Announcer: Wall Street Unplugged looks beyond the regular headlines heard on mainstream financial media to bring you unscripted interviews and breaking commentary direct from Wall Street right to you on main street.

Frank Curzio: How’s it going out there? It’s December 21st. I’m Frank Curzio, host of the Wall Street Unplugged Podcast, where I break down the headlines and tell you what’s really moving these markets. Moving these markets, holy cow. Boy, are they moving. Starting to see sell offs in a lot of stocks. In fact, most stocks. So the average stock, and we’re talking about the US markets, when not cherry picking NASDAQ or S&P. So, the S&P, NASDAQ, Russell, everything right, is down 28% off its highs. That’s the average stocks. So, if you wonder why your portfolio is down, my portfolio is down 15%, that’s why. It might not seem that way, because the major indices aren’t really on that much as a whole, because some of those big stocks are keeping it up, but even those are starting to get hit. You looked at Nvidia, right? Nvidia’s off its highs. Tesla’s well off its highs, now. It could be interesting going to next year, but a lot of this is happening because investors are trying to factor in a few things, right?

Frank Curzio: The Fed, doing an about-face. Get lots of rate hikes coming up. That should be interesting. And Omicron, which by the way, it is barely a cold, what we’re seeing from the data. So, a lot of people are getting this. So, a lot of people are getting this, but I wish they’d just really start telling this the truth. I think people are really getting sick and tired of all the bullshit. But when you really look at the data, and the UK is the best example, because this is one of the most heavily vaccinated places. And it’s spreading like wildfire, showing that, we were told that the vaccines would help us and prevent this. But now we’re being told, “No, no, no, if you get it, it’s just, you’re going to get more mild.” Right? It changes. The narrative changes all the time, and we’re going to continue to get booster after booster, after booster.

Frank Curzio: But when you really look at the UK data, their cases have exploded. I mean much, much, much, much higher than they were even during the heart of COVID. And that was like during the second wave, I think that was around June 2020, July 2020. But the most important piece of data is the death rate is going down. They’re down like 90%. So, most of the people that are getting this don’t even know it. They have to get tested, because we all have to get tested before they do different things. If they’re go to conferences or whatever. You’re seeing athletes get tested all the time. So now, a lot of them are saying that they have COVID. Even Cramer went on TV, and I haven’t been too happy with a lot of stuff he believes about COVID, but he’s showing, “Hey, I got the booster along with the first two shots, and I got it.” He’s like, “I’m not going to the office.” He’s like, “I feel perfectly fine, and there’s nothing wrong with me. But I tested in the morning, I didn’t have it. And the afternoon, I had it.”

Frank Curzio: So, most people are getting it. And even if you’re getting like a high fever or something, a lot of people aren’t going to the doctor. They’re saying, “Well, it’s the flu.” It might be better if you get Omicron, to be honest with you. One, it’s going to build up your immune system. Two, you probably barely know what you have it, because you’re not even probably going to have a fever. Not saying I wish that on anyone, but if you have the flu, that’s you should again, you can’t really hang out with your family. Omicron, I think it’s just, everybody’s going to get it. I think a lot of people aren’t going to know they get it, and we need to really talk about this because we’re seeing international travel, again, get halted in some places. In Israel, and getting worried.

Frank Curzio: We started seeing conferences being canceled. I’m going to the Consumer Electronics Show pretty soon. And this is from the third to the eighth. Lots of fun and lots of ideas. It was canceled last year. Not canceled, but it was virtual, which was horrible for the Consumer Electronics Show. It’s the one conference that you can’t do virtual at all. And it was terrible. But JP Morgan Healthcare Conference, one of the biggest, 40 years. Over 40 years, and that’s the second week in January. They just announced that they’re going virtual, because a lot of companies were canceling their trips. So, I think there was 4,200 companies for CS. Now there’s only like 2,100 right now, but we’ll see. And hopefully, we go and everything’s a go, but I can tell you if it’s a no-go, if they go virtual and say, “Hey, we’re not going to do it this year,” sell every Vegas-related stock immediately, because you’re talking about hundreds of thousands of cancellations.

Frank Curzio: It’s going to be insane. Nobody’s going to go. You’re going to be able to go to Saint de Bellagio for $30 a night if that happens, in January. I mean, it will be terribly, terribly bad. So, I’m getting marketing emails. I’m setting up meetings like crazy. I don’t think that’s going to happen. But, again, a lot of this is fear of Omicron. People are going to get it and these spreader events, but the bottom line is barely. People are barely knowing that they have this. I mean, it’s much lighter than, than Delta, much, much lighter than original COVID. But hey, people are digesting this, and you’re seeing the markets go crazy.

