Skains Investment Partners

04/30/2026

My updated website is live. Lots of great investment related information available.
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04/06/2026

Shared with clients on 4-1-2026

Risks, Are we hearing the whole story?, To the Moon Alice!!

On the date of my last note that I sent out, 3-19-2026, the S&P 500 broke a critical support level called the 200 moving day average. The next day it broke another support level. For the most part, the NASDAQ index broke similar support levels at very close to the same time. The next levels of support are quite a bit lower. All this means to me is that the risk in the equity markets had become much more elevated.
In this business we have 3 different kinds of research that we can follow; Fundamental, Technical and Quantitative. I feel its important to consider all 3 of these, when possible, in making investment decisions.
The definition of Fundamental research, from Investopedia: From an investing point of view, fundamental research (or analysis) is the method of determining a security’s intrinsic value by examining related economic, financial, and qualitative factors. It aims to identify if a stock is over- or undervalued by analyzing financial statements, management quality, and industry conditions.
From an investing point of view, Technical Research (or Technical Analysis) is a method of evaluating securities—such as stocks, commodities, or currencies—by analyzing the statistics generated by market activity, primarily past price movements and trading volume.
Unlike fundamental research, which looks at a company's financial health to determine its intrinsic value, technical research focuses on identifying trends, patterns, and behavioral signals to predict future price direction and determine optimal entry and exit points.
From an investing point of view, Quantitative Research (often called "quant research" or "quant analysis") is the systematic, data-driven process of using mathematical models, statistical methods, and computer algorithms to study financial markets, identify investment opportunities, and manage portfolio risk.
It removes human emotion and subjective judgment from the investment process, focusing exclusively on numerical data, such as historical prices, company financial ratios, and trading volumes.
Here are some recent statements that we have heard coming from Washington D.C., (the administration). We are going to pause bombing Iran. We are having very good talks with Iran. Iran has allowed 8 to 10 tankers go through the Strait of Hormuz.(the Gift) Iran is going to allow about 20 tankers to go through the Strait. Iran wants to end the war. We continue to have productive talks with Iran. But while we see and hear this, there have been statements from Iran saying, they are not in fact talking to us!
I look at Flight Radar 24 every single night. https://www.flightradar24.com I can tell you that every night I see anywhere from 2 to 6 tanker aircraft flying in the vicinity of Israel, Iraq, Saudia Arabia, the Persian Gulf, and Iran. To me, it does not make any sense whatsoever to be flying tanker aircraft if they are not there to support active military operations. My feeling is the bombing continues even when we are told we are holding off until (insert the date given) and then the next day we hear about the bombings on the news. I can tell you that fighter aircraft, B-52’s, B-1’s, B-2’s and military helicopters are not showing up on this program, in the Middle East. You can see the tanker aircraft as well as all of the cargo aircraft. I’m seeing roughly 5 to 6 C-17’s and some C-5 Galaxy aircraft, every night. So the amount of supplies and hardware that has and is moving to the Middle East is absolutely incredible. (For those that may not know, a tanker aircraft is used for re-fueling other aircraft like fighters, bombers and others who need to refuel to get back to base, as an example.)
