^^ yeah you ain't kiddin' there looks like XLV breaking below the march low here. of course UNH is a pretty big weighting there. XLV is now the only sector which is trading below its 50ma and is in extreme oversold territory and only up a meager +2% ytd. in the DJ30 there are 4 stocks that are in the red YTD right now, can you guess which one's they are? yup all health care names
Transports and Semiconductors up over +1%. Growth stocks continue to underperform Value stocks. Want to see that turn around soon.
Good Thursday morning to all. Here is this morning's pre-market news thread for those of you wanting to get a quick read before today's open- <-- click there to read! Hope everyone has a good trading day ahead on this final trading day of the week.
https://www.cnbc.com/2019/04/18/weekly-jobless-claims.html US weekly jobless claims lowest since 1969; unemployment rolls shrink
Morning Lineup - A Flood of Data Thu, Apr 18, 2019 Futures have turned a little higher this morning ahead of what is an absolute flood of economic data. Retail Sales, the Philly Fed, and Jobless Claims were just released, and the results were mostly better than expected with Retail Sales coming in better than expected, Jobless Claims dropping to an astonishingly low level of 192K, but the Philly Fed slightly missing consensus forecasts. There's still a lot more data to contend with, though, as Markit Flash PMIs, Leading Indicators, and Business Inventories are still on the docket. Tomorrow is a holiday for the stock market in observance of Good Friday, but both Housing Starts and Building Permits will be released at 8:30. If you are off, enjoy the three day weekend. Following the recent settlement between Apple and Qualcomm (QCOM), we wanted to check up on the status of our comparison between the relative strength of semiconductors and the performance of the S&P 500. We have highlighted the leadership of semis numerous times in the last several weeks, and QCOM's surge over the last two days has caused the group's relative strength to soar to levels not far from last year's high. As we have mentioned in the past, every major decline and rally of the last six years has been preceded by a move higher or lower in the relative strength of the semis. Emphasis is often placed on the importance of the transports in determining the direction of the market, but in recent years the semis have been a much better tell.
yowza! ima have to dig up some historicals later on to see if we're closing in on the ATL in claims. amazing!
^^ also, i'm not too sure if i had ever shared this chart in here with you guys. here is the chart plotting the cash SPX vs. initial claims (inverted, blue line). seems like the 2 have moved essentially in lockstep since the '08-'09 crisis. seeing as we printed a new cycle low in initial claims today, might mean the ATH in the SPX could be incoming any week now.
^^ ok, last post in here regarding the initial claims # this week (sorry guys! ) but, did y'all know that today's print marked the 3rd consecutive week that the initial claims # came in 10K or greater than what the consensus was looking for. that's only happened 2 other instances in the past 10 yrs! what makes this week's # even more impressive is that it is happening at these extreme low levels! but wait! there's more... this week's print also marked the 80th consecutive week (yes, you heard right!) that claims have come in below 250K, which is currently the 2nd best streak ever on record. furthermore, this week's print also marked the 215th consecutive week that claims have come in below 300K, which is indeed the best streak on record. lastly, the continuing claims # as well as the non-seasonally adjusted data for claims fell to 195.4K which is the best since 1969 same as the headline #. i know i don't talk about this econ. data set in detail like this much at all ever, but these #'s are so noteworthy, it's hard not to at least make a brief mention of it in here. just when you think it can't go any lower, it does! pretty amazing imo. this is not my own chart, but just sharing in here to illustrate the steep decline here, especially in the past few weeks alone.
btw you guys, just a quick reminder here in case any of y'alls maybe forgot. tomorrow the markets will be closed for good friday. i believe globex futures will remain open until like 1pm...albeit i'm not 100% sure on this one, but ima double check on that in just a bit here. hope you guys all have an amazing 3-day weekend if i didn't get to say it later!
The economic data and the earnings have been pretty good For now we are seeing earnings growth instead of earnings decline that many were feared. Of course we still have a lot more earnings to come but so far so good If we continue to see solid data and earnings then hard to see the SPX not to hit a new ATH
LOL good thing for double checks! looks like i was wrong. globex futures will be closed all day tomorrow as well... so it's a true 3-day weekend for the markets.