Frank Curzio: Now with this podcast, usually, full monologue, which I’m doing today, and then I’ll have Daniel tomorrow, and then I’ll have an interview. This week’s different, because it is the holidays, we’re going into Christmas. So, I’m not going to do an interview. I don’t want to bother anybody before Christmas. So, you have me for three straight days. I sent Daniel out of here, kicked him out of the office. In all honesty, he went to go see his family, which is really cool. And the following week, I’m giving my whole company off because everyone really kicked ass this year, and they deserve it. And I want to make sure that they have time to themselves and their family. So, for the next three days you have me. And in these three days, I’m going to have a different format where I’m just going to answer your questions.

Frank Curzio: So, feel free to send me questions, frank@curzioresearch.com, on anything. Any stock, fund, macro, micro. If you have questions about sports, your marriage, I’m very professional at that stuff. Just, I need lots of advice on my marriage all the time, but anything again, frank@curzioresearch.com, but send them now because Wednesday and Thursday, I’m going to be answering questions. These are questions that I’m getting all the time, that I’m going to answer today. But, you never know, your question might be one of the ones that I read on the podcast either on Wednesday or Thursday. It just should be a lot of fun.

Frank Curzio: So, let’s start today with a question from Kurt. Says, “Frank, I just caught up with your podcast from Tuesday and Wednesday. Since you think the Fed will raise rates four times this year, do you think this will crush gold and silver stocks?” No, absolutely not. And I’m going to tell you something about gold, and I’ve done the research on this. I’ve done a lot of homework on it. I have no idea what drives gold. I have no idea what drives gold. People say, “Inflation drives gold.” It didn’t happen. People say, “The market crashes. It drives gold.” Well, that didn’t happen during the credit crisis. And well, you look at gold stocks, right? I mean, they crashed during the credit crisis. They were down just as much. You’re looking during COVID, they were down just as much.

Frank Curzio: So, it’s not a safe haven. But, the store of value? I don’t know with the store of value, you think nobody would see sell gold, and gold will be a lot higher right now, especially with we are doing to our currency, 10 and a half trillion injected. So, that doesn’t work. They say it’s good during when real interest rates are negative. They’ve been negative forever. They’re going to be negative forever. Which means what? Accounts for inflation. So, if we have 2%, which right at zero as it is right now, and say if we go up to 2%, we have 5% inflation. The real interest rate would be negative three.

Frank Curzio: And as long as it’s negative, you’re going to put your money in gold, because it provides a better store of value, compared to if rates go, say real interest rates are 3%, 4%, you could store your money someplace and generate that return. Right? So why go to gold, when you could just put in something that’s generating interest in yield. Throw out everything I just said, because I’ve studied all this. I do know this. I know that the gold producers have never been this strong in the history of the industry. I mean, they’re producing at under a thousand dollars, under $900. It’s $1,800 now. The reason why I think gold hasn’t soared, because we’ve seen inflation soar, which surprised me and surprised a lot of other people, is one, you have Bitcoin, which is challenging and that’s digital. So, think about the next generation of people.

Frank Curzio: Most older people, I don’t want to say older, but let’s say over 50, which is basically me now. I’m coming close to that. But, we know about gold is a store of… That everyone growing up has no idea about gold. They’re all learning digital currencies. They’re growing up in a digital world, and that’s going to steal gold’s thunder, and it has. By that, when you have young people getting in it, not only that, Bitcoin’s gone up tremendously. However, the reason why I think you haven’t seen so many people go into gold is because everything was working. Bitcoin was working, speculative assets was working, meme stocks are working. Even large cap stocks are working. The biggest companies in the world kept hitting new highs. The trillion. $2 trillion valuations, approaching $3 trillion valuations now for Microsoft and Apple. So, when everything’s working, why have something that’s boring? Now, everything’s not working.

Frank Curzio: Now, you’re noticing how gold prices broke 1800. We’re around there. Might be a little bit below there. I think they’re going to go well past 2000, and you’re seeing gold catch a little bit of a bid here. I think you’re going to see them really catch a bid next year, because what we do is in the markets, funds have to put their money someplace or they don’t generate anything. And a lot of things are super expensive. We have a Fed that’s tightening, going forward. And I think just simply based on what these companies are doing, their balance sheets, that they pay dividends. And even the good projects, that are run by good people in junior mining space, that some of these things are down 60, 70% from their highs. I think they’re going to be incredible buys going to new next year.

Frank Curzio: You have to be very selective because 90, 95% of junior mining stocks are all shit. They’re all garbage. They’re people just trying to make money off cheap stock and promote this thing. And, they try to promote through so many different services, and get paid, and give them shares and all this garbage. And then, they’re into two or three other projects six months later. Be very careful, but the large ones, the Newmont, Kinross, especially which has down because one of their mines, and we got hit because of timing, which is my fault. I was wrong. One of their mines had a fire, which accounts for about 20% of the production. And they said, it’s going to be up and running about now to next month. But then, they just acquired a large company as well. I think where it’s trading is a steal. Newmont, I think is a steal here. Those are great, great companies, but go with the producers.