Recently in the news it has been said that Iran is asking for a cease fire, but almost at the same time they fire a missile that hits an oil refinery in Israel and they threaten to cyber attack technology companies in the United States. They have attacked ships in the Persian Gulf and launched drones with explosives. Let me ask you a question. If you were asking the United States for a cease fire would you be launching missiles, drones and threatening cyber attacks? My feeling is that so much of the higher levels of government in Iran have been eliminated that we do not really know who is running the country. We may have one person or group asking for the cease fire while the military is still firing missiles and such. I do not think we are going to come to an agreement with Iran any time soon. I think Iran’s negotiating points are mostly going to be a no go for the U.S. Will the U.S. then go ahead and bomb their infrastructure like electric generating plants, Kharg Island, Oil production facilities, and desalinization plants as the President has stated? We have moved a considerable number of troops to the area. If we put “boots on the ground”, then this situation goes longer and I feel the investing markets will interpret this as a big negative.
I really do not see how this situation is going to come to a resolution within a couple of weeks, as we are hearing.
Now, lets look at something else. D.C. has told us about the ships being allowed to pass through the Strait. If you have an interest, check out this persons you tube channel. Its named, What’s Happening going on with Shipping. https://www.youtube.com/ (Click on “video’s” to arrange them in chronological order and view several of the most recent.)
He highlights exactly what is going on within the Persian Gulf and what ships are in reality are passing through the Strait. The “Gift” of 8 to 10 ships passing and then later saying up to 20 are passing is just not reality.
MarineTraffic.com is another site where you can see all shipping traffic around the world. Just as Flight radar 24 shows aircraft around the world, this one shows boats/ships.
I think the Administration is trying to give us what is perceived as tidbits of good news possibly to appease the investment markets and to tell the American public things are going better than reality.
Additionally and the Strait of Hormuz only has a very few number of cargo and tanker ships passing when the normal number is closer to 130 per day….the essential blockage of the strait is holding up not only critical oil and gas for markets around the world but also holding up many resources like minerals and chemicals used in manufacturing around the world. The you tube channel mentioned above states that the country of Australia only has about 39 days of fuel left. What happens when they run out? Economies around the world are at risk.
If you add all of these issues up, the risk in the market from a research basis, the words from D.C that are not reality, the likelihood that Iran agrees to the U.S. demands is why last week on Tuesday and Wednesday, for those accounts that I manage, I started to reduce risk by selling off growth/equity assets by approximately 30 to 50% of the account. Yes, the market went up quite a bit yesterday, but it just got back to the level where I was selling. I feel we have a better chance of market weakness than strength. But, if I’m wrong, we still have some funds invested. There could be some short term trading opportunities that come up.
Please keep in mind that I manage to the client and not to a model. I invest for each clients respective investment objectives and risk tolerances. I do not use models and make everyone fit into a particular model.
Tonight the President addresses the nation re: Iran. Tonight we launch a rocket sending astronauts to the moon. This Friday is Good Friday and the markets are closed. And, yes today is April 1st, and this note is NOT an April Fools joke newsletter.
In conclusion, you can see that the world is ever changing and with that the investing markets are always changing. This is what keeps me going is interpreting what is happening on a global scale and determining how that affects our investing markets and helping customers manage their investments within this environment. As always, if you know of anyone who may need help with their investments, retirement plans, insurance needs, etc, please let me know. If you have any questions or comments, please get in touch.

