The Fed Likely Won’t Raise Rates In 2017
As I mentioned in my last article, the reflation trade has stalled and is now starting to reverse. The country was relieved the election was over so survey results were off the charts in terms of optimism. I showed you how some surveys showed firms not claiming they saw any boost in sales, but they…
Reversal Of The Trump Trade
Today the market is playing out as I projected. The leaders of the market, the financials and small caps, are selling off. The KBW bank index was down 3.43% and the Russell 2000 was down 1.44%. The initial hype that Trump would cut regulations to help these stocks became overheated. The market was expecting these…
Financials Take the Hit From Dollar Comments
Stocks opened in negative territory, losing steam throughout the session ahead of a busy week of corporate earnings. Equities fell on Brexit commentary from UK Prime Minister Theresa May and on a plunging U.S. dollar after Trump talked tough amid the recent strength. The dollar fell after an interview with The Wall Street Journal late…
Buy Volatility in the Zombie Markets
Stocks posted small gains on Friday and remain near record all-time levels heading into the start of earnings season next week. Financial earnings grabbed the headlines and were mixed, but still posted solid returns, led by a jump in regionals. Large cap banks rallied as well as JPM posted solid returns, while BAC and WFC…
How Were Retail Sales This Holiday Season?
As most expected, department store sales lost share to online sales this past holiday shopping season. Kohl’s and Macy’s saw 2.1% drops in comparable store sales in November and December. Amazon likely had a great Christmas. If you are only focused on retail stocks, then a summary of the season is it was a hit…
China Regulates Bitcoin
The price of bitcoin has stabilized in the low $800s. This isn’t to say that’s a permanent or even temporary bottom, because we saw the stabilization in the $900s vaporized within hours. However, I do have reason to believe the chance that the correction is over is higher than it was before because of progress…
The Case for Bearishness
Even when the equity market falls, it seems to rebound. In the morning, the S&P 500 was down as much as 0.78% before regaining more than half of those losses. Today was the first day the Nasdaq was down this year as technology stocks had been making up for lost ground in this Trump rally.…
Market Optimism Ending
While optimism exploded after the election, it has slowly started to revert to the mean. If you’re only focusing on equities, you wouldn’t be able to see the unwind because the S&P 500 is within less than 1% of its all-time closing high. The Dow is still making its attempts at reached the heralded 20,000…
ATR a Leading Signal for Potential Pullback
Can’t keep this market down! Even though major U.S. averages ended lower on the day, as the NASDAQ ended its 7-day win streak (and 4-day streak of consecutive all-time highs), markets finished well off their earlier lows as investors continue to take advantage of any opportunity to add to positions on the slightest pullback. In…
Economic Policy Uncertainty
2017 should be a year with many economic policy uncertainties. This is because major political elections were won by populists such as Brexit and Trump in 2016. The result of this political momentum is sentiment which tends to be against free trade and globalization. The movement is fueled by the opinion the respective countries are…