Frank Curzio: Their margins have never been this great, their balance sheets have never been better. And that’s one of the sectors that makes a lot of sense in a market like this. When money’s coming out, people are nervous. There’s a lot of shit out there. You’ve seen these companies, these meme stocks, the ESG names, the EV names, right? They’re losing that massive premium valuation and that money has to flow someplace. I think you’re going to see it flow to gold, and you’re seeing it. You’re starting to see it right now. So, I wouldn’t worry about the Fed raising rates four times, because just like everyone thought with interest rates at zero and inflation surging, it would be great for gold. It hasn’t.

Frank Curzio: Look, I just think if you’re looking at gold, the dollar, we’ll see what the dollar does. It could get stronger here. I don’t know. And that’s probably a better reflection of where gold goes, but I think we could see the dollar go higher, as it’s a safe haven of the world, even though we’re spending money like crazy. And also, I think gold’s going to go higher as well. And, that’ll break a little bit of a trend that you see, usually the inverse related. So, no to, that’s a long-winded answer for your question, Kurt, but I appreciate it. But yes, that’s how I feel about gold. And, I am heavily invested in gold. It’s a big part of my portfolio, and I’m going to be adding to it, too, going forward.

Frank Curzio: So he says, Kurt says, “Your Eagles are way better than my Lions,” as a PS. I would say, that’s not true. The Eagles have more wins and they look better, but the Eagles have not played anybody. Although wins have come, I’m pretty sure, against losing teams. So, whenever they play someone that’s good, they get smoked. But yet, Detroit, two in a row, and they beat two good teams. The Vikings, well, you could argue, Vikings are good, but they killed the Cardinals. They killed them. It wasn’t even close. So, they didn’t have Hopkins or whatever. But man, Kyler Murray just took a step back and crazy. But, I think Detroit is for real. I think they’re good. I think they’re getting momentum here, and I know the Eagles smoked them earlier this year, but Detroit’s a different team. I don’t know. I think they may be better than the Eagles.

Frank Curzio: And I know that Detroit, it’s really fun to watch right now, because I watched a couple of those games and they’re fun. If you go to that game and the way they’re playing right now, it’s really, really cool. They’re playing hard. They love playing spoilers. It’s pretty cool. So look, they’re not going to make the playoffs, and it hasn’t been a good year, but it’s nice to see this because this momentum means a lot going into next year, and hopefully, they can get it right. I mean, Goff’s just, Goff’s not a bad quarterback. He just needs to get a little bit more confidence. I think he’s starting to get that. Let’s go to the next question.

Frank Curzio: From Robert, he says, “Hey Frank, I am a new subscriber to your service.” He goes, “I’ve tried countless other services, only to be disappointed by false hype. I’ve fallen for it a lot. You seem to be different and have clearly made some accurate calls historically. Right now, I’m most concerned about preserving capital and not losing more money from falling stocks,” or he says, “Failing stocks.” He says, “I have about 15 securities. I seem to have a dark cloud over me, even in a bull market. My stocks are in the red. Most are suggestions from other services. Should I hold onto these securities?” And he says, he names them. “Home Depot, Sony, BP, Silver Gate, Baidu, Silver ETF, Sirius, AEM, Franco-Nevada, Pasco, Verizon, or sell? Many think another 20% downturn is coming in next few weeks. Do you think so? Many thanks, Robert.”

Frank Curzio: Rob, I can’t give personal advice. I could answer this question, and I think I’d answer you saying, “Hey, I can’t give personal advice,” but when answering to the audience I can. So, sell everything and get out of the market. I’m just kidding. You have a lot of good stocks there. Obviously, you have too much money in the stock market. Okay. I think you need to lighten up a little bit, because if you’re really worried about pullbacks or these things being in the red, you said that you seem to have a dark cloud over you, even in bull market, my stocks. We’re not in the bull market, we’re in a bear market, an extreme bear market.

Frank Curzio: I just told you that the average stock’s down 25%. My personal portfolio is down 15%. You know, things are getting nailed, and you’re not seeing it that much because the major stocks, and the trillion dollar companies, the six or so, however many there are now, they’re holding up the market. That’s the safe haven. And they account for 30% of the S&P 500. Even more than that, I think it’s like 11 trillion plus right now, just from six or seven stocks, which is like 32, 33%, I think of, so a third of the S&P 500. And yeah, even though it looks like, hey, stocks are down 5% from their highs, 6% from the highs, whatever it is today, most individual names are down a lot, lot more than that. They’re getting crushed and some names don’t deserve to be crushed. So, they’re going to become good buying opportunities.