Derek
All of the comments stated within these notes are the opinion of Derek Skains and not the opinion of Osaic Wealth, Osaic Advisory Services or Pershing LLC. These notes should not be considered investment advice. Please consult with your advisor so that when making investments you can make them within your respective investment objectives and risk tolerances.

What's Going on With Shipping focuses on Maritime Industry Policy, and current events in the Maritime Sector, along with Maritime History. The channel features videos that examine the world's merchant marines, the international maritime sector, current events in the maritime trade, and history. You....

03/19/2026

Interest Rates, Iran, Holiday. Is Cuba next?

Another Fed meeting has come and gone and rates were held steady (no change) for the target range of 3.5% to 3.75%. Inflation has remained stubbornly higher than expected which really doesn’t allow for rates to be lowered. The President continues to call for lower rates, even today, 3-19-2026, to help consumers as we are all dealing with higher fuel prices. Prices of general goods, services and food, in my opinion are going to move up as the fuel prices remain high and most likely have not been fully factored into the prices of these goods, services and food. Remember virtually everything we buy as consumers moves by a truck powered by diesel, and sometimes it moves by truck more than once before we get it.

Interest rates are hardly the big news item. You may remember from my last note I mentioned that it appears we were positioning for military activity in Iran. It didn’t happen exactly when I thought it was going to, but none the less, we are in it now for about 2 weeks. The outcome and conclusion of this activity is still unclear, for the people of Iran. I hope they get the democratic government that the people have been craving for, for 47 years. Iran’s clerics have been known sponsors of terrorism in many parts of the world. They have funded Hamas, Hezbollah, and the Houthis for many years and if a new democratic government can be elected hopefully the sponsorship of terrorism goes away. Peace in the Middle East? Iran is rich in not only oil and natural gas, but they are also known for having rare earth deposits which have become very valuable these days.

Now, think about this. It’s estimated that Iran sells about 70% of their oil output to China, whom imports almost all of their oil needs. China was also a buyer of the majority of the oil output of Venezuela. Both of these sources of oil for China have been basically eliminated. If the U.S. controls what happens with Iran’s oil, like they do now with Venezuela’s, then I would think that would give the U.S. some leverage on China in any future negotiations.

With the military activity going on and how its impacting the oil markets around the world it has obviously driven our barrel of oil prices higher. Which is interesting to a degree as we only import about 1% of our oil needs from the middle east. The U.S. produces and or receives oil within the Americas for virtually all of its needs. (we import from Canada and some from Venezuela) So even though we produce virtually for all of our own needs, the price of WTI oil has still been affected and has gone from about $58 a barrel at the beginning of the year to about $94.50 today. My feeling is, until we can get the price of WTI back down into the mid 50’s to low 60’s we are going to continue to see an inflationary environment, which will keep the Fed from lowering rates. Even though we will get a new Fed governor in May, he probably would not get the votes to lower rates right away.

This has put pressure on Housing stocks and the stocks of companies that cater to that industry, like Home Depot, Lowes, Masco and others. Some of these companies’ stocks have been sold too much and could represent great opportunities in the short run. You might remember from an earlier note I sent out, I said sometimes the markets sell off so much that it’s like a rubber band has been pulled so far that it has to bounce back to some degree.
I still think we will get lower interest rates, but I feel it will be later than originally expected. The middle east activity needs to settle down, oil prices need to come back down and inflation needs to be well in control. If the unemployment rate goes higher, that would support a move for lower rates too.

Notice how quickly the movement for Greenland has disappeared? However, Cuba is coming into focus. Since the U.S controls Venezuela’s oil now, the U.S. has stopped that flow of oil to Cuba. Cuba depends on Venezuelan oil to run its fragile power grid. I did read recently that it appears that Russia is going to try and sell oil to Cuba. I think the administration in the U. S. would try to stop/prevent that in an effort to squash the government of Cuba and to allow the Cubans to elect their own government and come out of communist rule.

Wouldn’t that be something if in a relatively short period of time the U. S. was able to free 3 countries from Communist/Dictator (type) rule? (Venezuela, Iran, Cuba)

If these countries can be “freed” think of the rebuilding opportunities. Venezuela would need its oil infrastructure rebuilt along with roads, bridges, ports etc. Cuba would need a new electric grid and they probably have oil and gas discovery potential around their island and possibly onshore as well. Think of the opportunity to bring the Cubans up to the 21st century by building new factories for a lower cost environment, importation of food products, computers, TV’s, internet, etc. and open for tourism from the U.S. again. If Iran can elect a democratic government and restart the flow and sale of their oil and gas products I bet they could get back on their feet pretty quickly. I would also guess that they could become an ally of the U.S. along with the other middle east countries.

Lots of possible opportunities that could turn out to be investing opportunities.

Good Friday will be on April 3rd this year. The stock markets are closed for that Holiday. I hope you all have a Happy Easter. I may spend it on the beach recovering as I recently had a total knee replacement surgery on my right knee. Those that know, may remember I had my left knee done last summer.

In conclusion, you can see that the world is ever changing and with that the investing markets are always changing. This is what keeps me going is interpreting what is happening on a global scale and determining how that affects our investing markets and helping customers manage their investments within this environment. As always, if you know of anyone who may need help with their investments, retirement plans, insurance needs, etc, please let me know. If you have any questions or comments, please get in touch. My prior notes that I have sent out are all available on my business page. Just search for Skains Investment Partners on Facebook. Also, I recently had my internet site rebuilt and there is plenty of information available there as well. You can find it at www.SkainsInvestmentPartners.com

Derek

All of the comments stated within these notes are the opinion of Derek Skains and not the opinion of Osaic Wealth, Osaic Advisory Services or Pershing LLC. These notes should not be considered investment advice. Please consult with your advisor so that when making investments you can make them within your respective investment objectives and risk tolerances.

