The S&P 500 finished the week with a gain, but was hit with selling pressure in the final hour on Friday. For the week, the index surged on Monday and then traded flat from Tuesday to Friday. Small-caps led Friday's pullback as the Russell 2000 iShares... READ MORE
The S&P 500 edged higher on Thursday, but market action was mixed overall. QQQ and SPY closed slightly higher, while IWM closed slightly lower. Seven of the nine sector SPDRs were up with energy, industrials and technology leading the way. XLI got a nice bounce from GE, which... READ MORE
Stocks did the old pop and drop as the S&P 500 surged to 2135 after the Fed minutes and then plunged back to its starting point (2125). The index ended the day unchanged and nothing has changed regarding the trend. Yesterday's pop and drop was just... READ MORE
The S&P 500 is in the midst of one of the strongest and most consistent trends ever. The chart below shows the S&P 500 twice. The top window shows the index with a 7% Zigzag indicator in pink and the bottom window shows a 10% Zigzag.... READ MORE
Stocks meandered on Tuesday with the S&P 500 trading on either side of 2130 the entire day. The ETF fell below 2130 in the afternoon and closed at 2127 (-.06%). The sectors were mostly lower with energy leading the decline. The Finance SPDR (XLF) was the strongest... READ MORE
Stocks continued higher with the S&P 500 and Dow Industrials recording new all time highs. They were not the leaders though. The Russell 2000 iShares (IWM) led and was the only major index ETF to gain over 1% on the day. Seven of the nine sector SPDRs finished... READ MORE
The S&P 500 hit a new high last week and the Dow Industrials followed suit with a new high this week. Overall, the Dow broke triangle resistance with a surge on Thursday and this breakout signals a continuation of the current uptrend. Broken resistance turns first support to... READ MORE
It was a pretty wild week for stocks. The S&P 500 started weak with a 25 point decline and dip below 2090. This dip did not last long as the index surged back above 2115 on Thursday and hit an all time high on Friday. Yes, an all... READ MORE
The falling Dollar is boosting large-caps and they are outperforming small-caps. This makes sense because large-caps are typically multinational companies that derive a good portion of their revenue abroad. The Financial Times estimates that companies in the S&P 500 generate around 40% of their revenues abroad. These foreign... READ MORE
The S&P 500 opened strong and finished strong, and Thursday's close above 2120 was a new closing high for the index. The index has yet to hit an intraday high, but the trends are up and new intraday highs should follow. The rally was pretty broad-based,... READ MORE
The S&P 500 did just the opposite of Tuesday. The index opened weak on Tuesday, rebounded and then traded flat. On Wednesday, the index opened strong, immediately fell back and then traded flat. This is par for the course because it has been swinging above/below 2100 the... READ MORE
Paccar (PCAR) sports a bullish looking chart with two breakouts in as many months. The stock surged from October to December and then corrected with a decline that retraced 62%. After three bounces off the 62% retracement area, the stock broke out with a surge in mid-April. This breakout ended... READ MORE
You got to give the bulls credit on Tuesday. The S&P 500 opened weak with a 20 point decline and move below 2090. This decline wiped out Friday's gain and made the bulls look weak. Instead of continuing lower though, the index immediately firmed and bounced... READ MORE
The S&P 500 surged on Friday morning, traded flat the rest of the day and then worked its way lower on Monday. The overall loss (.50%) was modest and this could be just a correction after the Friday surge. The sectors were mostly lower with energy leading the... READ MORE
The Energy SPDR (XLE) is in a long-term downtrend and it looks like the short-term uptrend reversed over the last few days. The chart below shows XLE failing at the falling 200-day moving average with a bearish engulfing last week and breaking below short-term support at 81. The ETF bounced... READ MORE
Stocks surged on Friday as the S&P 500 opened around 2113 and closed around 2116. Even though the index held the opening surge, there was not much movement after the surge (+3 points). The major index ETFs closed higher, but small-caps and mid-caps lagged. MDY and IWM were... READ MORE
Stocks bounced and the major index ETFs closed modestly higher. Eight of the nine sector SPDRs were up. Energy fell because oil was down sharply. The decline in oil boosted the Airline ETF (JETS) and this helped the Transport iShares (IYT) to a 1.11% gain. Commodities were down pretty... READ MORE
It has been a rough month for stocks overall, but Broadcom (BRCM) is bucking the selling pressure and challenging resistance. There are two bullish continuation patterns possible on this chart. First, an inverse head-and-shoulders pattern extends back to early March. Second, the right two-thirds of the pattern looks like a... READ MORE
Stocks closed lower again on Wednesday, but a late afternoon bounce pushed the major index ETFs off their lows. IWM and MDY actually closed with small gains as small and mid-caps held up well on Wednesday. QQQ and SPY closed fractionally lower. The Equal-Weight Consumer Discretionary ETF (RCD) led the... READ MORE
Stocks have been under pressure the last eight days with the S&P 500 SPDR (SPY) down around 2% from its late April high and the HealthCare SPDR (XLV) down around 4% from this high. At times like this, it is good to look around and see what is... READ MORE