Frank Curzio: But, I would lighten your position in these, because if you’re worried, I don’t know. Say, many think a 20% downturn is coming in the next few weeks. Look, nobody knows. I don’t know what’s going to happen. I have no idea. Maybe the Fed announces tomorrow and says, “Hey, we’re not going to raise rates anymore.” Nobody knows what’s going to happen tomorrow. I do know that if the Fed sticks to its plan, which it’s to likely do, it’s going to take money out of the system. A lot of that’s being factored in right now. There’s going to be a lot of names that get hit. You’ve got some really solid names in there: The Verizons, Home Depots.

Frank Curzio: Again, Home Depot had an extreme valuation and did very, very well, especially at stay at home. I don’t know if it’s going to… I sold that stock way too early. We did very, very well. I recommended it in the height of the crisis. I said, “This is one of the places that stay open,” and we did well, but it was trading at 32, 33 times forward earnings, and it just kept going higher and higher. Right? So, I sold a little too early, but be careful, because I’m not going to see that demand of Verizon. Great, great pick, I think in this type of market. Your diversity was silver, BP, good oil play. You have large cap stocks here, Franco-Nevada, again, got hit a little bit, but you know, great, great, great, great name. Pierre Lassonde, I’m a big fan of there, who I met personally. Just a great, great company, but there’s a lot of good names there.

Frank Curzio: But, if you’re worried about a 20% downturn, the way you’re going to go, this is money that, especially in the stocks that you have, that you should hold long-term, and you shouldn’t worry about. I’m not worried about my portfolio being now 15%, because I know it’s up a lot, a lot, right, in the past two, three years, four years. Right? So, you’re expecting a little bit of a pullback, which I expected. So, I’m not rushing to the exits and saying, “I need to sell everything.” I’m kind of expecting, and setting my expectations. And that’s why when things go up a hundred percent, you should sell half. This way, you lock in that money. If it goes higher, you own half, if it goes lower, you sold it. Right? And your cost base is relatively zero, outside of taxes and stuff.

Frank Curzio: But, also if you have some of these losses and you have gains on anything else, remember tax law season, you can offset them. But, I don’t want to give you that advice on all these names. I do know you have a pretty solid portfolio there. But, if you’re really worried about the volatility and another 20% downturn coming in a few weeks, I mean, this is a portfolio that’s set up. It should be set up for the next three to five years, and just rebalance it every year or so and make sure your thesis is still intact on a lot of these things. But, don’t beat yourself up because you’re down. Everybody’s down in this market. Everybody’s down. Very few people are up. A lot of things. Again, average stock is getting destroyed right now. And you’re seeing that.

Frank Curzio: I know you’re not seeing it when you look at the major indices, and even today, we’re seeing the markets bounce back a little bit, but it’s been a disgusting, horrible market for the past month, especially since the Fed made that announcement. And then we had Omicron come in and scare the shit out of people. And again, when our media does a great job not saying that this is a mild cold, and you have nothing to really worry about, nobody’s dying from it. People are worried, and the president’s speaking about it, but who knows? So, there’s a lot of fear in the marketplace. We are really at oversold levels. I think we could see a nice bounce back in January, plus you have the Consumer Electronics Show I’m going to be reporting from. Lots of great names and stuff like that, I’m going to come back with, and ideas and stuff.

Frank Curzio: But, I would just, almost none of these stocks are in… I’m pretty sure the newsletter that you have is Curzio Research Advisory. And none of these stocks that you have are in my Curzio Research Advisory. So, you might want to throw a couple in there, make sure that those are the ones that are trading under my buy-up-to price, and don’t put in anything. And, just be careful. Follow the stops. And, if you’re worried about another 20% downturn, where it sounds like it’s really going to hurt you and you’re nervous, that means you have too much in the market. And maybe you should just go into the Verizons, the dividend pay inside. I think AT&T’s a steal here. You get, seeing massive upgrades. I know we’re down in that in the portfolio, but at this level it makes sense.

Frank Curzio: Or buy some super conservative things, even maybe Apple or something like that, which I consider a conservative stock, even though it’s trading at expensive valuation because that’s the safe haven of the world. Maybe some of those names to help you sleep at night, but that’s my advice. And, hopefully, we help you out. I apologize, but I understand how you tried countless other services and were disappointed by false hype. Okay. That’s why I started this company, and I hear you. You’re not going to get hype out of here. I’m not going to tell you every one of my stocks are going to go up, because they’re not. But, you’re going to see the research we do in every one of our newsletters, how hard we work. You’re going to have access to really cool ideas, because I’m out there in the field going everywhere, have great analysts here. And, it’s really cool. So, we built a good following. A lot of people subscribe, tend to subscribe to a lot of our products, not just one, and hopefully, that’ll be you, Robert. So any questions, feel free to, yeah, send me an email.

