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Travis Johnson, Stock Gumshoe

Author Bio

Travis Johnson is an individual investor who founded Stock Gumshoe in 2007 as a way to air his dissections of overhyped marketing pitches... and to share the "secret" stocks that stock newsletters hype to get your attention and your subscription dollars. His thinking? If you already know what the "secret" stock is, you can make a much more reasonable and thoughtful decision about whether or not to commit to an expensive newsletter subscription. (And if you don't pay for the info, you'll be more free to think for yourself about whether or not the investment is worth your money.)In his charmed life he has been, among other things, a university faculty member, a fundraiser, a writer, and a world-champion ice-cream scooper. Now he runs Stock Gumshoe for you, allowing us all to discuss and dissect the latest overheated stock ideas... as well as review and talk about investment newsletters and enjoy the commentary and opinions of Stock Gumshoe's other special contributors and the discussion with our unusually attractive, erudite and polite readers. He lives with Mrs. Gumshoe and all their little Gumshoes in the wilds of Western Massachusetts.

Author Archives

Here’s the lead-in from an ad for Nick Hodge’s Foundational Profits ($199/yr) that a few readers asked me about this week, his latest subject line for these ads was, “The Little-Known Mining Stock Everyone Wants”: “The ‘King-Maker’ of Lithium Has Already Made Me and My Readers 582% Gains “Now It’s Time to Think Even Bigger…. […]

January… ’tis the season for forecasting, and for planning… which means it’s the best time of the year to pretend you know what’s going to happen. Or better yet, to argue with other people on CNBC about what you’re sure is going to happen. And that means we should note, if for no other reason […]

Stock-picking “upgrade” newsletter from Curzio Research, focused on finding winning artificial intelligence stocks, particularly focused on smaller companies.

Entry-level investment newsletter from Manward Press, with a monthly investment idea and further commentary now based on “the latest opportunities within Manward’s proprietary Modern Asset Portfolio (MAP).” Gilani took over and revamped the newsletter strategy in late 2023 when Manward founder Andrew Snyder left, so this is very different from the previous Manward Letter which […]

And now it’s time to give some credit where it’s due… what were the most successful teaser picks of 2023? Each year, we spend a few minutes highlighting the worst idea from the investment newsletter world when we name our “Turkey of the Year” at Thanksgiving… but as the year comes to an end, we […]

Every year we highlight the “Turkey of the Year” at Thanksgiving time, calling attention to the worst performing teaser stock picks of the previous twelve months… so it only seems fair to highlight the best picks, too, and that’s what this time of year is all about… between Christmas and New Year’s Day, when Stock […]

This is how a recent ad from Louis Navellier begins… “For the First Time in Over 40 Years… “Wall Street’s ‘King of Quants’ Reveals His Secret $6 BILLION AI Blueprint “‘If you apply my “Secret Blueprint” to the red-hot AI market, the next 12 months could be extremely lucrative… even if you’ve only got $500 […]

Motley Fool Canada is selling their version of the “bundle” that so many newsletter publishers push — they call theirs Market Pass ($799 first year, renews at $999), and it includes access to the North-of-the-border versions of Stock Advisor, Rule Breakers, Hidden Gems, Everlasting Stocks and a Canada-only publication called Dividend Investor. But what caught […]

Here’s the lead-in for the latest ad from Tim Plaehn’s Dividend Hunter ($79/yr): “In the summer of 2014, I quietly recommended 3 no-name dividend stocks to a small group of retired folks… “A decade later… these 3 stocks generated $671,727 of dividends inside an average IRA portfolio “TODAY — I’m releasing a new set of […]

It’s been a wild month, no? We moved pretty high on the “Fear and Greed” index of investor sentiment during November, which was one of the dozen or so best months for the stock market in the past several decades, so we’re firmly back in “Greed” zone now, an even more abrupt turnaround in sentiment […]

So… what’s Porter Stansberry’s “picks and shovels” play in online gaming? It’s not a sports betting stock, which is somewhat of a relief given how aggressively those were touted a few years ago, but Porter hinted at his latest pick in the free lead-in part of his article on Friday, and I’ve got a very […]

Recent Author Comments

On Friday File: NVIDIA, Ackman, Toast, Keysight and more...

In that case, I offer my apologies to all and admit that I was foolish with this decision and didn't confirm what my accountant told me... probably mostly because it was a small position, though that's not much of an excuse. Sorry if I misled anyone by [...]

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On Friday File: NVIDIA, Ackman, Toast, Keysight and more...

I do t think human culture really changes that fast, but I could always be wrong.[...]

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On Artificial Intelligence Stocks A-to-V -- Which 63 Stocks Have Been Pitched as "AI" Ideas by Investment Newsletters?

Nope. If you don't want to do research and follow stocks and make decisions, it's extremely easy (and probably better) to just buy diversified index funds. Which is a perfectly rational choice, not everyone wants to have the same hobby.[...]