Stocks were hit with broad selling pressure on Tuesday with the Nasdaq 100 ETF (QQQ) leading the major index ETFs lower. All sectors were down with utilities getting hammered. Looks like XLU finally caught on to the rise in rates and followed the REIT iShares (IYR) lower. Techs were hit... READ MORE
The chart below shows the Sector MarketCarpet over the last five days (29-Apr to 5-May) and utility stocks are the weakest. The average stock in the sector is down over 2% during this timeframe, which is why the box is dark red. Healthcare and technology stocks also came under selling... READ MORE
Stocks closed modestly higher on Monday with the technology, healthcare and utilities sectors leading the way. It is most interesting to see utilities higher because the 10-YR Treasury Yield ($TNX) is up sharply over the last two weeks. Utilities have been negatively correlated to Treasury yields the last few months,... READ MORE
Stocks fell from Monday to Thursday and then surged on Friday with a strong open and strong close. QQQ and large-caps led the bounce, while IWM and small-caps lagged with smaller gains. The consumer discretionary, technology, industrials and materials sectors led with 1+ percent advances. The Home Construction iShares (ITB)... READ MORE
The Finance SPDR (XLF) has become the most boring of the nine sector SPDRs over the last five weeks. Boring today does not mean it will be boring tomorrow though. The chart below shows the Finance SPDR (XLF) surging to new highs in December, bouncing around in January-February and then... READ MORE
Stocks started the day weak and finished weak. The S&P 500 plunged below 2095 on the open, chopped around and then dipped below 2090 in the afternoon. Small-caps led the way lower as IWM lost over 2%. All sectors were down with healthcare and technology leading the way.... READ MORE
The S&P 500 remains in an uptrend and hit a new high on Monday, but some key groups are showing signs of selling pressure in April. The PerfChart below shows month-to-date performance for the S&P 500 SPDR (SPY), the Equal-Weight S&P 500 ETF (RSP)... READ MORE
Stocks were hit with selling pressure on Wednesday with small-caps leading the way. IWM and IJR lost around 1.1% on the day and have been underperforming since early April. Eight of the nine sectors were down with consumer discretionary, consumer staples and healthcare leading lower. The Equal-Weight Consumer Discretionary... READ MORE
It was pop and drop on Monday, and then drop and pop on Tuesday. Welcome to the week featuring the Fed policy statement on Wednesday and the employment report on Friday. Trading could remain choppy the next few days as these events become reality. Stocks were mostly higher on Tuesday... READ MORE
Stocks got the old pop and drop on Monday as the S&P 500 surged to a new high in the morning and then worked its way lower the rest of the day. The index closed with a modest loss of .41%. IWM led the way lower with a... READ MORE
It was all about big techs on Friday as QQQ surged over 1%. The rest of the market was mixed as IWM edged lower and SPY edged higher. Strength in Amazon (+14%) lifted the Consumer Discretionary SPDR (XLY) and strength in Microsoft (+10.5%) lifted the Technology SPDR (XLK). The... READ MORE
Stocks put in another modest performance with the major index ETFs gaining less than a half percent. Well, the S&P SmallCap iShares (IJR) did gain .60% to lead, but this was the exception. The sectors were mostly higher with energy and technology leading the way. The Home Construction... READ MORE
The image below shows the Sector MarketCarpet at "sector" level, which means we are seeing solid boxes for each of the nine sectors. There is a table on the left that ranks sector performance and this MarketCarpet shows performance for the current week (so far). The technology sector... READ MORE
Stocks dipped on the open, but quickly caught a bid and moved higher for most of the day. The final gains, however, were modest as QQQ, IWM, SPY and DIA gained around a half percent. The Finance SPDR and the Technology SPDR led the way higher. The consumer discretionary sector... READ MORE
Stocks drifted on Tuesday with a slight downward bias as IWM and SPY closed fractionally lower. QQQ bucked the selling pressure with a modest gain. The sectors were mixed. The healthcare sector led the gainers, while the energy sector led the losers. The consumer discretionary sector finished with a small... READ MORE
Activision Blizzard (ATVI) sports a bullish continuation pattern and improving momentum. The stock gapped up in mid January and broke out in early February. ATVI was overbought after a 25% surge and worked off these overbought conditions with an extended flag. I say extended because eight weeks is getting long... READ MORE
Stocks surged on Monday and recovered most of Friday's losses. The S&P 500 moved back above 2100 in the first hour (+1%) and then consolidated the rest of the day. The consumer discretionary, technology, industrials and utilities sectors led with 1+ percent gains. Internet, software, semiconductor... READ MORE
Trading in Apple has turned dull over the last six weeks as the stock moves in a tightening consolidation. The volatility contraction can be seen by the Bollinger Bands, which contracted to their narrowest since October. Notice that BandWidth moved below 5%. Also notice that the October squeeze featured a... READ MORE
Stocks meandered from Monday to Thursday and then got pummeled on Friday. There were two bouts of selling pressure that lasted less than two hours in total. The S&P 500 declined sharply on the open (45 minutes), firmed and then fell another ten points in the early afternoon... READ MORE
With a gap up and a gap down, the S&P 500 SPDR (SPY) formed an island reversal over the last four days. This is short-term bearish, but not enough to affect the longer trend, which is still up. To emphasize the short-term nature of this reversal, I am... READ MORE