Daily State of the Markets
Have The Worries Returned To Broad and Wall?
After finishing in the green nine of the last ten days, it wasn't exactly surprising to see the bears attempt to get back in the game on Wednesday and for the stock market to pull back a bit. After all, the S&P had stepped lively to a gain of 6 percent in just two weeks and 11.5 perce…
A Worrisome Sign or Simply Computer Folly?
There are times when "why" the market does what it does may be more important than "what" it actually does. Cutting to the chase, Tuesday's wild intraday action may be a perfect example of this phenomenon as neither the final tallies on the indices nor the intraday chart action itself tol…
The Next Driving Force Could Be: Performance Anxiety
Now that the D.C. drama has been placed on the back burner for a couple months, the intraday algos appear to have been toned down a bit and traders have turned their attention to more mundane issues such as the state of the earnings season, the state of the U.S./Global economy, and the qu…
Are Stocks Overvalued Yet?
It's tough to be a bear these days.
At the beginning of the year, those seeing the glass as at least half-empty were expecting Europe to drag the economies of the world into recession, China's economic growth to tank, the unrest in the Middle East to become a huge problem, the Fed…
The Key To Success In The Stock Market Is...
Stocks stepped lively again on Thursday and had it not been for IBM (IBM) stinking up the joint, the screens would have been green across the board. With "Itty Bitty Machines" lopping somewhere around 90 points off of the DJIA (DIA) the day may not have looked like much to the casual obse…
Back To Normal Now, Right?
Traders breathed a sigh of relief on Wednesday after Harry Reid confirmed that he and his Republican counterpart had come to an agreement to raise the debt ceiling and reopen the government. While there is still a fair amount of work to be done and there could be hiccups along the way, th…
Here's The Key: The Deadline Isn't Really The Deadline
Although the action on Capitol Hill appears has certainly been frenzied, the stock market continues to yawn. Yes, it is true that the intraday volatility did pick up in earnest on Tuesday as the algos pushed and pulled the major indices in a rather violent fashion after each and every hea…
Hold The Champagne, They're Just Getting Started
Stocks finished in the green for a third consecutive day on Monday as hope for a deal that would avert a debt default and reopen the government grew throughout the session. Things started off a bit on the rocky side however as the DJIA was down more than 100 points two minutes after the o…
Understanding The Gov't Crisis Play Book
The DJIA soared 323 points on Thursday and the S&P 500 posted its biggest one-day percentage gain since the first day of trading in 2013 (a move that coincidentally was also sponsored by Congress finding a way to avoid sending the economy into a depression). Although yesterday's move …
A Sell Signal Worth Paying Attention To
If the last fifteen years in the stock market has taught investors anything, it is that managing risk is a vital part of the game. Given that (a) the bear markets of 2000-02 and 2008-09 both produced declines in excess of 50 percent and (b) a loss of 50 percent requires a gain of 100 perc…