Friends Volatility picked up a little today as stocks rallied at the open to the tune of about 100 Dow points, then gave back almost all of those gains, only to rally once again in the afternoon. The economic data released throughout the morning was a bit mixed and...
Friends If we were just looking at the Dow Jones Industrial Average today, we might be tempted to say that it was a pretty non-eventful trading day. But the broader market averages had much more trouble, with the NASDAQ actually down by more than a percent. The Dow,...
Friends As we pointed out yesterday, it was the messenger, not the message. Once traders got over the shock of watching our new Fed Chair, they realized that nothing really changed, and even if Ms. Yellen’s timetable seemed a bit hawkish, future data will determine...
Friends Traders were just killing time today, waiting for the FOMC meeting to come to a conclusion and stocks were drifting along right at the breakeven level. Then we got the FOMC statement, which, as we expected, kept the tapering process on schedule and revealed...
Friends Stock futures were looking sluggish this morning until Mr. Putin indicated in a prepared statement that he had no intentions on going beyond Crimea and moving into Eastern Ukraine. He indicated he still doesn’t recognize the current Ukrainian government as...
Friends Relieved that nothing unexpected happened over the weekend in Crimea/Ukraine, stocks rallied strongly in the morning and were able to hold onto most of the gains as the trading session wore on. Whether it was short covering by bears expecting something worse...
Friends As we approach the end of the first quarter of the year, and wait for the Crimean vote over the weekend (the outcome seems obvious), we will take a second to illustrate what we mentioned yesterday – 2014 is turning out to be much different than 2013. Last year...
Friends Despite a couple of good economic data points this morning (both retail sales results and the weekly jobless claims number were better than expected), and a soft rally in early morning trading, the bears took control of the session and sent stocks decisively...
Friends Another very quiet day of trading. After a bit of a selloff in the morning, stocks recovered to get to positive territory by lunch time, only to fade back into the red as the trading session wore on. Once again, there was not much in the way of economic news...
Friends The bears were able to set the tone in today’s trading session, after a feeble attempt by the bulls to generate some positive momentum during late morning trading. As the afternoon unfolded stocks continued to slide, as no real catalyst for either side could...
Friends Stocks took their cue from overseas trading this morning and proceeded to spend the day in negative territory. The bears may have thought they had something going early, but as the midday passed, volatility dried up and boredom set in. After being down more...
Friends If you guessed that the jobs report would show that 175,000 new jobs were created in February, then you win. Yes, the number did come in higher than the consensus estimate of 150,000 new jobs, but the markets really seemed unimpressed. Stocks did rally early...
Friends Stocks drifted in higher territory today, as traders wait for the all-important jobs report tomorrow. Today’s weekly jobless claims number was a little better than expected, but tomorrows number will likely set the tone for the markets as we look into next...
Friends On the economic front, both the PMI Services Index and the ISM Non-Manufacturing Index came in shy of expectations and indicated slowing in the service sectors of the U.S. economy. The ADP private sector jobs number came in shy of the estimated number with...
Friends Stocks wiped out all of yesterday’s losses and then some today as traders responded to Mr. Putin’s press conference with a sigh of relief. The Russian leader took a less hawkish stance towards Ukraine (although his comments were somewhat rambling and...
