GATEWAY HITS 52-WEEK HIGH ... Even on a relatively flat market day, there's always something going up. Today it was Gateway. The stock was the biggest percentage gainer in the S&P 500. And its daily bars in Chart 1 pretty much speak for themselves. GTW broke through... READ MORE
STOCK PLUNGES 3.4% ... Retailers are the day's weakest stock market group. The main reason is today's 3.4% plunge in the stock of Wal-Mart which is the world's largest retailer. In so doing, the stock is suffering some serious chart damage. Just recently,... READ MORE
FEAR OF LESS FOREIGN BUYING ... Not too long ago I wrote that there were two main side-effects that would flow from a falling dollar. One was, of course, higher commodity prices. The other was the flow of funds into foreign markets. Money tends to flow from countries with falling currencies... READ MORE
TURKEY BOUNCE STILL FAVORS VALUE... The market enjoyed its traditional pre-Thanksgiving bounce. All the major averages ended the day in plus territory with the the S&P 500 closing up nearly 5 points. The hourly bars in Chart 1 show, however, that the S&P 500 is still... READ MORE
BE CAREFUL WITH THE DOLLAR... If you've been reading my commentary for any length of time, you'll know that I've been bearish on the dollar for more than two years. My book on Intermarket Analysis, which was written last year, devoted a lot of... READ MORE
SMALL CAPS STILL LEAD LARGE CAPS ... Small caps have been the best performers by size this year. The Russell 2000 Small Cap Index has gained 11% this year versus 6% for the large cap Russell 1000 Index and the S&P 500 Large Cap Index. Midcaps came in second... READ MORE
TIPS ARE INFLATION PROTECTED BONDS... With all the talk about protecting oneself against rising inflation pressures resulting from higher commodities and a falling dollar, it's worth considering Inflation Protected Securities (or TIPS). These are Treasury bonds that are indexed to the rate of inflation as measured by the... READ MORE
ANOTHER LOOK AT THE CRB/SPX RATIO ... One of our newer readers expressed puzzlement at the ratio of the CRB/S&P 500 chart that I showed on Friday. The chart is a ratio of the CRB Index (representing commodities). The point of the chart was simply to show... READ MORE
A CORRECTION ... In my Friday evening message, I mentioned that the 1140 level for the S&P 500 was important because it represented a couple of percentage retracement levels. One of our readers pointed out, however, that one of the numbers was incorrect. Here are the right numbers. Chart... READ MORE
ANOTHER LOOK AT RSI AND ADX ... It looks like I got a little too cute with my short-term reading of the RSI and ADX lines. Since I've gotten several questions on them, and given today's stock selling, I need to do some more explaining (and a... READ MORE
DOLLAR PLUNGES AGAINST THE YEN ... In a speech today, Mr. Greenspan expressed concern that foreign investors might tire of financing the big U.S. trade deficit unless they were rewarded with higher interest rates. He also showed no enthusiasm for stopping the dollar slide which is accelerating to the downside.... READ MORE
ENERGY SECTOR IS RISING AFTER ALL ... With crude oil trying to stabilize in the $46-47 dollar range (and in an oversold condition), energy stocks are starting to climb again. In fact, Energy was the day's top market sector. Chart 1 shows the Energy Select Sector SPDR surviving another... READ MORE
SOX IS CHALLENGING 200-DAY LINE... A strong technology sector is leading the market into a broad-based rally today with the major stock indexes resuming their fourth quarter uptrends. Good news from Hewlett Packard and Kmart's purchase of Sears helped light the fuse. The strongest technology group, however, is... READ MORE
PPI HITS 14-YEAR HIGH ... The latest Producer Price Index (PPI) report saw a shocking jump of 1.7%, which is the biggest monthly jump in fourteen years. Most of the gain came from rising food and energy prices, but it can't be ignored. That also puts producer price... READ MORE
SEMICONDUCTOR HOLDERS REACH FOUR-MONTH HIGH... The chip groups continues to creep higher. Today's buying put the Semiconductor Holders at the highest level since mid-July. Its relative strength line, which bottomed in early September, is creeping higher as well. Two of the day's top percentage chip gainers... READ MORE
DELL DOES IT... The last time I wrote about Dell on October 6 I drew the same two lines shown in Chart 1 and identified them as a bullish "triangular" pattern. A flat upper line and a rising lower line is called an "ascending triangle" which... READ MORE
ANOTHER GOLD FUND... Earlier in the week, I wrote about a Canadian gold-mining ETF that's traded in Toronto (Chart 1). A number of readers messaged me about a closed-end gold fund traded on the American Stock Exchange. It's called the Central Fund of Canada Ltd (CEF)... READ MORE
S&P 500 SPDRS GIVE ANOTHER BUY SIGNAL ... Major stock averages achieved strong market gains with virtually all sectors and industry groups contributing. The only losers were gold and oil -- and their losses were relatively small. A sharp drop in oil prices, however, did give a market a... READ MORE
NASDAQ 100 AND S&P 500 ARE ON BUY SIGNALS ... A few weeks back I wrote an article explaining how to use point & figure Bullish Percent charts (October 21, 2004). The Bullish Percent Indexes that can be found on the Stockcharts Market Summary page are based on the... READ MORE
10-YEAR T-NOTE YIELD NEARS UPSIDE BREAKOUT ... On Monday I wrote about the possibility that long-term yields could be starting to rise again. After the Fed today raised short-term rates to 2%, long-term rates moved up as well. With short-term rates rising, a weaker dollar, and rising commodity prices, it was... READ MORE
