Tuesday, June 7, 2011

Stealth bull market leader: DTG

Here's one some of us may have missed in the great Bull Market of Disbelief (2009-present): Dollar Thrifty Auto Group (DTG). 

Check out the 3 year pattern on this stock, from the collapse of '08 to the bull market recovery of 2009 and beyond. Yes, you see that chart right. DTG has risen from its early '09 lows below 80 cents to over $81 today. That's not a "10-bagger", it's a 100-bagger, or a 10,000% gain. 


I happened to notice this chart while scanning through some names in the diversified services sector today on freestockcharts.com. When I backed up from the daily chart to view DTG on a weekly timeframe, the phenomenal rise and long-term recovery pattern were staring me right in the face. 

Here was a name I had totally lost track of for at least the past year or more. I wondered if anyone else was long DTG or even tracking it, as I couldn't recall many mentions of it in my Twitter stream or in the trading blogs I read. 

While glancing through the archived $DTG tweets on StockTwits, I noticed some interesting things. 

First off, the stock is not one of the hotly followed securities on StockTwits, with only 8 people following the ticker (some hot stocks or futures contracts will boast over 1,000 followers on ST). It is under-followed and probably under-owned among retail investors, although it is very widely held among institutions.

Secondly, the stock has been lifted higher in recent months thanks to a protracted bidding war among major car-rental chains Avis and Hertz. In fact, the two firms have been fighting for DTG since April, 2010. Here's a funny little tweet from Leigh Drogen, way back in September of 2010, which illustrates that fact. 

Finally, many of the archived tweets seem to highlight the fact that many of us just plain missed it, or were reluctant to go long after witnessing the first 1,000% advance. A great many also seemed to want to play DTG short-term for swing trades on the long or short side, but few traders offered a verified account of their ownership of DTG over the long haul. 

So here's a stealth bull market leader that many of us seem to have missed. Something I found interesting on a day when many of the stocks in my watchlist are chopping around or breaking down. I guess it really does pay to take note of the market leaders, go long, and acquire the wherewithal to sit tight (with proper risk management in place).