Movin’ On Up

As of last night, I have moved up to #1565 in the CNBC Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge. With 1,273,430 contestants in the running, it appears I will need to pass another 292 to make it in to the top 0.1%. If that happens, I’ll set my sights on the top 1000, then maybe…

My reality check is that tenth place is currently at $2.89 million, safely ahead of my $1.64 million war chest.

As I described yesterday, I rode AKS up after their strong earnings report, but the stock ran out of steam late in the day and finished with a 4.2% gain for the session. Of course I dumped AKS at the end of the day and elected to put my chips on Veeco Instruments (VECO) – a nanotechnology equipment company with a focus on the semiconductor industry. VECO has had a difficult year, lowered guidance for the most recent quarter, and delivered some lackluster numbers last night. Still, strength in their MOCVD business has brightened the outlook somewhat and helped push the stock up 2.5% this morning.

For the record, I recognize that Amazon (AMZN), which is currently trading up 20%, was the obvious earnings play last night, but my thinking is that if you are trying to beat the crowd, you increase your chances dramatically by getting off the beaten path. I can only hope that when it comes to Amazon at least, my competition is thinking along the same lines…