Daily State of the Markets

Is QE to Blame For All The V-Bottoms?

There has been a lot of talk about the fact that the S&P 500 has displayed a remarkable tendency to produce a "V bottom" during the majority of the pullbacks seen over the last couple of years. Including yesterday's action, the blue chip index has put in a total of 10 such "V bottoms"…

Never Fear, The Next "V" May Be Here

The primary purpose of this daily missive is to identify the current drivers of the stock market action. The idea is that if we can understand why stocks are doing what they are doing in the near-term, we are unlikely to be fooled by a really big, really important move. It is impo…

Is It Time to Worry About Growth in the U.S.?

In what is being dubbed as the worst start to a new year in ages, oil, Russia, and Greece are capturing most of the headlines. However, there may another factor lurking which could be causing some investors to fret. Namely, the state of the U.S. economy. Coming into 2015, the cons…

Greece Again? Say It Ain't So!

So far at least, the New Year has been anything but happy for stock market investors. In short, traders have ignored the traditional seasonal pattern and have instead focused on the negative. So, the worries are back. Greece is back. And after yesterday, some fear appears to be back at th…

Hard To Believe, But Greece Still in Focus

Good morning. As we enter the first full trading week of 2015, the immediate focus remains on Greece, the ECB, and oil while traders will no doubt be keeping an eye open for this week's all-important jobs report scheduled for Friday. In Europe, the upcoming Greek elections have ca…

Expectations for Stimulus May Aid Mood

Good morning. After a disappointing end to an otherwise strong year for the stock market in 2014, the mood appears to be improved on this first trading day of 2015. There are several stories capturing traders' attention on the topics of QE in the Europe, Eurozone PMI, and China's PMI data…

The New Year's Eve Line in the Sand

In addition to the usual focus on oil, traders have input from the ECB's Draghi and Chinese economic data to consider on this final day of trading in 2014. In China, the HSBC Manufacturing PMI came in with a reading of 49.6, which (a) represents the first decline in the final PMI …

The Focus Remains On Oil, Russia, and...

The song remains largely the same on this next-to last trading day of 2014 as the focus remains on Russia, oil, and Greece. Stocks continue to struggle in Russia with the major index losing nearly 10% yesterday and down another 2.4% today. On a chart basis, it would appear that a …

A Year of Underperformance - The Horror!

And so it goes. Now that the bull market is nearly six years old and has produced gains of more than 200 percent since March 9, 2009 (+213% to be exact), the popular press as well as a great many financial advisors appear to be climbing back aboard the buy-and-hold band wagon. We'…

Seasonality, Stabilization, and Oil are the Keys

With the majority of the world's major stock exchanges closed and traders in vacation mode, the day after Christmas has traditionally been a pretty slow day. However, with seasonality remaining strong and oil continuing to stabilize, the mood among those traders manning their posts today …