Frank Curzio: Let’s get to one more. This is from Eddie. Says, “Hey Frank and Daniel.” So, Daniel’s out this week, so I’m going to speak for Daniel. So, Daniel’s going to tear you apart on this one. I’m just kidding. He goes, “Frank and Daniel,” he goes, “Been meaning to write for a while, but it’s been crazy out there, because I wanted to share with you the extent that NFTs are starting to reach real life. I’m a wine club member of some different wineries and get notices from several others. But I was a bit surprised that Robert Mondavi has embraced the NFT technology and have developed a program for rolling out wines and art. Check this out.” And he provides a website for it.

Frank Curzio: “Also, had a question about Galaxy Digital, for being the Goldman Sachs of the digital world,” which I coined that term. “I’m wondering why there is quite so much volatility. You would think that share price would be a bit more stable in the cryptos they’re representing. I view them as more picks and shovels play on crypto, that should be more stable than the cryptos themselves. Am I missing something, or is this some change in a thesis that is making it so volatile? I had another question, but can’t think of it right now. Will send it again when I remember. Getting old.” He goes, “Thanks for all you do, looking out for us little guys. I appreciate you both being real and wish you both a Merry Christmas and Happy New Year. Paid up One Member.” Thank you very much. Curzio One is the premium membership here, where you get access to all the products and services now and everything we launch in the future, at a price, and then you pay a certain fee, which isn’t really that much considering all the value you get.

Frank Curzio: And, Eddie also has a PS here. So, I’ll answer that. Because he goes, “To Frank, since Daniel prefers shooting sports,” which you’re right. He goes, “The NFL season is none like I’ve ever seen. The parity is crazy. My Steelers have pulled off some great quarters, but has stuck it up more than 50% of the time. We have flashes of brilliance, and I think Najee could be something really special.” He’s the running back. “But we need some serious help on both offense and defensive lines. At this point into the season, who are you picking to make it to the Super Bowl?” Okay. I’m going to answer all these questions for you.

Frank Curzio: So, let’s start with NFTs. So NFTs, people believe that this is a BS trend because you’re seeing just like crypto, you saw capital raised in 2016, ’17, and a lot of bullshit coming to the industry. Right now, you’re seeing everyone from Grouch selling, and spiking a football and stuff. You’re going to have that. You’re going to have a lot of BS in this industry, but make no mistake. I mean, NFTs, it’s not some fly by night trend here. NFTs is a secular trend that’s in its infancy. And if people associate it with art, which is fine, or collectibles, it’s going to expand much more than that. So, whether it’s financial services data, you talk about real estate in the metaverse, tickets to any event. I mean, these are all kept on the blockchain, but essentially what are you doing here? You’re giving ownership. You’re giving ownership on a safe, secure ledger to anyone. So, anyone can have ownership of their content, which we’re in a market where content’s being dominated by mostly the big technology companies.

Frank Curzio: But now, you have ownership to your content where anyone can make money, if you’re coming up with something original, right? And the whole world is digital, and it’s going to get crazy, and crazy, and crazier. Everything, everything, everything is going to be digital, especially as we gets more into storage, and increased storage, and increased speeds, and just everything, and AI, and big data analytics. So, when you’re looking at NFTs, this is a market that you have to educate yourself on. It could make you an absolute fortune. I think we’re going to see that very easily, with that fortune. But you know, NFTs are definitely the wave of the future. NFTs are a way to really crush it. I think it’s an incredible growth market. It’s not just a fly by night trend. It’s not a fad, and it’s going to get bigger, and bigger, and bigger. So, you need to pay attention. And a lot of people are. A lot of people who are smarter than me are.

Frank Curzio: So, that’s for NFTs. You talk about Galaxy Digital being the Goldman Sachs. I will tell you about Galaxy Digital. Listen, that is an amazing company. Now, they are leveraged though to crypto. That’s what they are. They’re a crypto company. So, when you see crypto come down, that’s going to come. You’re going to see less people do business, and less deals in a crypto space. And they’re part of it. When I say investments, they’re the Goldman Sachs of the crypto industry, they’re the ones that are investing in so many different startups. They’re getting access to that, right? So the investment banking unit is doing fantastic, which you know is Goldman Sachs. These guys are in almost every deal. When I look at really good companies in our Crypto Intelligence newsletter, it seems like Galaxy Digital is on almost all of them.

Frank Curzio: They’re on almost all of them. They’re funding. They’re getting cheap stock. They’re getting the word out. They’re early to the party. Now, you’re seeing everybody follow them. And they’re so advanced that instead of starting their own divisions at Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley, they’re signing partnerships with Galaxy Digital. The biggest investment firms, because like, “Holy shit, we just missed this. It’s a $2 trillion industry.” And today, right, it’s close to that. Even with the pullback, which again, was expected. It’s going to provide you a great entry point into lots of new ideas, but that’s where the innovation’s going to come from. Innovation’s coming from crypto. That’s what you’re going to see. But a lot of crypto companies are going to be at the Consumer Electronics Show. Your DeFi, we’re launching security tokens, which you guys know that, our Curzio Equity Owners token. It’s going to go free trading on tZERO pretty soon.

