Someone asked a question. Finally the investment community delivered an answer, for a while, maybe, sort of.

“A few months ago someone online asked me if I have any ideas about which stocks will have explosive growth soon.” – A Bit Of My Investing Process (March 2023)

MVIS gave me an excuse to use them as an example of what matters and what is entertaining. Much of stock news is in the entertaining category.

MVIS had a pop and a drop. You decide if it was explosive, something that fizzled out, or whether it this the sound of a fuse being lit and about to launch a new and profitable era for the company (MicroVision).

Oh no! MVIS went down over 12% today.

Ah, but the stock was up almost 30% for the week!

And it is up 182% in a month. A month!

For the last twelve months it isn’t as grand, but 94% beats a lot of alternatives. And, look at the spike at the end. Explosive enough?

But lets keep in mind how volatile things can be. Thanks to a really low price five year ago, the stock is up 440%. Gulp and yay.

But, I’ve held the stock since about 1999. Look at those shares and gulp and cry eep. Down 85%.

Every time I write about MVIS I take this ride. I’ve held the stock long enough that it is old enough to drive, and maybe complete a Masters in something. Surviving this many pops and drops has drained most of my emotions about MVIS, or at least fatigued them. I cheer the pops, but I’m more likely to give it a thumbs up rather than a shout and applause.

The stock goes up and goes down.

I adhere to LTBH, Long Term Buy and Hold. (See my book: Dream. Invest. Live.) A friend described my approach as ‘get rich slowly’. During the Internet Bubble my approach retired me. A perfect storm of bad luck un-retired me. Lately my approach seems to be emphasizing the slow part of the approach. I’m older. Sooner would be better than later.

In the meantime, I know investors who have traded right by skill or luck or both or whatever and are now multi-millionaires. Every strategy has its success stories. Every strategy has its failures, too; but it is harder to hear about them. They don’t hold parties as often.

Investors were partying this week. Someone who bought Friday morning probably isn’t cheering, but imagine the ones who bought Monday, or in May, or last year. As I understand it, any yearly return of more than 15% is doing well, historically.

The folks who bought within the last five years, however, have learned more lessons. Buying prior to April 2021 meant surviving prices falling to $0.15. Hold on and the price shot up to ~$30. That’s a nice return on investment (#MassiveUnderstatement). Corks were popped. But, someone bought at the top. Feel for them as the stock dropped back to about $5. Ouch. MVIS touched $5 about a year ago, but it dropped back to ~$2, again.

That’s a story. That’s also reflected in people’s lives. But, if you hadn’t noticed, notice now that I haven’t mentioned the company’s story.

I’ll steal from my end of year synopsis of the company (and remind myself that I’d due to do that again at the end of the month. Semi Annual Exercise EOY 2022)

“MicroVision is an electronic component designer and manufacturer developing a wide series of applications based on a chip equipped with an oscillating mirror. Shine light on the chip in one direction and it can display an image. Shine it the other way and the chip becomes a sensor. Expand the spectrum and it can send or detect or both send and direct radar images, and probably even more applications.”

Oh yeah, and one version fit a projector inside a smartphone.

The company announces announcements. There are press releases released. They make news for the news. They do not, however, make much money. Oops.

But maybe they’re about to. Hope and optimism prevail regardless of a history of fruitlessly being exercised.

The stock popped on no news, as I define it. News is factual, quantifiable, significant, and hopefully positive. Current hints are about LiDAR for cars and such, vision systems for Microsoft, various display applications, and things hidden behind non-disclosure agreements. Similar hints have been talked about for decades.

Maybe this time is different, again.

Was the pop because someone thought MicroVision would be part of Apple’s new products? Was a car going to be sold with MicroVision parts? Something else? No announcement. No news, by my definition.

A likely influence is the market for shorting the stock. I Will Not try to describe the short market except to say that those investors need to borrow shares to buy them back. (Still a strange, yet old, concept.) In a rare event, there were none. If a brokerage told a short seller that they had to buy back the shares, they had to go to the open market, which drives up the price, which makes it more expensive to buy back the shares, which cycles until there is some resolution. (As I understand it) Hence, a pop.

Stock market news relies on guessing at motivations. An investor doesn’t have to say why they bought or sold. We guess, but never really know, unless it is yourself.

Look back at that 2021 spike for an example similar to what just happened, and is possibly continuing to happen with MVIS. In 2021 there was speculation about product launches and buyouts. MVIS is usually heavily shorted, but that situation was amplified by the Meme Stock bubble. The two situations fed off each other – then popped. The product launches didn’t launch much. There’s a good chance that the bubble drove MVIS’ price so high that it became too expensive for a buyout. And, there had been solidarity within the anti-short crowd, but that solidarity is hard to maintain.

About two years later, MVIS returns to $2 and a high-spot on the shorts board. And no new news.

You are intrepid (or bored) to make it this far into this blog. Here’s the beginning of the summary.

The charts are entertaining. The emotional ride is real because the financial ride is real.

I am investing in MicroVision. I bought MVIS because if the company succeeds I can succeed. I’d rather try to understand a company than the stock market, particularly the shorts part. I invest because I think the company can succeed significantly, can replace an archaic industry with a positive solution, and because I can benefit from my research and patience.

I’ve been wrong so far, but that’s why I own a few other stocks. I’d prefer to own several, but I’ll return to those days – I hope. I don’t expect them all to succeed, or for them all to fail. Stay tuned.

Sadly, patience has a price. The stock has been split and diluted enough that what was originally more than enough may be barely sufficient, now. My shares are less than a hundredth as valuable as those original shares. While some will blame management, I blame myself. I could’ve sold then, or not even bought until now. By one measure, I’ll break even if the stock rises to ~$12. That’s why I didn’t sell as it danced with $30. Somewhere between $30 and $300 is re-retirement money. MVIS pops to $8? No reason for me to move.

Small stocks can pop on no news, and they can pop even more of good, real, news. Guessing the timing is just a guess. One way to be there at the right time is to own the stock already. I’m ready.

I’ll join in the entertainment as the price does what the price does. It’s the best proxy for real news. But I’l also base my decisions about buying and selling on less emotional conclusions. I researched. I bought. I bought more. I’m holding. I’m waiting. I’m ready.

And waiting.