AAPL helps drive late day sell off
Index & Sector performance 9/9/14 The Market: All major indices on the WSC Scoreboard finished the session lower with the Russell 2000 (IWM) leading the charge down 1.18%. The S&P 500 (SPY) started the session weak but found a bottom in early trading and then managed to rally until 2pm ET when the index turned and sold off making new lows for the session. The NASDAQ (QQQ) held in well during early trading as traders were likely waiting for the Apple (AAPL) product announcement. The initial reaction to AAPL’s news (new/bigger phones, watch, payment system) was positive and the…
Very quiet start to the week
Index & Sector performance 7/7/14 The Market: Today was a very quiet trading session which saw the market give back some of last week’s holiday gains. Looking over the Economic Calendar, this is a light data week and while Alcoa (AA) will kick off earnings season tomorrow after the close it will still be a while before we are in the thick of earnings season. We are watching the Russell 2000 (IWM) closely. In good times you expect to see the Tech Stocks and Small caps lead. While the NASDAQ (QQQ) has come back to do its part this year,…
Early volatility wanes, dull day
Index & Sector performance 6/2/14 The Market: Overall a quiet day in the market if you look at the overall performance but that does not show the early volatility the market saw when the S&P 500 futures dropped roughly 10 points at the open to only “V” bottom and spike back up near where the drop occurred. After that it was tight trading the rest of the day leaving a small up day in the Dow & S&P with the NASDAQ and Russell 2000 closing on the downside. Today there was some drama around ISM Manufacturing PMI after it was…
FOMC minutes ease market concerns
Index & Sector performance 4/9/14 The Market: After bottoming and bouncing in yesterday’s session, the S&P 500 futures spend the majority of the overnight session consolidating in a tight range. This lead to an early breakout, retest, and continuation higher but it was after the FOMC minutes were released at 2pm ET when the strongest gains were realized. Concern the Fed would be aggressive with rate hikes subsided and traders rewarded the market with 1+% gains across the board with the Nasdaq leading the charge up 1.7%. Next on the economic data schedule is Unemployment Claims which are released at…
S&P 500 remains above the 50 DSMA
Index & Sector performance 4/7/14 The Market: Friday’s selling action continues on Monday as the S&P 500 index lost roughly 20 points. Today’s lows in the SPDR S&P 500 ETF (SPY) correlated nicely with previous levers of reaction and the 50 day SMA. If this short term support is lost we could see the cash index next targeting $1800 and even $1650-1700. In the meantime, aggressive traders could look to use today’s lows as a level to trade again on the long side for a bounce. Reporting EPS 4/8/14 Pre-Market: Only one name of note reporting EPS tomorrow…
Analyst Comments
Since breaking out of a trading range back in October 2013, Alcoa (AA) has been a strong performer gaining over 50%. With the stock trading around $9.24, Goldman Sachs upgraded AA to Buy with an $11 price target on 11/25/13 and later upped that target to $12 which AA reached in less than 2 months. This action has prompted Goldman Sachs to review AA again and instead of going to a Neutral, they are upping their price target once again this time to $15. We agree with Goldman that it appears AA has more left in the tank but it…
Market dips early but fights back
Index & Sector performance 1/21/14 The Market: This is the type of market that frustrates both the Bull & the Bears. Strong moves in each direction serve to whip weak traders our of their positions. After a very light futures trading session Monday with the Stock Market closed, the S&P 500 futures pressed higher in late Monday/early Tuesday trading. Just before the open the futures printed $1844 and then started to sell off right at the open. The market finally found a bottom near noon EST but only after losing roughly 18 points from the pre-market highs. The S&P 500…
The Calm before Jobs data storm?
Index & Sector performance 1/9/14 The Market: A mixed consolidation day in S&P 500 saw the futures up in the pre-market only to sell off at the open. That sell off persisted until 11am EST losing roughly 15 S&P points from the pre-market highs and then the S&P bottomed and staged a rally which didn’t make it back to the pre-market highs but did take back more than half of what was lost. In Economic data today, Unemployment claims came in better than expected posting a 330K number when 337K was expected but the previous week was revised about 6K…
A low volume flat session
Index & Sector performance 11/25/13 The Market: Monday’s trading started with some optimism but that was sold in early trading and the market started climbing back toward the highs of the day after a pullback. The rally efforts topped around 2:30 pm EST and the market then declined into the close but after the dust settled it was a flat day. Again volumes were on the light side. Today’s economic calendar was light with only Pending Home Sales on the docket and came in worse than expected posting a -0.6% when 2.2% was expected. Tomorrow we get more housing data…
AA kicks off a new earnings season…tomorrow
Index & Sector performance 10/07/13 The Market: The markets started down strong but found early support and rallied into midday but couldn’t hold and press toward Friday’s close and instead sold off during the last hour of trading closing near the early morning slows but just slightly above. Hard to believe we are kicking off another earnings season but Alcoa (AA) will start tings off again Wednesday 10/8/13 after the close. While AA no longer has the significance it once did, it still is known for ushering in the season and many larger more impactful names will then be reporting….