Having a conversation with parents about their finances is an essential step in helping to ensure their financial well-being as they get older.

01/16/2026

This note was shared on 1-14-2026.

Interest Rates, Iran, Greenland, Venezuela, Holiday, Oh My!

It’s no secret that this administration wants to have lower interest rates. Lower rates would typically benefit just about everyone. First off it makes mortgages less expensive and can have a positive impact on people buying homes. This step alone has huge economic impacts from the mortgage people making money to the real estate agents, the home builders (new homes) to the Home Depots and Lowes of the world as people decorate, improve landscaping, buy appliances, update their homes, etc. Not to mention the employees of those stores as well as the employees who make those appliances, paint, tools, landscaping materials, etc.
Then you have businesses who would benefit. If their cost of capital is lower, they may be more incentivized to expand, buy new machinery, hire additional employees for expansion, create, build and sell new products.
In my previous notes, you may remember me saying that it appears that the Fed held rates too low for too long as we went into an inflationary environment….the inflation rate hit about 9.1%....they raised rates, the economy cooled and again, its my feeling that they kept rates a little too high for too long before starting to cut those rates.
The current administration in D.C. has made no secret that they want lower rates and plan to replace the current Fed Governor, Jerome Powell, when his term ends in May 2026.
The four candidates for replacement have all stated that they will lower rates. Even one said they might cut them immediately by 1.5%. That is a very large possible cut in rates and it will immediately make almost all existing fixed income investments pop in price making them more expensive and lower the yields to match the (new) current rate. If Jerome Powell is replaced sooner than May 2026, this timeline may speed up. So we need to position for lower rates ahead!!
Venezuela: Not to get political on Venezuela but now with the U.S. in some fashion controlling Venezuela, this, in the grand scheme of things, makes our hemisphere slightly more safe. No secret that China and Russia have been doing a lot of business with Venezuela. China’s Belt and Road initiative has them invest in countries all over the world. This has happened in particularly poor countries where they come in and “loan” money to the country to provide for infrastructure projects that are needed. It could be roads, bridges, dams, for hydroelectric power, airports…really anything. These countries end up being the hook with China and owing them a lot of money to the point where we could see eventually China running some of these countries. When these infrastructure projects take place do you think its American companies getting the contracts? This has been happening in many countries in Africa, and I feel the Chinese stepped up their ambitions during the previous administration. The U.S. has lost a lot of respect in Africa since then. We really don’t need that to happen in Venezuela, much closer to home. The current administration has already changed the fact that the Chinese operated the ports on both sides of the Panama Canal!
Venezuela at one time was considered something like the 3rd richest country in the world. It was considered the Paris of the west. In fact, many years ago, Air France had daily flights between Venezuela and Paris. After 20 something years of communist rule starting with Hugo Chavez then Nicholas Maduro, it has turned the country into a 3rd world cesspool and estimates say that over 8 million citizens fled the country. Maduro failed to honor the latest election that he lost and incredibly stayed in power until he was arrested by the U.S.
Moving forward, hopefully the people of Venezuela will get the government they want and the country can rebuild, grow, and be the place that Venezuelans want to live! Do you think American companies will get the contracts to help rebuild? I bet most of them will be. Chevron is the only U.S. company that has been operating there.
