July 21, 2019

The Fed has now gone beyond the mere idea of monetary stimulus and is now invoking the concept of monetary “vaccination.” On Thursday, one Fedhead called for inoculating the economy against some as-yet unspecified disease with preventative interest rate cuts. In the Age of QE, just when we think we’ve seen everything, we now see the Fed expand the creative horizons of QE vernacular. The... Read More

July 17, 2019

The market  melted to all-time highs on Monday, setting up a distribution day off the peak yesterday. This resulted in another down day today, but on lighter volume. The S&P 500 and NASDAQ Composite Indexes closed below their 10-dma. That equates to two days off the peak for the S&P and the NASDAQ, and tomorrow looks to be a rough open with futures down... Read More

July 14, 2019

The major market indexes have continued to reach for new highs. The S&P 500, Dow Jones Industrials and NASDAQ Composite Index all posted new closing highs. Volume was light, however, but with the perception that the Fed is set to ease and continue easing over the next 2-3 meetings, sellers do not seem inclined to swarm the market.   ... Read More

July 10, 2019

The pullback in the NASDAQ Composite Index on Monday ended midday yesterday as the index found support at its 10-dma and closed up for the day. This morning, the release of Fed Chair Jerome Powell’s prepared remarks to Congress gave the market what it wanted, and the futures were off and running pre-open. This led to a big gap-up open that saw the S&P... Read More

July 7, 2019

An allegedly strong jobs number on Friday sent the markets into a tantrum over the possibility that its expectations of a Fed rate cut in July won’t be met. The day started off to the downside, with the S&P 500 Index dropping nearly 1%. But after a brief bout of kicking and screaming, the market found its feet and rallied off the lows on higher volume. The NASDAQ... Read More

July 3, 2019

The gap-up in stocks seen as benefiting from the weekend trade news mostly turned in a shortable gap-up, or SGU, affair. This was the litmus test I was looking for that would determine how real the gap rally was, at least in the short run. Most of these stocks, however, opened high and finished low in reversals that looked rather bearish. For example, one of the biggest upside streakers on... Read More

June 30, 2019

With the Fourth of July holiday coming up this Thursday, perhaps it is fitting that the market put on a little fireworks show of its own. That may be the case when we open on Monday after news Friday night that the U.S. and China agreed to resume trade talks and President Trump announced a lifting of the ban that prevents U.S. technology companies from selling to Chinese telecom giant Huawei. The... Read More

June 26, 2019

New highs for the indexes in this environment usually mean it’s time for a pullback. As I wrote over the weekend, “Despite the new highs, the market action has taken on a sluggish character with respect to individual stocks.” Some of that sluggishness turned into bearish action as a broad swath of leading and not-so-leading stocks have been hit with selling so far this week. Yesterday’s... Read More

June 23, 2019

The S&P 500 Index hit an all-time high on Thursday in a tribute to the Fed’s increasingly dovish tone. That new high was achieved by a margin of .05 S&P point over the prior 2953.13 high, and then quickly given up on Friday as the index stalled and reversed off the highs. Volume was heavy thanks to quadruple-witching options expiration.   ... Read More

June 19, 2019

Excitement over Facebook’s (FB) new crypto-currency gave way to excitement over a presidential tweet regarding an “extended” meeting with Chinese President Xi at the upcoming G-20 summit. Altogether, the news sent the NASDAQ Composite Index gapping up through its 50-dma. And then came... Read More