The Bot Brief

"There is no force on earth more powerful than an idea whose time has come."     

- Victor Hugo

Bots in The News:

In the first week of the new year every stock within the Bot Index recorded negative weekly returns except three of the defense stocks. As noted in our last Bot Brief, the defense stocks were among the only companies that posted negative returns for the entire year. Raytheon Technologies gained 1.48%. Lockheed Martin rose .7% and Northrup Grumman increased a mere 30 basis points.

For the week, the Bot Index fell 3.78% while the S & P 500 declined only 1.53%. The worst performing company was 3D Systems, a perennial volatile performer, with an 11.50% drop. That was closely followed by NIO Inc. with an 11.13% slide. Cognix declined 9.32% with the announcement of the CIO’s removal from the management team. Faro Technologies was next in line as a loser with its 8.57% slide on big volume both Thursday and Friday.

The employment report that was announced on Thursday left many investors and economists puzzled. The December report noted that employers added 216,000 jobs, much better than the 170,000 that was expected. The news came on top of the .4% increase in average hourly wages and 4.1% for the entire year. The combined issuances from the Department of Labor caused some concern that the Fed may not reduce interest rates as much as had been earlier anticipated.

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To Further Muddy the Water on Labor:

Our friend and colleague Paul Attwood of Harbour Trust Investment Management Company provided the following chart on the probable progression of the robotic-labor issue.