Frank Curzio: But, you can go through some of Dow. You’re looking at, the metaverse is going to have to go through crypto. You’re looking at a company that’s going to benefit tremendously. However, it is a pure play. This is a pure play. Michael Novogratz’s pure play crypto company. So, if you’re going to see the fluctuations in crypto, you’re going to see it with Galaxy Digital as well, at least a little bit, right? Because, you’re going to see business pull back. It’s almost like the stock market. If you see the stock market pull back, there’s not going to be as many deals in investment banking, and that’s going to hurt Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley. Same thing. We have a market that the Fed keeps injecting liquidity, liquidity, liquidity, like crazy.

Frank Curzio: So, these guys never really took a step back, but when you see crypto really, really take off, and I think Bitcoin will go to a hundred thousand. I don’t know when it’s going to happen. It’s not going to happen by the end of this year. It’s not going to happen by next year, maybe, but three, four years, whatever, you’re going to see just more money pour into the system. You’re going to see more great ideas coming to the system. And Galaxy Digital is the place that you go to, because they have the biggest network. They have the biggest, the most sources, biggest resources. And that’s where you want to go for the best ideas. And these guys are going to be invested in a lot of those best ideas, which is going to be amazing. I mean, you’re seeing it in the numbers already, which are incredible. The growth is incredible, just over the past year, year over year. If you look from the past two years, it’s been incredible for Galaxy Digital, and I’m a big fan of that name, and Michael Novogratz.

Frank Curzio: Last thing, you were asking about football, another football question. So you said, “Who am I picking to make the Super Bowl?” You talk about parity. Is it me, or it seems like every team that takes the lead, that looks really great, loses the following week? I will say this. I mean, the Cardinals lost and they lost bad. Tom really looks terrible all of a sudden. The Rams lost a few, but kind of had a rebound game against a crappy team. They look a little bit better, but the Rams have a great team. Let’s see if they get their confidence back. I liked the Bengals, two weeks ago, three weeks. They lost two in a row. I think they won last week though. But, they trailed off for some reason. Still, have a shot to win a division.

Frank Curzio: I was never a fan of Baltimore. Baltimore, I have no idea why they went for two last game, which is freaking insane at home. I have no idea why they went for two against Green Bay, but you did and you wind up losing. Tampa Bay, they just lost Godwin for the year. I think Antonio Brown’s coming back. I’m not sure. Brady has looked absolutely… I know him, because I have him in fantasy. I need him to win to make the playoffs. And I don’t think that happened. We got a couple games for Tuesday. We’re hoping for a couple players, but the last six quarters, Brady looked like he was 60 years old. I mean, he looked absolutely horrible. Outside of that, overtime win for Brady, which that was one pass. But the first half, I think he had three touchdowns or something.

Frank Curzio: And, in last week, he was a disaster. He was a disaster. I mean, he was missing open wide receivers, and he was trying to run away from traffic, which I’ve never seen him do in his career. And he took like four, five, what was it? Four sacks at least. I think TJ Watt has like a hundred sacks this year, or whatever. But, when I see Tampa, there’s a couple. Look, the Rams have a shot. Green Bay has been solid throughout the whole year, and they’re healthy. And the team that everyone doubted early on, which is really hot right now and looks like they’re right back in position, is KC. So, if you look at KC and Green Bay, I think that’s a Super Bowl right there, but it could be the Rams that sneak in.

Frank Curzio: But Green Bay, look at Aaron Rodgers, he’s on a mission. Everyone attacked that freaking guy when he didn’t deserve to get attacked. I mean, they really, really went after him, like he was killing people and stuff. You could be pissed off at him, or whatever. Whatever side you’re on, in terms of him getting the vaccine and shit. But look, he’s on a mission. They’re just beating teams like crazy. They’re the ones that have been steady. KC was kind of weak early on, and now, I think they’re nine and four. They look really, really good right now. They look solid, had a big win. Very, very, very big win against San Diego. So, they’re probably almost guaranteed to win that division. So, those are two teams I like. But yes, it’s been crazy, man. It’s been crazy. It’s all over the place.

Frank Curzio: Dallas was great at one point. You had the Cardinals that were great. Again, you had the Bengals that looked good. You had the Rams that looked really good. Then KC, the Raiders looked awesome at the beginning of the year, before all the shit hit the fan there. It’s just weird where these, I’ve never seen that before where there is so much parity. There’s not dominance, but Green Bay has been pretty dominant, and KC has it, looking at the last five, six weeks, that it has looked very, very, very good. And, getting more confidence back in the defense, starting to play better.

