaker job data, as we've seen,
- 3:21It suddenly kicked up.
- 3:23It kicked up, the probability kicked up for a rate cut to about,
- 3:28I would say two hours ago it was about seven, close to 30%
- 3:34probability of a rate cut now for March. And then April,
- 3:40they had it now over 40% probability, close to 50%
- 3:46probability for a rate cut in April.
- 3:49As the job data came out now, much better than expected.
- 3:55Unemployment lower, non-farm payrolls, they actually way better.
- 4:00It's now 94% probability for being unchanged in March.
- 4:06So that's a that's a crazy.
- 4:07Let me put this into perspective.
- 4:09The job rate went from 4.4 percent.
- 4:11The unemployment rate went from 4.4 percent to 4.3 percent, still at a four
- 4:16year high.
- 4:18OK, number one.
- 4:20Number two, the US, which is a 300 million person population country,
- 4:24created 130,000 jobs in the month of January versus the
- 4:31expectation of 60,000 jobs.
- 4:33It's still pathetic.
- 4:34and it Don't forget that these numbers were late.
- 4:38So they've been, I don't know, there's something weird going on there.
- 4:43And there's also been the government shutdown, which is still filtering through
- 4:48the system.
- 4:50I don't believe any of these numbers.
- 4:52I think we've got to smooth it out over the next few months.
- 4:53And I still don't believe that it justifies a predictor tool going from 45%
- 4:59to 90% just because of one piece of data, which quite honestly wasn't.
- 5:04particularly impressive, even though Mr.
- 5:05Trump will be doubtless now with his stubby little fingers on his phone,
- 5:12sending out something on Truth Social saying,
- 5:14look at the jobs that I've created.
- 5:15Another rant.
- 5:18No, well, it clearly did.
- 5:20And I'm just reading a look at the sensation.
- 5:24I mean, I totally agree with you.
- 5:26We had the shutdown.
- 5:28And when they bring out economic data with the words...
- 5:33revised December data, then you know that why did they revise something?
- 5:41Because we had a shutdown and there was no data.
- 5:43So they had to revise.
- 5:45But what we see, I just want to tell you the sensation.
- 5:49They've actually, you know,
- 5:52US stock gain at the open after blowout job data.
- 5:56Oh, please.
- 5:58Yeah, yeah.
- 5:59That's exactly, that is exactly.
- 6:01I mean...
- 6:02New stocks open high on Wednesday after a January non-farm payroll report.
- 6:07I mean, this is how sensation works.
- 6:09And suddenly this probability shot up from close to,
- 6:16it's called a 71% probability staying unchanged, now 94% unchanged.
- 6:22That's a massive, massive kick in.
- 6:24And most probably not going to show us a rate cut or seeing a rate cut close to 80%
- 6:30probability.
- 6:32for for for saying unchanged which still needs to this is going to be interesting
- 6:37one because we know president trump
- 6:39he is listen he's fix yeah he's fixated on on getting rates
- 6:45you know interest rates lower so
- 6:48of course it is and if anyone that doubts my feelings towards the 47th and the
- 6:5445th president of the united states of america I'm not a big fan.
- 6:59And the reason he wants rates lower is not because he wants the US economy and the US
- 7:04people to do well,
- 7:06because he's thinking of other people.
- 7:08He's thinking of himself because he is in charge of a crumbling empire, so-called,
- 7:12which needs lower interest rates because it is geared to the hilt in debt.
- 7:17And he needs lower interest rates to service that debt more cheaply.
- 7:21It's very simple.
- 7:22It's about him.
- 7:23So that's why Mr.
- 7:24Walsh must be very careful.
- 7:26He's the new Fed chair nominee, must be very careful not to yield to political
- 7:31influence.
- 7:33Hopefully not.
- 7:35I think he's maybe one of the better choices that were being mooted, Scalp.
- 7:36Anyway, what's the dollar index done on the back of this?
- 7:39I would imagine what it's done is exactly the same as the Fed indicator that you've
- 7:43been talking about.
- 7:45I would imagine that the dollar has strengthened somewhat because of this.
- 7:48Yeah, because we know it's been under pressure.
- 7:50She's 100% right.
- 7:51It was a slight improvement.
