Every week, we look at the United States shares Commonwealth Bank of Australia's (ASX: CBA) CommSec brokering platform tells us are proving popular with its customers.
As CommSec is one of the largest online brokers in the country, this data can be indicative of general investing trends in our market. This week's data covers 16-20 November.
So here are the top 10 US shares that CommSec customers were buying last week:
Most traded US shares on the ASX
According to CommSec, the 5 most traded international shares last week were the following:
- Tesla Inc (NASDAQ: TSLA) – representing 7.7% of total trades with a 67%/33% buy-to-sell ratio.
- Nio Inc (NYSE: NIO) – representing 4.8% of total trades with a 71%/29% buy-to-sell ratio.
- Alibaba Group Holding Ltd (NYSE: BABA) – representing 2.7% of total trades with a 91%/9% buy-to-sell ratio.
- Apple Inc (NASDAQ: AAPL) – representing 2.4% of total trades with a 52%/48% buy-to-sell ratio.
- Palantir Technologies Inc (NYSE: PLTR) – representing 2% of total trades with a 91%/9% buy-to-sell ratio.
The next 5 most traded shares were these:
- Pfizer Inc (NYSE: PFE)
- Moderna Inc (NASDAQ: MRNA)
- Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ: MSFT)
- Boeing Co (NYSE: BA)
- Teladoc Health Inc (NYSE: TDOC)
What can we learn from these trades?
Another fascinating set of numbers to peruse this week, to be sure. Last week, we noted how the frantic buying pressure we saw in October has dampened into a more even buy/sell spread. That trend seems to be continuing this week, with a far more even split between buyers and sellers for Apple and Tesla especially. However, we also see that trades of Alibaba and Palantir are remaining very lopsided towards the buying end.
Interestingly, some investors seem to be very keen to take profits off the table with Tesla, given the stock has climbed close to 40% since the start of the month (although 67% of traders are still evidently hoping they are not too late to jump on this train). However, the Apple share price is pretty much flat over the month, despite 48% of traders also taking cash off the table there.
Turning to Alibaba and Palantir, the shares investors are scrambling to buy, Palantir is up 126% since the start of the month, whereas Alibaba is down more than 8%.
Another stock to note here is Boeing – the giant US aerospace and weapons manufacturer. Boeing has not appeared on this list for months (at least to my knowledge), and yet makes the No. 9 spot this week. Again, it's probably got something to do with Boeing stock rising more than 50% in November so far.
We also see continued interest in pharmaceutical/vaccine companies like Pfizer and Moderna, which continues the trend we have seen in recent weeks as well.
A final trend we see continuing from last week is the absence of the FAANG stocks (aside from Apple) that often appear at the summit of these lists. Amazon.com Inc (NASDAQ: AMZN) and Facebook Inc (NASDAQ: FB) didn't even make the top 10 (they were 11 and 18 respectively), whereas Google parent Alphabet Inc (NASDAQ: GOOG) (NASDAQ: GOOGL) couldn't even cut the top 20.
