This morning, the big market news is that Twitter $TWTR and Elon Musk are getting close to striking a deal for the eccentric billionaire to take the company private.

This is a dramatic turn of events from just last week, when the company announced it had adopted a “poison pill” to ward off Musk’s takeover efforts.

The latest reports suggest a deal could be finalized as early as today.

From the desk of Steve Strazza @Sstrazza

Welcome to our latest Minor Leaguers report.

We’ve had some great trades come out of this small-cap-focused column since we launched it back in 2020 and started rotating it with our flagship bottom-up scan, Under the Hood.

We recently decided to expand our universe to include some mid-caps…

For the first year or so, we focused only on Russell 2000 stocks with a market cap between $1 and $2B.

That was fun, but we wanted to branch out a bit and allow some new stocks to find their way onto our list.

The way we did this is simple…

To make the cut for our new Minor Leaguers list, a company must have a market cap between $1 and $4B.

From the desk of Steve Strazza @Sstrazza

Our Hall of Famers list is composed of the 150 largest US-based stocks.

These stocks range from the mega-cap growth behemoths like Apple and Microsoft – with market caps in excess of $2T – to some of the new-age large-cap disruptors such as Moderna, Square, and Snap.

It has all the big names and more.

It doesn’t include ADRs or any stock not domiciled in the US. But don’t worry; we developed a separate universe for that which you can check out here.

The Hall of Famers is simple.

We take our list of 150 names and then apply our technical filters so the strongest stocks with the most momentum rise to the top.

Let’s dive right in and check out what these big boys are up to.

Here’s this week’s list:

The largest insider buy on today's list is a Form 4 filing by Jan Barta of Pale Fire Capital.

Barta now owns 2,658,550 shares of Groupon $GRPN, which represents an ownership stake of approximately 9%.

This is our ASC Research Q2 2022 Playbook.

With the current market environment giving us many mixed messages, what better time to dive in and see what's happening underneath the surface?

• Stocks (International & U.S.)
• U.S. Sectors & Industries
• Market Breadth & Sentiment
• Commodities
• Currencies
• Intermarket Analysis
• Cryptocurrencies
• New Trade Ideas
• Overall Strategy

In the activist world, Bill Ackman announced that Pershing Square exited its position in Netflix $NFLX, as the stock was plunging lower by 35% on the heels of a disappointing earnings report.

It’s estimated that the hedge fund lost over $400 million on the position, which was just purchased back in January.

From the desk of Steve Strazza @Sstrazza

When investing in the stock market, we always want to approach it as a market of stocks.

Regardless of the environment, there are always stocks showing leadership and trending higher.

We may have to look harder to identify them depending on current market conditions… but there are always stocks that are going up.

The same can be said for weak stocks. Regardless of the environment, there are always stocks that are going down, too. 

We already have multiple scans focusing on stocks making all-time highs, such as Hall of Famers, Minor Leaguers, and the 2 to 100 Club. We filter these universes for stocks that are exhibiting the best momentum and relative strength characteristics. 

Clearly, we spend a lot of time identifying and writing about leading stocks every week, via multiple reports. Now, we're also highlighting lagging stocks on a recurring basis.

Welcome to the Short Report.

For this week's trade, buying $XLI January 130 calls for 35 cents or cheaper.

Get the full details, risk management procedures and targets for this trade here:

This is the video recording of our April 20, 2022, Inside Scoop Weekly Strategy Session.

The only insider buy on today's Hot List is a Form 4 filing by the CEO of Solo Brands $DTC, who reported a purchase of roughly $486,200.

In the options market, there was bullish options activity in the social media platform Pinterest Inc $PINS and in the retail pharmacy operator Walgreens Boots Alliance Inc.

Today’s Hot List is a short one.

Durable Capital Partners continues to build its position in the language-learning website and mobile app Duolingo Inc $DUOL.

This is the video recording of the April 2022 Mid-month Conference Call.

We discussed:

• The Major U.S. Indexes and Current Technical Analysis
• Commodities making multi-year highs vs Stocks
• Our Sentiment Composite Indicator shows excess Pessimism
• Value Stocks continue to lead vs Growth Stocks
• Energy Stocks and Commodities Trades
• Agriculture Stocks and Commodities
• Base Metals & Precious Metals
• The US Dollar vs US Dollar Index are very different
• Global Markets: Pockets of Strength & Weakness
• Bonds Yields and Yield Curves
• What To Do With These Beat Up Growth Stocks
• Bitcoin Correlations & New Crypto Trade Ideas