- 7:52I mean, we're not talking 1% or 2%.
- 7:55This is about a 15 basis point improvement.
- 7:58And just as we speak, which was interesting because I started off, good
- 8:04news is bad news, bad news is good news.
- 8:06I read this sensational heading for this specific media outlet.
- 8:11But as I'm reading this, I'm looking at… the S&P 500, Nasdaq, and Dow Jones.
- 8:19You should see that graph.
- 8:20It just went like, wait a minute.
- 8:22This is not good because we're not going to see interest rates.
- 8:26And now it's dropping.
- 8:27Dead cat bounce, you see.
- 8:30This is it.
- 8:30And you want to know something that's dropping that does it before the indices
- 8:35do?
- 8:35Have a look at Bitcoin now.
- 8:3766,000.
- 8:39And it was below.
- 8:39No, 65,900.
- 8:42It bounced up to 72,000 on Twitter.
- 8:45Monday and over the weekend during thin trading.
- 8:48Now back down to 65,900.
- 8:51Things are coming down again, I'm afraid.
- 8:53And there will be some sort of correction, in my opinion, including in tech stocks.
- 8:58And then everything will be fine again.
- 9:01But a correction is needed and a correction we will have.
- 9:05Anything else happening apart from the jobs data, which we've covered very
- 9:08nicely?
- 9:09What about South Africa?
- 9:10Any stock exchange news service announcements there?
- 9:13And any reaction?
- 9:15on the major indices that you cover?
- 9:17Yeah, there was a few reports that came out.
- 9:24What I think, let's first use my favorites.
- 9:29We had, I don't know if it was today or yesterday, I think it was today, it was
- 9:34Pan African.
- 9:34Yeah, yeah, it was Pan African Resources, They came out today.
- 9:36Okay.
- 9:37And I found the Pan-African Resources one, and okay, let's state my claim again, I
- 9:43love gold.
- 9:44I do, do love gold.
- 9:46You've hidden it well.
- 9:50Moving on.
- 9:51So Pan-African Resources, a fairly smallish mining setup.
- 9:58And I found this exactly what we thought we were going to see for this year for
- 10:05these gold mines.
- 10:07So firstly, the operating trading update, the group trading update, and that's for
- 10:12the period, six-month period ended
- 10:1431st of December.
- 10:16They actually came out and said headline earnings per share is going to be anything
- 10:19between 187%
- 10:21and 197% higher.
- 10:23Headline earnings per share is going to be anything between 507% and 517%
- 10:29higher.
- 10:31So revenue increased by 157%.
- 10:35so
- 10:35It's expected because when you look at the average gold price they received for
- 10:42their gold over this six-month period was $3,812.
- 10:48And remember, you're going to tell the listeners now in a second or two about
- 10:53your call on Monday
- 10:55and how gold is still trading over $5,000.
- 10:56And they've also now said that they've pretty much unhedged all their gold.
- 11:03When you say unhedged, in other words, they're just letting the gold price do
- 11:09what it does and get whatever the amount
- 11:11is when they sell it?
- 11:13Exactly.
- 11:15Now, to put this in perspective, they didn't mention the all-in sustainable
- 11:17cost.
- 11:19But I just looked at the previous announcement, which came out early
- 11:22January,
- 11:24where they actually already mentioned that the all-in sustainable cost of the
- 11:29production for the first half of
- 11:312026, which is now.
- 11:33It's expected to be in a range between $1,825 per ounce and
- 11:37$1,875 per ounce.
- 11:41This is crazy.
- 11:43This is crazy to think that they take this out.
- 11:47At a runabout, it's called $1,850.
- 11:50Let's split the dips.
- 11:50$1,850.
- 11:53And they got for this period more than $3,800 per ounce.
- 11:57But looking at the current market,
- 12:03Every day that the gold price is trading at $5,000, and in years marked,
- 12:08I would say the biggest thing that stood out for me on the trading app is the fact
- 12:14that they've
- 12:14managed over this period to increase their gold production by over
- 12:2051%.
- 12:22Wow.
- 12:24This is really, really, really good.
- 12:25This is what you typically want.
- 12:27Well, this is a very good South African story, if that's the case.
- 12:29And I wonder if the others are able to do that.