Greenland: I do not know why the current administration wants to OWN Greenland. There has been a treaty in place for many years that allows the U.S. to do just about anything they want with regards to the Military there. We currently have military people there although the number of people and assets is much lower than it was during the Cold War. I can only guess that the reason the administration wants to OWN it is because of the possibility of rare earth metals that could be mined there. I do not believe there will be any military intervention to own Greenland, I think that if the U.S. becomes the owner somehow it would be a purchase, much like the Gadsden Purchase, the Alaskan Purchase, the Danish West Indies, (which became the U.S. Virgin Islands) the large land purchase from Mexico called the Treaty of Gudalupe Hildago and of course the Louisiana Purchase.
Holiday: Next Monday is Martin Luther King Day and the markets will be closed for this national holiday. I would expect that the banks and post office will be closed as well.
Iran: The civil unrest in Iran has been growing daily and the number of protesters that have been injured or killed has grown considerably. President Trump has warned their government to not kill their own citizens. If you haven’t noticed, President Trump does not like killing of any kind. We have seen him in the past year try to end conflicts all over the world. Its also no secret that the Iranian government has wanted to eliminate Israel. This is why the U.S., in conjunction with Israel, last year, preemptively struck Iran to stop them from creating nuclear weapons. Iranian water resources are drying up, their currency has fallen to historic lows, the economy is on the brink of collapse. The country is about to fall.
Again, in the 1970’s Iran was a rich country. They were rich in oil and culture. It was a very western society. The citizens dressed much like the people of the U.S. did at the time. For example, at swimming areas, it was normal for women to wear western styled swimsuits and or bikinis, if they wanted to. Doing that today would result in an immediate arrest and most likely jail time. Then in 1979 the Islamic Revolution happened and the country has been ruled under Islamic religious, I’ll say, extreme rules ever since. It looks like now, the people want their freedom back and I hope they get it. Now, fasten your seat belts!
I think the US is preparing for some type of military activity in Iran and I bet it happens very soon, like this weekend.
Russia has evacuated 3 plane loads of diplomatic personnel and their families from Israel. The U.S. has started moving assets from the U.S. into Europe. The U.S. has started to move un-needed people from bases in the Middle East. The UK, Switzerland, Australia, Ireland and France have moved embassy staff out of Iran. Recent military intervention has happened on weekends. I feel the weekend is important, so the investing markets don’t panic and it gives a day or two for things to calm down before the markets open again. Long Holiday weekend coming up!
I cannot guarantee anything happens this weekend in Iran but do not be surprised if it does, or something happens soon. By the way, the price of oil has been moving up everyday for about the last week. Its anticipating volatility or risk and is moving higher.
In conclusion, you can see that things are always changing, adjusting, getting better, or getting worse and that is what keeps me interested in the investing markets and helping investors manage their way through these changes. We have also been fortunate as the markets have generally been positive for us for a few years and the year of 2025, and early 2026 we have seen the equity markets setting new highs numerous times. I feel we may see more of these new highs as we get lower interest rates, more tax deductions, less regulation, and lower global conflicts.
If you know anyone who may need help with their investments, please let me know. If you have any questions or comments, please get in touch.

