A Thousand Percent,
and Minus Eighty-Two.Week of November 2 · BOOT · CENX · QURE
One of Monday's three windows carries a cumulative gain above a thousand percent. The same card shows a worst year of -82.23%. Both come from the same thirty years of data.
One of the three windows opening Monday has a cumulative gain of more than a thousand percent.
The same card shows a worst year of -82.23%.
Both numbers are true. Both come from the same thirty years of data. And they sit four inches apart on a card we are not showing you in full today, because a figure like the first one without the second one attached is how people get hurt.
That is the entire job of this newsletter in two lines, and this week handed it to us without our having to argue for it.
What makes the comparison sharper is the card below it. A five-star biotech window, opening the same morning, with a downside band roughly twelve times tighter. Same Monday. Same board. Twelve times the difference in how hard it swings. Star ratings do not capture that. Frequency does not capture that. It lives in the band underneath, which is the only one that answers the question that decides your outcome: how much should I put on?
The one with its earnings already behind it
Boot Barn sells western and work wear — boots, denim, hats — from several hundred stores across the United States. It is about as far from a story stock as retail gets, and the thing that makes this particular window interesting has nothing to do with the brand.
It is what just cleared out of the way. Boot Barn reported second-quarter earnings on October 28 — five days before this window opens. You are entering a 16-day hold with the quarter's largest scheduled risk event already behind you. That is genuinely unusual; most of what we publish holds through a print, and we normally have to flag it as a warning.
Earnings came in at $1.73 a share against a $1.63 estimate, and the board authorised an additional $400 million share repurchase. The stock moved up roughly 15% on the news. Across fifteen analysts the average target sits near $203 against a $130 price, with thirteen Buy ratings and two Holds. The stock trades on a P/E near 14 and a PEG of 0.74.
Third-quarter guidance of $3.03–$3.19 came in below the $3.41 the Street wanted, and full-year guidance landed slightly light too. The target cuts since have been heavy — UBS from $272 to $232, Citigroup $205 to $180, TD Cowen down to $140. The average target is still far above the price, but the direction of revisions is down. And the downside band is not gentle: a -37.88% worst drawdown and a 9.13% sigma on a stock with a 1.76 beta.
Discretionary apparel retail is directly exposed to the household budget, and the Fed is still raising. The offset is a 16-day hold that closes November 24, well clear of the December meeting, with its own earnings already reported.
BOOT is the rare window that opens with its earnings risk already spent, on a business that just beat and expanded its buyback, trading far below the average target. The caveats are guidance that came in light, a wave of target cuts, and a -37.88% worst drawdown that deserves respect.
Thirty years, and the widest card we have ever printed
Thirty years of history — the deepest record on this board. Century Aluminum smelts and sells primary aluminium out of plants in the United States and Iceland, a business that lives and dies on commodity pricing, power costs and trade policy.
Its cumulative gain across those thirty years is the largest figure we have ever published on any card. Its worst year is -82.23%, which is the worst figure we have ever published on any card. Both numbers come from the same thirty years. We are printing the second one and withholding the first, because that is the order in which they should be read.
Context worth having: the stock is down roughly 20% over the past month, David Einhorn made a positive case for it at a conference nine days ago, UBS carries a Buy with the target trimmed to $55, and third-quarter earnings land inside this window. It is the longest hold of the three by a wide margin.
Both dates, the upside and downside bands, the catalyst, the risk flags and the bottom line continue inside Super Seasonal.
The quiet one, and the tightest band here
A five-star biotech window with a 91.67% frequency and a profit factor above 35 — on a hold of under three weeks. uniQure develops gene therapies, a corner of healthcare where single readouts move stocks violently.
Which makes the downside band the surprising part. It is roughly twelve times tighter than the card above it, and among the narrowest we have ever recorded. Two windows opening the same Monday morning, both carrying four stars or better, and one of them swings twelve times harder than the other. No star rating tells you that. It only appears in the band we have blurred.
Both dates, the upside and downside bands, the catalyst, the risk flags and the bottom line continue inside Super Seasonal.
The three, side by side
| Ticker | Rating | Years | Freq. | Profit Factor | Hold | Worst Drawdown | Downside Σ |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| BOOTBoot Barn · unlocked | 4 / 5 | 12 | 83.33% | 5.18 | 16d | -37.88% | 9.13% |
| CENXCentury Aluminum | 5 / 5 | 30 | 86.67% | 7.76 | 00d | -00.00% | 00.00% |
| QUREuniQure NV | 5 / 5 | 12 | 91.67% | 35.85 | 00d | -00.00% | 0.00% |
A date is one kind of trigger. It is not the only kind.
Everything on this page runs on the calendar. A window opens on a date the data chose, closes on a date the data chose, and your job in between is to size it properly and leave it alone.
The reason that works is not the calendar. It is that the decision was made before you were in the trade. You are not asking yourself every morning whether today is the day — the condition was set in advance, and you either honour it or you do not.
If the part of seasonal trading you actually value is the decision being made in advance rather than seasonality specifically, Trigger Trades is built on the same principle applied differently. Full details, structure and pricing are on the page.
See Trigger TradesSeparate from your SuperSeasonals membership. Trading involves risk, including the possible loss of principal. See the page for current details, pricing and terms.
The Big Picture
The widest card we have ever printed, and one of the tightest, opening the same morning.
A thousand percent is the number that sells a newsletter. Minus eighty-two is the number that keeps a subscriber solvent. They came from the same thirty years of the same window on the same stock, and any service willing to print the first without the second is not describing a trade to you — it is describing a lottery ticket.
That is why there are twelve numbers on every card instead of four, and why the third group is the one we will not let you skip.
Super Seasonal Trade Desk
