Worst Holiday Shopping Season Since 2009 Coming
Holiday Shopping Estimate Latest data suggests this won’t be a good holiday shopping season. An extra $300 in jobless benefits per week ran out for many states. Plus, the labor market is weakening and no stimulus is on the docket. Furthermore, there will be more restrictions in the Midwest because of COVID-19. Even if this…
Huge Increase In Speculators’ Positioning - Major Reversal
Selloff Continues, Albeit Mildly Technically stocks sold off because most fell even though the S&P 500 was up. S&P 500 was up one basis point, but the Nasdaq and Russell 2000 fell 36 and 31 basis points. We’re sort of in a selloff, but it hasn’t been deep. That makes sense because we are right…
Highest Retail Sales Growth Since 2011
Very Strong Retail Sales September retail sales report was so strong, it surprised many. It seems like the labor market started to slow in October compared to September, but this was a good report. Consumers were helped by the delayed extra benefits that they got in September. Many states gave out $300 per week. Since…
Euphoria In Nio Cannot Be Tamed
Small Cap Rally Stocks sold off to start the day, but recovered most of their losses by the end of the day on Thursday. Small caps beat large cap tech which is surprising because COVID-19 is getting worse and the stimulus is up in the air. Investors heavily invested in small banks even though rates…
Economy Takes A Dive
Bad Jobless Claims Report Last week’s jobless claims report was bad. This one was worse. The trend is unsettling. Don’t look at the declines in continued claims because there are people moving off traditional benefits to pandemic and extended benefits. Labor market has stopped improving in the past few weeks. We will likely see much…
Rare Treat - Energy Beats Cloud Stocks
2 Day Losing Streak Right after we mentioned there was a lot of optimism in markets, we had a 2 day losing streak as the S&P 500 fell 66 basis points on Wednesday. This decline was uniform unlike on Tuesday when small cap value led the decline and large cap tech rallied excluding Apple. On…
Q3 Earnings Season Is Underway
Earnings Season Is Here Earnings season has started, and we're looking for large beats and an increase in firms giving 2021 guidance. As of Q2 last year, there were 147 firms giving next year guidance. Obviously, that guidance was hogwash because an unexpected pandemic occurred. As of Q2 this year, 138 firms gave 2021 guidance. …
Stocks Barely Fall Despite Negative News On COVID-19 and Stimulus
Four Negative Catalysts The stock market dealt with 4 negative catalysts on Tuesday. It's actually surprising that it didn’t fall more. Even with small cap value stocks underperforming, they did well considering the news. Johnson & Johnson’s vaccine testing and Eli Lilly’s therapeutics testing were both paused. Those are normal events, but the stock market…
Consumer Spending Growth Weakens
Another Improvement In Small Business Confidence Small business confidence in the NFIB report rose from 100.2 to 104 which beat estimates for 100.9 and the highest estimate which was 102. We’ve basically recovered all the losses from the recession as the top chart shows. Every indicator except one increased in the September reading. Expected credit…
Optimism Brings Market Near Its Record High
Unbelievable Optimism The stock market is back to experiencing optimism as it is closing in on its record high. Monday was led by the big tech stocks, but small cap value also increased. It was a party where stocks like Apple got the craziest, but stocks like Mondelez also attended. It’s tough to explain the…