Derek

01/12/2026

A note send to clients on 9-11-2025:

This is a paragraph from my last note:
How many times have I written growth is on sale? Well, the markets are a little higher since the last note I sent out (one month ago) but there is still opportunity. With the close of business today, Friday June 27, 2025, the Dow Jones Industrial Average is only about 1254 points from its old high.

The Dow Jones is now about 2278 points higher than where it closed on the day I wrote that note, setting a new record high as well. The other indices are higher as well, the S&P 500, NASDAQ but the Russell 2000 has not made a new high but is getting very close. The yield on the 10 year Treasury has dropped 6 out of the last 7 days and closed today at 4.026%, the lowest level since the end of March, 2025.

So, what drives the markets? Generally speaking, “Earnings” drive the markets. You may have heard in the news that the “Market” is trading at 22 times earnings. (for example) What this means is that if you add up all the earnings per share for each company in the index that you are talking about and divide them by the price of that index you would get the 22 times, for example. This is also known as the P/E ratio. Price divided by earnings. So in general, the underlying companies that make up the indexes are earning more money quarter to quarter and this in turn has investors bidding up the price per share of these companies. IF we were to have our economy fall into a recession we would expect that companies would sell less products and have lower earnings which would drive down share prices and the indexes.

What about interest rates. I would think most of us have heard about President Trump pressuring the Federal Reserve to lower interest rates. If interest rates were lower versus higher, it could spur additional business activity as the cost to borrow money for the expansion of factories, new product launches, hiring more employees, for example, would all be much cheaper than with higher interest rates. The increased business activity could put more money into the economy, and if the business is selling more products, their earnings increase and thus the stock price increases.

You may have heard in the news recently that the head of the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) was fired on August 1, 2025. Since then, data for new jobs was recently revised for the period from March 2024 to March of 2025 showing that there were actually about 1 million less jobs (created) than what was reported by the BLS. This new data supports the idea that the economy is on a more fragile footing than before. In addition, there have also been quite a few layoffs around the country and also in particular, in Washington D.C. So far, my daughter who lives in DC and works for the State Department still has a job and has made it through the layoffs.

So let’s put all of this information together. Companies in the US are still doing, generally speaking, well. They continue to earn money which is driving their stock prices higher. Interest rates in the market are moving lower right now. The jobs picture is foggy. The housing industry is somewhat slow, and, in the news, it’s reported that we continue to have a very large housing shortage.

With lower interest rates that could help spur the housing industry which can pump a lot of money into the economy, help businesses grow and ultimately continue to drive stock prices higher.

We have Federal Reserve meeting this coming week on Tuesday and Wednesday and it is generally believed that the Fed will cut rates by ¼ of a point. My feeling is that if they cut by ¼ of a point the market will not do much as its already expected. If they cut by more than a ¼ the market will go higher on the news. I seriously doubt they will cut more than a ¼. If they don’t cut at all, I feel the market may sell off a little as that would be a disappointment. I feel it’s also expected that they will cut by ¼ at future Fed meetings. There are only 2 meetings left for the year and that is in October and December.

I also wanted to touch on AI. Who hasn’t heard AI mentioned just about every day, all day long? If you are not familiar with it, its Artificial Intelligence (AI). Talk about an industry driving our economy!! AI is said to be the next innovation to bring considerable change to our lives since the INTERNET! Barely no one in the US is not using the internet in some way practically every day, if not all day every day. After all, you’re receiving my e-mail via the internet, probably pay your bills via the internet, you may read your news on a tablet, via the internet. Some people stream their TV viewing over the internet and even some people make their phone calls over the internet. Anyway, AI needs very fast and sophisticated computer chips, AI will also need massive amounts of computing space to handle all the tasks that will be moved to AI. Utilities will need to build out more electrical generating capacity to power the data centers that will hold all of the computers that will be tasked with AI. The data centers are there for regular companies computerized needs as well. This is why the company named Nvidia is so well known now. They are a leading company that makes the sophisticated chips that power AI. There are a handful of utility companies whose stock prices have done extremely well because they are building out additional power generating capacity for these needs. There are companies that supply parts to the builders of the data centers that are doing very well. Even Uranium mining companies’ stocks are doing well as we are seeing a resurgence in nuclear power in the US.

Even though we are entering a period of time, September and October, which tend to be seasonally weak for stock prices, you can see there are plenty of reasons to be excited about investing in equites for growth. Will there be sell-offs in the future? Of course there will be. Will there be opportunities in the sell offs? I feel there will be. The likelihood of a recession is very low at this point. Is growth still on sale? I would say, a little less so right now, but as earnings increase, it still keeps stock values attractive.

Well this note has been too long for sure but I want to say I hope everyone had a great summer as we turn the season toward the fall and now kids are all back in school and Christmas is about 3 months away! I got a TKR for the summer. A total knee replacement of my left knee. That is a tough recovery, but my wife and I were able to recently travel to Mount Rushmore. This has been a bucket list item for me for a long time. Now I have only 3 states left to eventually travel to so I can claim that I’ve been to all 50 of the United States.
Until next time, please let me know if you have any questions regarding investments and please keep me in mind if you know of anyone who may need help in this area.

Derek