The Rally That Never Ends

Stocks Increase On Earnings & Economic Data Stocks increased yet again on Thursday as this has been a great start to 2020 for the market. There were some earnings reports and a few economic reports that must have pleased investors. The retail sales report wasn’t bad or great. Maybe that’s enough to satisfy investors. The…

81% Of S&P 500 Firms Have Beaten Q4 EPS Estimates

Very Slight Increase On Wednesday Wednesday’s action was interesting. Mostly because the market’s morning gains were quickly wiped away in the afternoon. Especially as it looked like a real selloff was coming. However, the market rebounded in the last few minutes. Many were expecting the beginning of the sharp decline that we've waiting for, for…

Target Has A Bad Holiday Shopping Season

Solid Redbook Growth, But Target Misses Estimates In the week of January 11th, Redbook same store sales growth was 5% which fell from 6.1%. That’s still strong growth though as the first half of the month looks solid. Based on the initial data points, it’s possible seasonally adjusted yearly retail sales growth in January is…

Volatility Died As Large Cap Tech Dominated

Slight Decline On Tuesday The stock market fell slightly on Tuesday, although, small caps rallied. It’s ironic that small caps rallied and outperformed on the same day the NFIB small business index fell. To be clear, small firms in the NFIB survey aren’t large enough to be in the Russell 2000. And the decline in…

Fed Set To Ignore Higher Headline Inflation

December CPI Report: Headline Inflation Rises December CPI report was in line with estimates on a yearly basis, but missed them on a monthly basis. Headline inflation continued climbing higher because of energy; core inflation continued falling despite rising medical care inflation.  As you can see from the table below, monthly headline CPI was 0.2%…

Stocks Are Very Overbought: Chart Extravaganza

Stocks On A Rampage: Recent Returns Signal A Good 2020 Many predicted there would be a correction in January, but instead we have seen a continuation of this rally for the ages. S&P 500 is already up 1.78% year to date. That’s almost half the gains expected for the entire year. In this article, I…

Is Demand Weak Or Is The Labor Market Full?

Labor Market Growth Reviewed In this article, let's look at the December labor report. Job creation was solid, but missed estimates slightly. Also,  wage growth fell sharply especially for production and non-supervisory workers. And, the underemployment (U6) rate hit a record low. The current difference between the underemployment rate and the unemployment rate is 3.2%. Record…

Wage Growth Disappoints, Sending the 10 Year Yield Lower

Stocks Decline, But They’re Still Overbought Stocks fell on Friday amidst the modestly disappointing jobs report, but they are still overbought. We need a flush lower to cleanse the market of euphoria, not a 0.29% decline. CNN fear and greed index only fell 2 points to 91 which is extreme greed. Usually the CNN index…

Another Solid Jobs Report

Initial Jobless Claims Fall Again Before reviewing the BLS non-farm payrolls report, let's look at the jobless claims report from Thursday since it is generating a lot of discussion. These discussions draw from the spike in continuing claims versus the decline in initial claims.  It’s worth noting that the initial claims data is from the…

Another Record High As Overbought Market Breaks An Indicator

Another Rally: Solid Jobs Report Awaits Predictions for a correction in January have proven to be wrong. Especially so far as the market rallied again on Thursday to a new record high. S&P 500 has rallied on each of the past 4 days prior to the non-farm payrolls report. The table below shows the estimates…