- 12:31And they're saying to themselves, OK, well, we haven't been very efficient
- 12:38because the gold price hasn't allowed us to be efficient, but now we can be more
- 12:40expensive.
- 12:42And there is an ore body there that is now profitable.
- 12:44So we can go into different places with newer equipment.
- 12:46I mean, I'm being very simple.
- 12:47I'm no miner.
- 12:49I'm no Bernard Swanepoel here.
- 12:51But it sounds to me as though the South African gold mining industry, which it
- 12:58hasn't done in the past, is taking advantage, Skalk,
- 13:00if this company is a representation.
- 13:01Exactly.
- 13:02This is exactly and this is good.
- 13:05Ultimately, this is going to be very, very good for Shell.
- 13:08This is not just the Pan-African resources because you would expect most of the other
- 13:15gold miners and ultimately also the
- 13:17PGM miners, the northerners, the Impalas, those people to do similar.
- 13:21And if you see that, that's going to falter back through to this African
- 13:26economy, our currency.
- 13:28So this is good news.
- 13:30I think it's good news all around.
- 13:32And I thought this stood out for me as maybe a nice story
- 13:37when we look at today.
- 13:38Two more SA-centric stocks, very much linked to the domestic economy.
- 13:43I suppose City Lodge Hotels is a bit of a tourist stock as well.
- 13:49They came out with a trading statement, as did Capitec.
- 13:52Did you have a chance to look at either of those today, Scott?
- 13:55I've actually looked at both.
- 13:58Well, it's Capitec, strength to strength.
- 14:01I mean, it's just unbelievable what this bank is doing.
- 14:05What have they done now?
- 14:06Have they got a new product?
- 14:07Have they just got new people, new customers?
- 14:10What have they done?
- 14:11Where are they finding all these ways to make money?
- 14:14Strength to strength, and that's the thing.
- 14:16I mean, when you look at companies like this, and there's a few other, I mean,
- 14:23I've listened, and I'm not a shield of Pepcor,
- 14:25but you get the same feeling when you read updates from Pepcor, similar stories when
- 14:29you read from
- 14:31ShopRite. But back to Capitec, this was just a trading statement.
- 14:35So a trading statement told us already that the...
- 14:38We can expect good things for the net set of results.
- 14:41Headline NSP share is going to be up between anything between 20% and 25%.
- 14:45Similar story on the basic headline NSP share.
- 14:48And then they just went through where did their growth come from.
- 14:52And you can just see this as a well-oiled machine.
- 14:58It's just they are, I mean, they're just growth-focused and they're just doing the
- 15:05basics right.
- 15:07the whole time so but also keeping up with technology i mean they're keeping getting
- 15:12the basics right but they're also introducing new
- 15:14innovative products all the time that people understand as well and i'm not
- 15:19being dismissive of the the
- 15:21majority of the client base that they have but everybody likes to keep things a
- 15:25little bit simple we don't
- 15:27need things too complicated there's a there's a
- 15:28company in europe now called revolute uh it's a it's a A fintech stock,
- 15:34essentially,
- 15:36but it's a bank and it's doing exactly the same.
- 15:36It's challenging the old high street banks, just like Capitec did in South
- 15:43Africa.
- 15:44And it's working.
- 15:45So well done, Capitec.
- 15:46So South Africa looking good, Skulk?
- 15:48We've got the budget coming up on the 25th, I think.
- 15:53I think it's going to be a more upbeat budget.
- 15:56I think the Minister of Finance is going to look at all of these things that's
- 16:01currently happening, look at our current account.
- 16:03And just look at our general, because remember,
- 16:05we don't want to sit with a very high debt to GDP levels.
- 16:10And I think these type of moves will not only help these companies, because we know
- 16:16if we turn the clock back six, seven years ago,
- 16:18but when you look at a typical South African mine,
- 16:20there was a company that sat with fairly high debt levels.
- 16:25Cash flow was always under pressure because they really always struggled to.
- 16:31sort of surpassed at all in sustainable cost.
- 16:33This six months, they've managed to do it.
- 16:36Next six months, then you struggle to do it.
- 16:38And it always sort of went into that overdrive.
- 16:42And now it's massive positive cash flows.
