March 19, 2024

The NightCap

The Market: An initial gap higher was immediately sold but an afternoon surge helped the Dow, S&P and NASDAQ finish higher while greatly paring losses in the Russell 2000.  Downside momentum seems to be waning and today’s mixed session is likely pointing to a bottom.  In all likelihood that bottom will only be short-term but we will have to see how the action takes place. Ideally, for the start of a move higher, we would like to see a gap down (or strong move lower in early trading) tomorrow which takes us near or below today’s lows which is again…

Market Shrugs off initial gap down

Index & Sector performance 5/28/15 The Market: Today started with a gap down but the major indices on the WSC Scoreboard were able to rally back to near flat on the session with the NASDAQ (QQQ) leading to the downside.  After two very volatile session, it appeared the market used today to take a breather.  FYI, tomorrow is the last trading day of the month. Transportation (IYT) was the clear loser on the WSC Scoreboard as it finished nearly 1% lower on the session.  We generally do not look to catch falling knifes and YTD the IYT has not been…

Shortened week but already big moves

Index & Sector performance 3/30/15 The Market: Very strong rally across the board today with the Dow (DIA) leading the charge followed by the Russell 2000 (IWM) and then the S&P (SPY).  In the very short-term these indices are overbought and likely due for a consolidation.  The nature of the pullback will be telling if more upside is forthcoming or if we are heading back down toward the lows. Energy (XLE) led the Sectors today closing up over 2% followed by Financial (XLF), Materials (XLB), and Industrials (XLI) all finishing up over 1.5%.  It was green across the board. Please…

Overnight loses quicky negated

Index & Sector performance 10/30/14 The Market: In the overnight session the S&P 500 futures lost roughly 20 points and it appeared to be signaling for a rough Thursday but then recouped nearly all the loses by the open and managed to rally for the majority of the day.  All 4 indices from the WSC Scoreboard finished higher with the Dow (DIA) leading the charge helped immensely by Visa (V) which finished the session up 10.24% after reporting better than expected EPS and a new $5B Share Repurchase program yesterday after the close. In Individual sectors the clear standout was…

Market recovers after weak GDP

Index & Sector performance 6/25/14 The Market: After a quiet overnight session, the S&P 500 futures spiked lower after the Government announced worse than expected GDP estimates for the first quarter of the year but, after the open, buyers stepped in and all four main indices from the WSC Scoreboard closed higher. In individual sectors HeathCare (XLV) and Transportation (IYT) outperformed closing up 1.06% and 0.99% respectively.  The only sector closing lower on the WSC Scoreboard was Consumer Staples (XLP) finishing down 0.16%.  The leader in the XLV was Bristol-Myers Squibb (BMY) finishing up 2.96% after announcing positive Phase III…

Daily Wrap

DJIA +21.73 (+0.14%) to 15,324.53;S&P 500 +6.05 (+0.37%) to 1,654.41;NASDAQ +17.01 (+0.57%) to 3,011.83 After the Unemployment claims number came in slightly higher than expected the futures started to sell off in the pre-market but that soon turned and by the open we were slightly positive and then rallied higher for the remainder of the day until roughly 2:30 pm EST when the highs were seen and we drifted lower into the close.  As noted in economic news Unemployment claims rose to $354K and 1st quarter GDP slightly disappointed with a 2.4% reading down from 2.5%. Dow member Disney (DIS) was in the news after the…

Daily Wrap

DJIA +33.25 (+0.23%) to 14,329.49; S&P 500 +2.80 (+0.18%) to 1,544.26; NASDAQ +9.72 (+0.30%) to 3,232.09 Today was a quiet lower volume trading day ahead of the Jobs numbers tomorrow morning.  I am currently showing consensus estimates at 162K and as a reminder (unless revised) last report came in at 157K.  The report will be out at 8:30am EST tomorrow giving us about an hour to digest and get the day’s bias before we open. Time Warner (TWX) was in the news as they announced plans to spin off its Time Inc. publishing division.  TWX expects the new entity to be trading before…