Frank Curzio: So, send in your questions, guys. Definitely send in your questions next two days. I’m here for you. Also, as promise, we’re running a special on Moneyflow Trader, which is our a high end product that we have here. And I created a video, which is about 15 minutes long. It’ll be sent to all of you in your emails and stuff like that. But I’m taking 40% off this product, and giving you a year for free, and which is the best deal I’ve ever offered on this product. So, why am I pushing this now, right? So, it’s the end of the year, Christmas. “Frank, all right. We’ll have a good year, whatever.” I’m pushing this, because we’re going to see one of the most volatile markets, not including a Black Swan event like in COVID 2020, but we’re going to see one of the most volatile markets in over a decade.

Frank Curzio: It already started with the average stock being down 25% right now. And again, we had a question earlier where most people don’t know that. They think, “Well, the market’s doing good. Why am I getting my ass kicked?” Why are you getting your ass kicked? Because, everyone’s getting their ass kicked, because most stocks are getting crushed. A lot of good names are getting crushed, too, that reported great, great numbers. The past two quarters are just falling because people are selling and saying, “Hey, I’m nervous. I made my profits. Let me get out. Let me get to the sidelines.” But, we have a market where we’re going to… Fed’s going to be taking leverage out of it. Lots of names are going to get crushed even after this 25% decline, especially with seeing over a 30% decline from meme stocks and high beta names. Despite that decline, they’re still very expensive.

Frank Curzio: So, Moneyflow Trader helps you make money when stocks and sectors get nailed. So, Genia has done a great job of this during those years, where I started this product over three years ago, and it’s been mostly a bull market. But when we saw the COVID crisis hit, seven triple digit winners, including the 500% winner. Already has two triple digit winners in the past few weeks with the markets all over the place, which is expected, but that’s the type of market I’m expecting for the next 12 to 18 months. It’s going to be all over the place. It’s one of the most important products I create at Curzio Research. I would say, not just Curzio Research, but the entire financial newsletter industry, because it helps protect your portfolio.

Frank Curzio: And you guys should be sitting on pretty solid gains, even if you’re down a little bit towards the end of this year. It does this by buying long data puts, which essentially bets against a particular stock or a sector, that it will fall by more than 10% over a 12-month period. Maybe a little bit more than that. Think about that. Do you think that stock could fall 15% over the next 12 months with everything going on, with new variants hitting the market? Omicron, all this crap. I mean, with the Fed taking money out of the system? So, if you’re looking at that, if a stock falls more than that, say it falls 20, 25% or more, you can make three X, five X, even 20X on these puts, right? That turns a $2,000 investment into 10, 20 grand. And if it doesn’t work out, you only lose the amount of money that you put into the trade. So, you’d lose 2K.

Frank Curzio: It’s a super easy strategy that I feel like nobody explains. Genia walks you through it, step-by-step. These puts can be bought through your online brokerage accounts. Very, very simple. Shows those long sub names, which is good, because we had to adapt because it’s been a bull market. And the performance, obviously, if you’re betting against stocks and the market comes up, and up, and up, that’s what’s going to happen. Again, outside of the credit crisis, and the COVID crisis, right, which stocks almost immediately bounced back. If we inject the 10 and a half trillion to our economy, it’s been mostly a bull market. But you’re looking at the past three years, guys. We’ve seen 31% gains in 2019, 18% returns in 2020. What are we up? Over 20% of the S&P 500, right? Because the S&P 500 gained in 2021.

Frank Curzio: Pretty crazy, considering the S&P averages 8% annual returns. So we blew them away, especially over the past three years, but you know what? We should have blew them away. The markets deserved to go gang busters, traded at premium valuation because the Fed was buying bonds, which injects more money to the system. And also, kept short-term rates near zero for close to 12 straight years. Again, outside of a couple raises in 2016 to ’18, which will quickly reversed. The Fed’s no longer doing this. It’s going to stop purchasing bonds, right? Which is tapering, starting almost now, removing the punch bowl, right? So, the Fed’s always been there, the buy the dip market. The Fed’s there, low interest rates, always going to. It’s a different market going forward. They’re not going to be there.

Frank Curzio: You’re going to look at companies where when you take money out of the system, you take leverage out of the system. It makes it harder for companies to borrow. Think about buying a new home. Think about business loans, which again, you’re taking those loans out. What are you using the money for? Well, that filters into CapEx spending, right? Fund new projects. Again, that’s going to be cut. That’s less money going into system. Also, increase the payments of debt for small and large businesses. This is the market that we’re going to see. And I’m not calling for a crash here, right? There’s going to be companies that do well over the next 12 to 18 months, as we go deep into tightening mode. You’ll see banks, energy companies, lots of companies that have pricing power and consumer staples. Small, large cap names that are in the right growth trends, like the metaverse, DeFi, AI, security tokens, DOW, NFTs, DNA Storage.