JAPANESE ARE SELLING THE YEN... The September US trade deficit showed an unexpected drop. While it's still very high, today's announcement is causing some buying of dollars and selling of foreign currencies. Chart 1 shows the Euro struggling to hold its recent move above the February... READ MORE
MICROSOFT TESTING TWO-YEAR HIGH ... Microsoft carries a lot of influence on the Dow and the Nasdaq because of its large size. That's why it's worth noting that the technology giant is on the verge of a major bullish breakout. Chart 1 shows MSFT moving up to... READ MORE
CHEMICALS ARE LEADERS... The last time we looked at the Materials Select Sector SPDR it was just starting to bounce off its late September low and its 200-day moving average after having a bad October. Since then, the group has recovered and more. Chart 1 shows the XLB breaking out... READ MORE
NO SURPRISES... I'm happy to see that the markets did pretty much what was expected while I was in Europe last week. Now that I'm back I thought I'd review some of the recent intermarket trends -- just to bring things up to date.... READ MORE
HANG IN THERE - JOHN WILL BE BACK NEXT WEEK... John is currently in Europe speaking at two different conferences. He will be back next week. In the mean time... A GOOD TIME FOR A REVIEW... I wanted to take this time to make sure that all of our Murphy... READ MORE
MURPHY MARKET MESSAGES INDEX... I'll be in Europe next week to give a speech at the International Federation of Technical Analysts Conference in Madrid, Spain and make a couple of other speaking stops along the way. My main topic will be the same market trends and sector rotations... READ MORE
OIL VS. THE AIRLINES ... I've been asked a lot lately to explain why the transports continue to climb in the face of rising oil prices. Historically, the transports are adversely affected by higher energy costs. This time it has been different at least for some transportation stocks. Ironically,... READ MORE
BUYING INDUSTRIALS AND TRANSPORTS WITH ONE TRADE... I've been writing a lot lately about the relationship between a strong transportation group and relatively weak industrial group. I wrote yesterday that I believed that the industrials were out of step with the transports (and utilities) and should start rising... READ MORE
DROP IN OIL CAUSES SELLING IN ENERGY STOCKS ... I've written several times recently about two things that needed to happen to ignite the much-anticipated fourth quarter market rally. One was upside leadership by the technology sector, which we've already seen. The second was a drop in... READ MORE
TWO OUT OF THREE ARE AT NEW HIGHS ... With the Dow Utilities jumping to a new 52-week high this week, I can't resist coming back to the glaring divergence between the three Dow Jones averages. Last Friday I wrote about the divergence between the strong transports and the... READ MORE
OVERSOLD AIG LEADING DOW HIGHER... I mentioned last evening that the Dow was in oversold territory and that it's drop looked overdone. It's getting some help today from American International Group which has been one of the Dow's weakest stocks owing to the recent... READ MORE
SOX STILL SHOWS DECENT RELATIVE STRENGTH ... A brokerage upgrade this morning gave a boost to the Semiconductor (SOX) Index and kept it in a position of relative strength. The chips stayed in the plus column all day even as the major market averages traded in the red. The SOX'... READ MORE
EURO AND GOLD ARE TESTING 2004 HIGHS... The Euro continues to surge against the dollar which is giving a big boost to gold and gold shares. Chart 1 shows the Euro right up against the high reached at the start of this year. The close correlation between the European unit... READ MORE
DOW BREAKS SUMMER LOW... Since I started writing about point and figure charts yesterday, I thought I'd use them again today to give a fresh look at the major market averages. I'll explain a little more about their construction. At the same time, I'll... READ MORE
DOW THEORY REVISITED... Technical analysts are trying to figure out the meaning of the current divergence between the rising Dow Transports and the falling Dow Industrials. Which brings us to a discussion of Dow Theory. Dow Theory is built on the idea that the industrials (companies that make goods) and... READ MORE
QQQ LEADERSHIP CONTINUES... Money coming out of some parts of the market continues to rotate into technology stocks. That's being seen in the relatively strong action of the Nasdaq 100 Shares (QQQ) which is the day's strongest index. Chart 1 shows the QQQ continuing to stay... READ MORE
BPI BASED ON POINT & FIGURE BUY SIGNALS... Back on October 5 I wrote a piece on how to use the Energy Bullish Percent Index. I explained that the Bullish Percent Index (BPI) for any group is based on the percentage of stocks that are on point & figure buy... READ MORE
FINANCIAL STOCKS CONTINUE TO TUMBLE ... Heavy selling that started in insurance stocks is spreading to the entire financial sector. Two of the day's biggest casualties are Countrywide Financial (Chart 1) and JP Morgan (Chart 2). CFC is trading under its August low and its 200-day moving average on... READ MORE
WHY LONG-TERM RATES AND THE DOLLAR ARE FALLING... In the normal intermarket course of events, a falling dollar produces higher commodity prices which in time pull long-term interest rates higher. There's no question that the major drop in the dollar since the start of 2002 has contributed to... READ MORE
IBM AND TXN LEAD TECH BOUNCE... First the good news. Positive reports from IBM and Texas Instruments are pushing both stocks higher and are giving a boost to the technology sector and semiconductors in particular. Chart 1 shows Big Blue gapping up to a new four-month high on rising volume.... READ MORE