Texas Instruments Incorporated (TXN)

I am talking about themes that can stand the test not of today, or tomorrow, but for all of 2021 and beyond.

Buy the best and leave the rest to those who don't know better.

While Intel stumbled, other major chip developers and manufacturers have been generally upbeat amid strong end-market demand. And M&A activity is on the upswing again.

After years of being losers how did everything auto catch fire? Simple: the darned pandemic.

Demand for PCs, tablets and gaming hardware all still look quite strong. And smartphone sales are gradually picking up.

Here's when you make your move and start buying.

But there was some good news under the mess.

Monday showed some signs of not just profit-taking, but some risk-off behavior by professional managers. What gives? Why now?

This is what's known as a positioning week, and starting Monday you're going to hear a ton of things.

While valuations are clearly very high for many tech names, investor euphoria might not go away until news flow meaningfully worsens.

The GPU giant could see value in ARM's large mobile footprint and budding server CPU efforts. But a deal would also present some challenges.

As TXN trades lower on Wednesday following its earnings report, let's see what the charts and indicators say.

The analog chip giant topped estimates and issued above-consensus guidance. But it also cautioned that macro pressures might take a while to go away.

Monday's rally might have been ugly, except that this is 2020. Anything goes in 2020.

Should COVID-19 significantly depress economic activity in the second half of 2020, companies seeing only moderate top-line pressures right now could see their sales drop more sharply.

A long list of tech companies have taken advantage of favorable credit and/or equity markets in recent weeks.

Qualcomm is pleased with how Chinese 5G phone sales are trending, while TI is cautious about how customer orders might trend in the near-term.

Two major Chinese carriers have reported strong 5G subscriber growth this week. That could be a silver lining for mobile chip suppliers during a tough time.

We need to see clear signs of aggressive buying of the chipmaker's shares before recommending the long side in the stock.

While rival STMicro issued a full-year outlook that got a thumbs-up from investors, TI frequently noted that demand visibility is quite low right now.

We have not seen intraday action this narrow since the market correction began in February, and here's what that means.

Brains per share. Hearts Per Share. I've been around long enough to be that positive. I like these companies and more importantly, I like their stocks.

Reactions to reports have been more puzzlement than anything else, as there is still too much uncertainty about what lies ahead and little reason to rush in and buy.

Beyond energy markets and the potential for ancillary fall-out, the S&P 500, and this may be more important from a technical viewpoint, failed to hold that 50 day SMA.

Where to invest as China restarts that economy?

In spite of the market's epic plunge, a lot of well-known tech names are still comfortably above their 52-week lows.