March 19, 2024

Market push and pull continues

The Market: With concerns over volatility in China, weak Economic data, and the FOMC statement, the market gapped down and continued lower throughout the early trading session before marking another big intraday reversal.  After dipping below the 200 day SMA, the S&P managed to rally from over 25 points down to slightly up on the session in intraday trading but then couldn’t hold the gains and sold off into the close. Today’s action is actually a good micro representation of the push and pull in the market this year. As we noted last week, we expect volatility to continue and…

Oil gets crushes while market dips

The Market: A small down day which could have looked worse if not for a late day rally off the lows.  Interesting to see the leaders to the downside were the Dow (DIA) and Russell 2000 (IWM).  We were looking for the market to close just off the lows and then gap down tomorrow for a short-term long opportunity but today’s end of day rally has changed that set-up. Overall we remain cautious on the broad market and believe the choppy trading of late will continue. Energy (XLE) led to the downside, again, as crude oil continues to slide reaching…

Market churns while XLU heads lower

Index & Sector performance 2/25/15 The Market: Another day of churn as the market continues to grind with an upward bias.  As we posted over at StockTwits we are starting to see a lot of negative divergence setting up on the MACD.  Divergence is not a trigger itself but is showing signs that each move higher comes with less momentum and excitement. Utilities (XLU) was the leader to the downside and a name we recently posted about in the Charts section.   After seeing a lot of people bullish on the name, we laid the road map we felt the Bulls…

Low vol drift higher

Index & Sector performance 12/3/14 The Market: Another low volume drift higher today which saw the Russell 2000 (IWM) lead and the NASDAQ (QQQ) lag even spending some time down on the session. In individual sectors, Consumer Staples (XLP) and Utilities (XLU) were the only two from the WSC Scoreboard to finish lower which Materials (XLB), Industrials (XLI), and Energy (XLE) finished up over 1%.  One name helping materials have such a strong session was LyondellBasell (LYB) which has been down significantly since September but finished today up over 2% and was up more than 3% intraday.  LYB is a…

Tight trading ends with pop higher

Index & Sector performance 11/18/14 The Market: After multiple sessions trading in a tight range the broad indices broke-out to new highs.  It is worth noting that volume was again light but that has been the case throughout much of this recent rally after the mid October bottom.  In the after hours session the futures started to give back some of today’s gains so we will be looking to see if today was a false breakout which gives way to a pullback or if the indices can hold. In individual sectors, HealthCare (XLV) led finishing 1.61% higher helped by strong…

Indices take back losses plus

Index & Sector performance 5/22/14 The Market: Overall today was a quiet day in the market which saw green across the entire WSC Scoreboard with the Dow and NASDAQ leading the charge followed closely by the S&P and finally the Russell 2000 which is getting use to lagging.  At 2pm EDT the FOMC minutes were released and discussed risks to the economy including U.S. housing, the Russia-Ukraine situation, and China’s economic slow down but this news did not appear to bother traders. Tomorrow is be the biggest economic data day of the week which includes Unemployment Claims and Existing Home…

Choppy trading leaves the indices flat

Index & Sector performance 2/26/14 The Market: A choppy trading session to saw a sell off toward the open which ultimately was bought until midday when the S&P started to make its way back down toward and below the previous intraday lows.  Again buyers stepped in and were able to close the S&P 500 essentially flat on the day.     Companies scheduled to report earnings pre-market:     Analyst Comments:        

Fed open to scale back causes pullback

Index & Sector performance 11/20/13 The Market: Initial optimism on better than expected economic data pre-market saw early selling as the S&P pulled off the highs of the day in the first hour of trading and then the market meandered waiting for the Fed minutes to be released.  After the 2pm EST announcement the market began selling off as the Fed showed they are prepared to scale back on the rate of asset purchases.  The S&P 500 was able to use late trading to close a few points off the lows of the day. In economic data, Core CPI came…

Ben to the rescue!

Index & Sector performance 9/18/13 The Market: The clock struck 2pm EST and it is time for Big Ben and the Fed to put all the recent speculation, at least for now, to rest.  Neither changes to the current $85B bond purchased program nor the fed funds target rate.  That news sparked a near 30 point rally which ultimately closed up 23 points from the announcement. Besides the Federal Reserve rate decision, in economic data we had building permits and housing starts which both came in lower than the previous month and also below expectations but with all due respect…

Shhh, Jobs data tomorrow

The Market: Not much in the way of action today as early gains met resistance in the previously highlighted areas around 1660-1663 which coincided with the 20 & 50 day SMA’s respectively.  Utilities again were the under performer of the tracked sectors and retail sector leading on the upside with Sears (SHLD) and JC Penny (JCP) putting in strong showing with gains of 6.27% and 5.33%.  Doesn’t it feel like all JCP needed was some big investor to bail to bottom? Today had a great deal of economic data including ISM Non-Man PMI which came in better than expected (as…