- 16:45And I think this similar story could happen and filter through into the South
- 16:50African finances.
- 16:52So that's good.
- 16:54Just quickly on City Lodge, just a voluntary update.
- 16:55And it's always good when a company bring out a voluntary update.
- 17:01And they use words like expect strong first-half results, and then you know
- 17:07things are good.
- 17:09But it did just show that they've also been, over the past few years, they came
- 17:13out of
- 17:13COVID, very similar to the likes of the Sun International, and were struggling.
- 17:19I mean, they had to go into high debt levels.
- 17:22I mean, Sun International even had to do rights issues.
- 17:25And they've focused on, again, things that's going well, sold off a few hotels
- 17:31that,
- 17:33I'm not talking about this past six months, but over the past five years, sold
- 17:38hotels that's just not doing well at all.
- 17:40And now they're starting to bear the fruit of these moves.
- 17:45Plus, we've seen a positive,
- 17:48let's call it tourist industry.
- 17:53Oh my goodness, the blowout numbers for Cape Town over the Thank you.
- 17:57The Christmas holiday period.
- 17:58Unbelievable.
- 17:59I think it was more than half a million visitors to Cape Town, foreign visitors to
- 18:04Cape Town over that period.
- 18:06And hopefully City Lodge was there to mop up some of the excess from some of the
- 18:11more traditional tourist hotels.
- 18:13Correct.
- 18:13Correct.
- 18:14So very good.
- 18:15We're looking at just at the hips of anything between, let's call it 29 to 36
- 18:20percent increase.
- 18:22So that's that's really good.
- 18:24Very nice.
- 18:26OK, let's have a look at some numbers because I know you've got to get off a
- 18:28little bit quicker this evening.
- 18:30Dollar round is 1594, barely changed on the day.
- 18:32The British pound against the round 2176, the euro round 1890.
- 18:35Euro dollar is just about 1905 at the moment.
- 18:38British pound against the US dollar 136.30.
- 18:41The gold price is 5065.
- 18:44Despite the slightly stronger dollar, the gold has rallied by $42.
- 18:49Someone explain that to me.
- 18:51Maybe there's some Iranian news that we You haven't.
- 18:54yet heard on the news was.
- 18:56Who knows?
- 18:57But anyway, the platinum price is also up,
- 18:59up $35 an ounce to $21.35 and palladium $17.56, up $51.
- 19:06That's the best performer, 3% gain.
- 19:09Other commodities, where's my CRB index?
- 19:12There it is.
- 19:13I know the oil price has had a pretty good day.
- 19:16If you like your oil high, then you've got Brent crude oil up one and three quarters
- 19:22percent to $70.02 per barrel.
- 19:24And West Texas crude $65.14 up 1.8%.
- 19:27The silver price I'll give you that's up 3.75% $83.79 per ounce.
- 19:34Copper price just below $5.96 per pound which is up 3.25%
- 19:41I want to give you this one now because this is my star performer of the day.
- 19:447.955% is the yield of the South African 10-year bond.
- 19:51It's nibbled below there a couple of times recently, but today it looks as though
- 19:56it's consolidating below there.
- 19:58It's only two and a half basis points down, the yield there is, but very good
- 20:01for the bond market,
- 20:03showing confidence in the South African economy.
- 20:04And hopefully the budget will bear that out.
- 20:06The US 10-year got down to about 4.13%, now 4.17%
- 20:12after the jobs numbers.
- 20:13S&P 500, 69.48.
- 20:16When we started this conversation, it was half a percent higher.
- 20:19The S&P has turned lower.
- 20:21Did I mention dead cat bounce at the beginning of the show?
- 20:24I can't remember.
- 20:25Maybe I did.
- 20:25Maybe I didn't.
- 20:27Maybe once or twice.
- 20:30Shut up.
- 20:31The Bitcoin phrase.
- 20:32Oh, dear.
- 20:33That cat is not just bouncing.
- 20:36It's dead.
- 20:3666,218 down
- 20:404.4% on its way to what it's worth.
- 20:44And I won't tell you what that is.
- 20:46Skunk.
- 20:47What about ups and downs on the JSC today, please?
- 20:50Okay, so when we look at the ups and downs, just quickly just open this screen
- 20:55of mine, just open this second.