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On Answers: Altucher's "NVIDIA's Silent Partner" Poised to 100X in 2025 -- Who's NVIDIA's "Tiny Back Door Contractor" teased in the "Deadline May 28" pitch?

Interesting... Luka Lango had a similar tout a few weeks back: https://www.stockgumshoe.com/reviews/luke-langos-innovation-investor/de-tease-lango-sez-buy-before-june-30-to-profit-from-musks-project-apollo-what-is-it/[...]

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On Microblog: Is Motley Fool Pitching Crowdstrike Again Today?

Probably so -- we covered their "next Mag 7" pitch in March, and CRWD was similarly discussed at th[...]

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On Eifrig's "Gold Bank" -- What's the "2024 Gold Trade" that "uses about $10 to harness 2 ounces of pure gold?

Quite true (and I owned SAND before then, and still own it now, they shot themselves in the foot a few ways over the past five years).[...]

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On Alexander Green's "I’ve Invested $100,000 in ONE Tiny AI Stock" Pitch ... What's his #1 Investment for 2024 and #1 Microcap?

Could be, there will definitely be some big losers in that portfolio, particularly among the stocks that I bought in 2021 (though the most recent one is also doing poorly, with a bad earnings release very soon after I bought it). I generally intend to che[...]

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On Answers: Altucher's "NVIDIA's Silent Partner" Poised to 100X in 2025 -- Who's NVIDIA's "Tiny Back Door Contractor" teased in the "Deadline May 28" pitch?

People do love stock splits, even though there's not as much point to them as there was 20-30 years ago.It will, at least, make options trading a little easier for NVDA, given the lower cost of 100-share lots... so bring out the gamblers and the hedgers.[...]

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On What's Altucher's "NVIDIA Backdoor" Company for the "X-Chip" -- Big News Coming on March 21?

Sounds like perplexity.ai read my article... :)[...]

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On Friday File: Thoughts on the Markel Reunion... and Valuation

The industry definitely goes through cycles, and I set my buy prices (and asset allocation) at levels where I'm willing to own for a long time with my current outlook. That's why my positions in WRB and KNSL are relatively small.We're probably closer to[...]

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On Friday File: Thoughts on the Markel Reunion... and Valuation

Glad you find it useful, thank you![...]

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On Porter & Whitney's "New Form of Money" -- What's "The Secret U.S. Currency No One Told You About?"

Beats me, but those parent awards are vastly larger than they've been reporting in revenue over the past few years. The latest award in the Micron trial is about as large as their market cap.Don't know anything else about them, or whether their patent[...]

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On Microblog: James Altucher’s AI wealth window - $2,500 cost join his service to find out small AI stock who has partnered with NVIDIA

Sounds like it might be a repeat of the one I covered here: https://www.stockgumshoe.com/reviews/paradigm-mastermind-group/whats-altuchers-nvidia-backdoor-company-big-news-coming-on-march-21/[...]

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On Friday File: Thoughts on the Markel Reunion... and Valuation

I don't pretend to be able to predict the weather... but I know Markel and Nephila were studying the same kind of data before NOAA released their prediction.In general, bad catastrophe years bring higher rates to absorb those losses, and it works out f[...]

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On Artificial Intelligence Stocks A-to-V -- Which 63 Stocks Have Been Pitched as "AI" Ideas by Investment Newsletters?

He has pitched a few, but most of his ads have pointed at Palantir (PLTR) over the past 18 months.[...]

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On Friday File: Thoughts on the Markel Reunion... and Valuation

Thanks Peter![...]

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On Microblog: Philosophical question: When is a stock too much of your portfolio?

I would guess that in any objective, long-term study the answer would be that letting your winners run is the best answer, on average. Water the flowers, pull the weeds.But we're not studies, we're human beings, so we need to establish whatever guard[...]

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On Artificial Intelligence Stocks A-to-V -- Which 63 Stocks Have Been Pitched as "AI" Ideas by Investment Newsletters?

I've never owned Microsoft, sadly, so I'm mostly being bitter when I say that I think it's too expensive, given the growth rate.But Microsoft, Amazon and Alphabet are the likely winners of almost any big technology shift, given their current dominance,[...]

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On Artificial Intelligence Stocks A-to-V -- Which 63 Stocks Have Been Pitched as "AI" Ideas by Investment Newsletters?

Don't remember ever really looking into either of those, what makes them stand apart?[...]

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On Artificial Intelligence Stocks A-to-V -- Which 63 Stocks Have Been Pitched as "AI" Ideas by Investment Newsletters?

Looks like NVDA has endorsed the notion that AI spending is still growing fast. I guess beating estimates by 10% is "table stakes" when you're as richly valued as NVDA, so it's up only a little... but their 10:1 stock split will probably get some folks e[...]

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