Market Speculator

Stocks Turn in Bullish Close

Market Speculator — Wed, 23 Jul 2008 03:07:27 +0000

Stocks are definitely looking higher, volume accompanied the move today. Although I do not believe we are entering a new bull market I do believe this will help us move higher for a small time frame. Airlines and Financials are leading this rally, not what I want leading. However, I’ll take the upside. Keep your losses small and new positions small.

I am traveling Wednesday, looking forward to a change of scenery. However, I will still post about this crazy market!

Enjoy!

Market Speculator

Stocks Were Stuck in Idle as Volume Slides Across Wall Street

Market Speculator — Tue, 22 Jul 2008 11:06:48 +0000

Traders were hesitant to jump in or out of stocks Monday as the market ended relatively flat and on lower volume. Crude oil jumped on news that Dolly may threaten the Gulf’s off-shore drilling facilities. However, the storm seems a little erratic at this point to judge the path and if it will head towards those oil rigs. Stocks at this point seem real sluggish and news that AAPL guided lower (sandbag as the street refers to it) the stock was taken out to the woodshed and beaten. Earnings season is upon us again and we’ll certainly see our share of beats/inlines/misses, but it’ll highlight the point that playing earnings is simply gambling and not speculating. Monday’s action was quite tame, Day 4 for S&P500 and Day 5 for the NASDAQ respective rally attempts. It was nice NOT to see us sell off on heavier trade, but will Tuesday bring on the pain for the newfound “bottom feeder” bulls?

I continue to be cash heavy and not a big fan of building any sort of long term positions. Although we may be close to a bottom, we won’t know until after. Odds are in my favor when I am patient and wait for that bottom to form and then move higher.

Enjoy

Market Speculator

Microsoft and Google Weigh on Stocks but Volume Fades

Market Speculator — Mon, 21 Jul 2008 01:15:43 +0000

Missing analyst estimates sets up the stock to get hammered, MSFT and GOOG did just that. Both stocks were tremendous laggards and were the majority of the reason why the NASDAQ was down over 1.2% for the day. The bright side, volume came in lower than the previous day. Options expiry failed to boost volume as it has done in the past. Friday marked Day 4 for the NASDAQ and Day 3 for the S&P 500. If we were to see a distribution day prior to a follow-through day it would spell trouble for our attempted rally. We are still searching for a follow through day beginning Monday.

Regardless of my opinion (I don’t think we are in a new bull market) if we do manage a follow through day I will gladly take it. At this point we do not have a leadership group in place. Oil stocks were our leaders and with the IBD100 in negative territory is leading me to believe we have quite some time until we can restart a new bull market. We’ll be able to spot a new bull market, it’ll be when new leadership groups will start showing up.

My position here is to keep a LARGE cash position. There is no need to be a hero in this market. I want to have as much capital hanging around to put to work during a new bull market. Be patient.

Enjoy

Market Speculator

No Positions

Crude Oil Slumps, Gives Boost to Stocks

Market Speculator — Fri, 18 Jul 2008 10:46:52 +0000

The big story of the market session was the fact that Crude closed below a key support area of $130.00. This helped calm fears regarding inflation but perhaps the fear of a slowing global economy were overlooked. China’s second quarter GDP fell to 10.1% from 10.6% first quarter. Whether or not this is the beginning of a recession in China will remain to be seen, but taking a look at the fall in the Shanghai index one can all but wonder that the possibility of a recession is high. Here in the United States many believe we are in a “serious” recession, I believe its a perceived recession created by an overzealous media (this is another story). However, these fears have been somewhat dampened by the recent fall in crude oil prices. At the moment, we do see volume favoring the upside and are awaiting for the market to follow through.

Financials lead the market higher once again. This beaten up group is blowing off sever oversold conditions, but we don’t want to see a beaten up group lead the market. In new bull markets, we want to see new innovative companies with new products/services leading us higher. At this juncture we haven’t seen this yet. Yet, we are on Day 4 of a rally attempt for the NASDAQ and could see a follow-through day on Friday. If we begin to see new innovative companies starting to breakout I may change my mind about this market. However, we still did not see show Max fear at our lows signaling a bottom. I remain overly cautious about this market.

Enjoy

Market Speculator

No Positions in the above securities/indexes

Stocks Rebound Nicely but Rally Lacking

Market Speculator — Thu, 17 Jul 2008 13:33:39 +0000

Stocks rode the wave of optimism following Wells Fargo’s earnings release prior to market open. The surprise upside earnings report calmed fears of financial meltdown and helped Financials lead the market. In addition to financials, airlines too lead the market higher as crude oil prices eased from all time highs. Although the skies were mostly clear, storm clouds are still here. Volume was lower across the board as big insitutional players did not flood the market and the two most beaten up sectors lead the market higher. When coming off lows, we want to see new leadership with new companies and sectors leading the market not the beaten up sectors.

There is nothing more I want than a new bull market. However, the signs are telling me that we just aren’t ready for one to emerge. New Highs continue to be trumped by New Lows, volume can not increase as we move higher and the VIX and VXN indexes haven’t shown fear as our indexes make new lows. I am not going to get terribly excited about this move, like the rally from March through June this one will ultimately fail. Short term trades can make some money off charts that are breaking out from sound chart patterns.

Best of Luck!

Market Speculator