Playing & Trading Strategy

So we climbed 8.67% this week.  And now that we've passed the 3 month mark, as I wrote last entry, I'll do a monthly check-in with a percentage increase from the 10th to the 10th of each month since IPO.

September-October: 33.3%

October-November: 61.4%

November- December: 44.0%

The average of the three is 46.2%.  Projecting forward at that monthly rate starting again from our total as of December 10th, gives us the following:

January: $44,632,060

February: $64,270,166

March: $92,549,050

April: $133,270,617

May: $191,909,688

June: $276,349,951

July: $397,943,929

August: $573,039,257

End of August (3 weeks from the 10th): $752,361,793

I think that total is unlikely, but it IS the total derived from current increase factors.  I'll continue to update that on a monthly basis.

We made money this week from Krampus and its derivates, The Mummy 4 as possible casting news hit, and Kubo on the release of the first trailer.  We took a bit of a hit as Fifty Shades 3 hit a significant bump after its initial IPO increase.  We've parked money into Neighbors 2 and London Has Fallen for the moment, as both seem undervalued based on the performances of their respective first films.  We're also invested in some nominoptions; while I don't expect Compton, Danny Boyle, or Steve Jobs as picture to get noms (Compton was more a mainstream hit than a critical darling, and Jobs probably underperformed too badly for picture and director noms), I do think Sorkin will get a nod for the Jobs script, and the actors on both Jobs (Fassbender, Winslet) and Danish Girl (Redmayne, Vikander) are a fairly safe bet.  Carey Mulligan for Suffragette is much less likely, so we're short on that one.  We also continue to be short on Sisters and its derivates for the upcoming wide release later in the week.  And we're long on Danish Girl for its wide Christmas day release in the hopes that HSX will update before then and it will receive an ow adjust at that time.

And with that, let's look forward at 3 more upcoming releases.

Term Life

First let's pop back to March 18th, now that this film has a release date.  It's a Vince Vaughn vehicle directed by Peter Billingsley, who's been a mainstay on Vaughn/Favreau movies as a producer since the beginning really (Swingers/Made), giving him something to do when he's not fending off A Christmas Story fans.  Previously, he also directed Vaughn's Couples Retreat.  However, this one is hitting VOD a month before its theatrical release, so Term Life will only get a limited theatrical release instead of a wide.  It's only trading at half a buck, and it's possible it will beat $500,000 in theaters and make it worth investing in, but whether it does slightly better than that or nothing at all, it's going to be a basic non-entity at theatres.

Mena

Tom Cruise's latest collaboration with Doug Liman after their success with Edge of Tomorrow.  This one is the true story of pilot Barry Seal who transported both guns and drugs for the Contra, CIA, and Medellin cartel.  Not sure if this will be as commerical as Edge of Tomorrow, which cashed out on HSX at $84, and it's probably unlikely it will see some kind of American Sniper return.  But there should still be some upward room above its current $45 price tag.  We'll probably need to see a trailer before having a better idea of how much and how this might perform.

Split

This is the M. Night follow-up to The Visit that Joaquin Phoenix was in negotiations for but ended up landing James McAvoy instead.  After somewhat redeeming himself in the eyes of critics and audiences with The Visit, and with McAvoy a higher profile lead than anyone in that film, I think it's very likely Split will beat The Visit's $58 cashout, which means its a solid investment (though a long time out until early 2017) for the stock, currently trading at $29.

That wraps up another installment.  Sisters goes wide this Friday, and we'll be crossing our fingers that The Danish Girl will indeed go wide on Christmas day.  See you next week!