March 19, 2024

The NightCap

The Market: Stocks had another tough session following a second day where the Chinese market was halted.  Chinese officials have removed the circuit breaker restrictions for tomorrow’s session and traders appear to be preparing for a volatile session but it will be interesting to see if allowing the index to freely trade will ultimately help it bottom — even if only for the short-term. Another session where no Sector saw gains but the relative outperformers were Retail (XRT), which was helped by Wal-Mart (WMT) after gaining 2.3% on the session, and Monday’s leader Utilities (XLU). Along with what happens overnight…

The NightCap

The Market: No Comments with tonight’s write-up.  Have a great evening!       Reported EPS 12/21/15 After the Close: Cintas Corp (CTAS) est $1; Steelcase Inc (SCS) est $0.32   Reporting EPS 12/22/15 Pre-Market: ConAgra Foods Inc (CAG) est $0.60; Paychex Inc (PAYX) est $0.51   Analyst Comments:

Early dip is bought, finishes flat

The Market: Overall a quiet day in the markets following yesterday’s FOMC statement as an early dip in the S&P 500 found buyers and the index finished flat on the session while the NASDAQ (QQQ) led. The S&P 500 looks to need at least a short term pullback to regroup before any longer term move higher but we will be interested to watch that first pullback as we are from from believing the coast is all clear and that the market is off to new highs. In individual sections, Utilities (XLU) led finishing up 0.74% on the session followed by…

Small Caps lag as market rallies

Index & Sector performance 3/16/15 The Market: A strong performance day as the S&P 500 (SPY), Dow (DIA), and NASDAQ (QQQ) finished up over 1% while the Russell 2000 (IWM) was the laggard finishing up 0.60%.  One of the positive noted on this recent decline in the broad markets was the resilience of the IWM which is close to a new all-time high.  Today could just be the other broad indices catching up to the already outperforming IWM but we cannot help but feel as though today was a perfect set-up for the IWM to lead all names higher and…

Central bank news abroad drives headlines

Index & Sector performance 1/21/15 The Market: It was a relatively choppy session which saw the Dow (DIA), S&P 500 (SPY), and NASDAQ (QQQ) manage to finish higher while the Russell 2000 (IWM) closed lower.  There were reports out of Europe that the ECB Executive Board proposed the purchase of EUR 50B/mo of bonds in a program that should last at least a year.  There was more news from outside the U.S. with a surprise rate cut in Canada to counteract the sharply declining oil prices. Energy (XLE) led the charge today as all sectors on the WSC Scoreboard finished…

The 20’s support today’s drop

Index & Sector performance 12/8/14 The Market: The S&P opened lower but like every other recent micro pullback it found a bottom and started to rally higher.  The market again looked like it wouldn’t be denied a higher close but then after the initial morning pop the indices started to roll and continued lower until roughly 2pm ET when they found a bottom for the session and moved off the lows into the close. The lows on the S&P 500 (SPY) and NASDAQ (QQQ) correspond with the 20 day SMA and we will be looking to see if those lows…

BIIB helps XLV finish up over 26% YTD

Index & Sector performance 12/2/14 The Market: It was a solid session following Monday’s drop with the Russell 2000 (IWM) clearly leading and with advancers leading decliners by roughly 2:1. In Individual sectors it was Transportation (IYT) leading up 1.18% followed closely by Energy (XLE), which is still trying to recover from Friday’s big gap down, up 1.16%, and lastly HealthCare (XLV) which finished 1.12% higher and is now up over 26% year-to-date.  Helping the XLV today was Biogen Idec (BIIB) which gained 6.43% on positive results from an early-stage Alzheimer’s drug trial.  BIIB is a name to watch.  Above…

Russell leads overall dull session

Index & Sector performance 11/24/14 The Market: An overall dull session with the S&P 500 (SPY) and Dow (DIA) barely moving while the NASDAQ (QQQ) and Russell 2000 (IWM) led.  As is expected for the remainder of this shortened holiday week, volume was very light. In individual sectors it was Retail (XRT) posting another great session up 1.32%.  Today the index was greatly helped by Outerwall (OUTR), operators of Coinstar and Redbox, which finished up 12.32%.  Also chipping in was Best Buy (BBY) up 2.29% and Foot Locker (FL) up 3.45%.  After spending much of the year down, the XRT…

Heartfelt thank you to our Vets!!!

Index & Sector performance 11/11/14 The Market: A Heartfelt thank you goes out to all of the past, present, and future service men and women who work each day to keep us safe.  Without you, what we have and unfortunately often take for granted each and every day would not exist.  Almost zeros across the board as it was a relatively uneventful trading session.  Maybe the clearest example of how uneventful is that the entire trading day’s range on the S&P 500 was 6 points and volume was again light. As noted last night, we still view the short term…

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…