Frank Curzio: If you’re a subscriber to Curzio Research Advisory, please pay attention to that. That’s going to be one of the biggest trends in the world. You’re going to hear about it all the time. You’re going to have the mega giants, Apple, Microsoft, Apple, Amazon. They need to find ways to store massive amounts of data, and this is one way to do it with new technology. It’s not that new. It’s been out since 2013. Microsoft’s going all in, started something called the DNA Alliance. But you’re looking at data increasing from 40 zetabytes to 181 zetabytes by 2025. Just to put that in perspective, because that’s a word you might not be familiar with, it’s enough to fill a trillion books, a half a million times over. So, that pile is so big, it would stretch from Earth to Pluto, 1,312 times. That’s how much data, and it’s only going to 2025. So right now, the world doesn’t come close to being able to meet that future demand.

Frank Curzio: So remember that term, DNA Storage, as it provides a hugely into a massive data problem. Whereas, the last minute I’ve been talking, 200,000 people have tweeted. You have over 400,000 apps were downloaded through Apple and Google, 5,000 videos being uploaded at TikTok. Over 700,000 stories have been shared on Instagram. This has happened in the last minute, right? So that data’s going to get crazy and crazier, especially as we go to video.

Frank Curzio: But there’s a few stocks and themes that will work in 2022. However, a lot of names are going to get nailed guys, a lot of names. And that’s what Moneyflow Trader does. It allows you to hedge your portfolio, maybe two, 3%. Where if you lose, it’s not a big deal, since I’m sure a lot of the names that you’re long in your portfolio will do well. However, if the market does fall, and you’re seeing one of these names or sectors for 30% plus over the next 12 months, you’re looking at just that small position being worth up to 20 or 30% of your entire portfolio. That’s how professionals invest. That’s what hedge funds, hedge, hedge funds, are all about.

Frank Curzio: So, while everyone else is nervous, watching their portfolios get hit, which I took a couple of emails today, showing people are nervous. If 401ks are getting nailed, you’re protecting yourself. Not only protecting yourself, but you’re making money on the downside, which means what? Now, you have cash that you could use to buy a lot of those great names. Some names that are unfairly punished, that are down 30, 40%. You get to buy these at a huge discount, that we were trading maybe six months ago. Imagine buying almost any industry leader. Pick any industry leader, and buy it in April or May, right, when the market crashed. I mean, you’re easily up triple digits on almost any industry leader that you can name. That’s what happens when the market crashes. You get to see a lot of names. You get to buy these names at very, very cheap prices. That’s how you make a fortune in the market.

Frank Curzio: It’s not by going long, long, long, long, bull, bull, bull, bull. We’ve seen the percentages. We’ve seen a massive bull market. It’s going to be different going forward, because of Fed. It’s a fundamental chain, removing the punch bowl. And it’s going to be a volatile year. So, Moneyflow Trader, 40% off the retail price, which is a great deal by itself, but also I’m going to give you a free year, because I want you in the product for at least 24 months, right? So, you learn how to protect yourself. You educate yourself, and you’ll be able to use these tools for of the rest of your life, or your investment career, right? As you’re investing, because that’s how you have to invest in the market. You always have to protect yourself because you don’t know where the markets are going to go. Nobody knows. Maybe we go straight up from here, but you want to protect yourself. And this is one product that helps you do it.

Frank Curzio: And anyone that’s on an email list, you’re going to get an email from us. You have a 15 minute video, if you usually watch them. But that’s a great deal for that product. We’ve never offered it that low. I mean, we’ve offered out a 40% discount, but we’ve never given a free year away. So, if you’re interested, fine. If not, no worries. This is only going to you guys, Curzio Research people who follow us. That’s it. It’s not going outside. Listen, I’m not selling the product to anyone outside that list. It’s going to be for the next two weeks.

Frank Curzio: So guys, this is it for me. Be sure to send in your questions, Wednesday, Thursday. Again, frank@curzioresearch.com. You never know: Your question may be the one I read. So, make sure it’s good. Make sure it’s entertaining. Feel free to poke fun at me. Those will make it to the top, but next two days is going to be answering lots and lots of questions, and use me. I’m here for you guys. I love you guys. You help grow my business, all listeners and everything, frank@curzioresearch.com, and happy to answer your questions just before the holiday.

Frank Curzio: So, I’m going to see Spiderman tonight with, I think, six of my nieces and nephews, my kids. Big family event, I’m looking forward to, so lots of fun tonight, and hopefully, you guys enjoy it with your families, but I really appreciate all the support. And, I’ll see you guys tomorrow. Take care.

Announcer: Wall Street Unplugged is produced by Curzio Research, one of the most respected financial media companies in the industry. The information presented on Wall Street Unplugged is the opinion of its host and guests. You should not base your investment decisions solely on this broadcast. Remember, it’s your money and your responsibility.