What I Will Share about Key Investment Trends at Next Week’s Las Vegas MoneyShow

One of the more common dangers during volatile times in the stock market is giving in to frustration. If you were to look at the sharp moves lower in stocks like Amazon.com (AMZN), Facebook (FB), FireEye (FEYE) and even Whole Foods (WFM), you would think the world is over! Now, we both know that isn’t true. What we do know is that those stocks have fallen out of favor with Wall Street for one reason or another. Perhaps the parrot-like analysts should do more thinking for themselves when it comes to forecasting revenue and earnings growth.

One great way to get a read on what really is going on is to talk with company executives, industry experts and others. I do that every week on PowerTalk, but next week I will be at the Las Vegas MoneyShow, where I will be giving several presentations and chairing two panels. My presentations will focus on how you can prosper by using PowerTrends to identify companies well positioned for what lies ahead. The two panels that I will be leading, on the other hand, will be with public companies, and these are some of my favorite discussions.

In each of the two public company panels that I’ll be hosting next week, several public company representatives will be on the dais. The focus of each panel will be slightly different. One will focus on growth opportunities in and outside of the United States, while the other will discuss the water, power and energy industries to address if there is opportunity or pain ahead. And for both panels, I’ll have the pleasure of talking with some great company representatives.

Joining me on the first panel will be officials from Banco Bilbao Vizcaya Argentaria SA (BBVA), Kraft Foods (KRFT) and Companhia Energetica de Minas Gerais, or CEMIG for short (BME: XCMIG). We’ll be discussing not only the trends they are seeing in their respective industries and geographies, but growth opportunities for each company inside and outside of the United States. On the second panel, where I will be talking with Allete Inc. (ALE), American Water Works (AWK) and Royal Dutch Shell plc. (RDS.A), we’ll be discussing the outlook for energy demand inside and outside of the United States and prospects for alternative energy sources. With American Water Works in particular, the discussion will center on the drought in the United States, the long-term drivers of the water industry and what needs to be done about our water infrastructure.

If you’re attending the Las Vegas MoneyShow, I’d encourage you to attend either of these panels, as well as my own PowerTrend presentations. I think you’d be surprised how much you can learn. I also open up all of the presentations that I give or moderate to questions from the audience. If you aren’t attending the show, I have some good news for you: Ransom Notes Radio hosted by Townhall Finance’s own John Ransom will be broadcasting from the show floor. I’ll be talking with John about PowerTrends and the public company panels, as well as analyzing the latest market news.

Lastly, in case you missed it last week, I appeared on “Money with Melissa Francis” on Fox Business. I talked with her, Charlie Gasparino and others about the April Employment Report and the continued conversation about raising the minimum wage. Quickly, the April Employment report was bittersweet — yes, 288,000 jobs were added, but more than 800,000 people fell out of the labor force during the month. Wages are stagnant, and the types of jobs being created are skewed toward lower-paying and part-time jobs. As far as the bid to increase the minimum wage, it seems there are those in Washington who have never run a business before. If they had, they would understand the sharp increase in costs that will get passed along to you, the consumer. Here are the links to my Fox Business segments:

• Digging into the April jobs data
• Can the economy sustain a $10.10 minimum wage?

Limiting Your Freedom for Guilty Pleasures with Michelle Minton, Competitive Enterprise Institute Fellow
Joining me this week on PowerTalk is Michelle Minton, a fellow at the Competitive Enterprise Institute. I’m especially excited to talk with Michelle about her area of focus — alcohol regulation, food and beverage regulation, Internet gambling and so on. Some call these sin stocks, but I call them Guilty Pleasures — and they are a staple of my investment mosaic.

As Michelle points out, however, there are efforts afoot to curb one’s ability to buy energy drinks, ban Big Gulps and even overturn state-regulated Internet gambling, even though demand for these and other guilty pleasures runs high. Michelle pulls back the curtain on these campaigns, showing us what and who are behind these efforts to shape behavior and limit your choices. Michelle doesn’t pull any punches and takes us behind the scenes and in the know, just the way I like it.

Listen to my one-on-one conversation with
Michelle Minton, Competitive Enterprise Institute Fellow

In case you missed it, I encourage you to read my PowerTrend Brief article from last week about how to ask the right questions to invest profitably. I also invite you to comment in the space provided below.

NOTE: Fabian Wealth Strategies is a Securities and Exchange Commission-registered investment adviser, and is not affiliated with Eagle Financial Publications.