- 20:57We know that the golds were, but in general, it was again a commodity there
- 21:02because when you look at the
- 21:04JSE RSI that actually improved by 2.5%,
- 21:07then you know it's going to be predominantly your diggers or let's call
- 21:13it your resource company.
- 21:15So from a top down, Tungela, 7.9%.
- 21:20Cecil, 5.5%, South32, 3.61%,
- 21:27Bright, that's 3.5%, and Impala Platinum, 3.4%.
- 21:31I'm just going to add a 6.1% just because we need a gold miner in there.
- 21:36Anglo Gold, that was up 3.4%.
- 21:38So really, really good.
- 21:40I'm throwing my eyes just on the top 10, top 15, and you can see most of them are
- 21:47either gold or...
- 21:49PGM miners.
- 21:51On the downside...
- 21:53I didn't have any gold or PGMs in my David Shapiro Sasser and Securities competition.
- 21:55You know, the yearly competition, you pick five stocks.
- 21:57You pick five stocks and you can't change them.
- 22:01And at the end of the year, whoever has done the best wins the nice prizes that
- 22:07David Shapiro has put together.
- 22:08I didn't have one PGM or gold stock in their skunk.
- 22:12I mean, yeah, I've got no chance now.
- 22:14I mean, I've got off to a very slow start, let's put it that way.
- 22:17Yeah, do you want to tell us which five stocks you choose?
- 22:20No, tell us the downside on the JSC today, starting with Quilter, if you will, down
- 22:266.75%.
- 22:28There we go.
- 22:30Then we've got Sappy down 3.6%.
- 22:32NASPAS, interesting one.
- 22:34This is a company which you will find in my top five.
- 22:39And yeah, it's down again further, another 2.3% for today.
- 22:44This is a company that's now down year-to-date 18%
- 22:47so this is a this is an entry story then but also one that's been been under
- 22:52pressure lately
- 22:542.2% HCI 1.92% down for today.
- 22:58Okay, very good scale So the indices just just just give us those indices the best
- 23:03and
- 23:03the worst given what you've just said I would say it's the resi that's done the
- 23:07best today
- 23:08Undoubtedly undoubtedly we've we've had a jay-z all share.
- 23:12That was a close that 121,753
- 23:16points that is up 0.72 percent resis where the star performer two and a half percent
- 23:23up uh industrials down
- 23:250.67 naturally with a little help from naspa's process and then financials that
- 23:30was also just kept itself in the
- 23:32green at 0.17 positive for today it's a property index up 1.34 and
- 23:36we saw the total value trade again uh surpassing the 25 billion ending the day
- 23:43at the 25.6
- 23:45billion that traded through the oil share.
- 23:47I'm going to let you go, but very, very quickly before you go, you said at the
- 23:51beginning off-air, Lindsay,
- 23:53I've got to make this a relatively quick one.
- 23:55I said, fine, let's try to do that.
- 23:57I think we have.
- 23:59Actually, we haven't, but anyway, it doesn't matter.
- 24:01You've spoken about the gold, and I want the update on the other four-letter word,
- 24:06the other G word,
- 24:08golf.
- 24:10How's it going, Skulk?
- 24:12You can't put me on the spot.
- 24:14I can, and I have.
- 24:16Yeah, so haven't.
- 24:18played yet but um yeah what a surprise this this weekend this weekend will
- 24:22be my first um you know golf golf i don't say tournament for me but any any any golf
- 24:29will be a tournament just finishing it up but anyway so yeah this weekend this
- 24:34weekend will be my first one so next time we speak we can we can have a sort of a
- 24:41bit of a check-in skunkler is a portfolio manager at
- 24:43psg wealth old oak in cape town and that was the five o'clock shadow Thank you.
- 24:44The views and opinions expressed in these podcasts are those of Lindsay Williams and
- 24:51various contributors and do not reflect the policy,
- 24:53position or opinion of any other agency, organisation,
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- 25:00Assumptions made on the analyses are not reflective of the position of any other
- 25:07entity other than the speaker or the author.
- 25:09And since we are critically thinking human beings, these views are always subject to
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- 25:16Please do not hold us to them in perpetuity.