Volume was pitiful on Tuesday, so I guess we still have to wait for traders to return from summer vacation. Today? Tomorrow? Next week?
Labor Day is the traditional kickoff to November elections. We’ll be inundated soon as campaign commercials take over the TV and grow like mold into election day. I found this derivative of the word “politics.”
The word “politics” describes the process so well: “Poli” in Latin meaning “many” and “tics” meaning “bloodsucking creatures”.
So true!
Futures up overnight. Let’s see if volume starts to pick up. September index futures start to roll over starting Thursday into December contracts. Keep an eye on that.
The news continues to suck, with GDP, consumer sentiment and speeches to confuse everyone. But, stocks still rallied. As we say, sometimes the reaction is more important than the reality.
Traders did take a quick trip down to test that 1040 S&P level. That level has been tested several times the last 3 months. We’ve also got oil moving up and bonds moving down…which should be good for stocks.
Sunday evening futures are moving up. And merger Mondays have brought good news lately, although Mondays have not been moving up much after the open. From the Stock Trader’s Almanac: August next-to-last trading day, S&P up only twice in last 13 years 
The market may be bad, but I slept like a baby last night. I woke up every hour and cried.
I fought the market today, and the market won! Do you ever feel like the Black Knight in the Holy Grail movie? I was the knight today and King Arthur was the market.
The individual investor has left the marketplace…computers and HFT are in charge! This can only help the bears ravage the market. Did you see some of those whips in nanoseconds? The bid/ask spreads were pretty wide also. Nobody can click a mouse that fast.
I spent most of the day just trying to get to cash with minimal losses. I was zigging and zagging as snipers kept shooting. 
I think I’ll trade futures this evening and take it easy during the cash market hours. Seems like the futures markets are much more reasonable and orderly during the night sessions. Night time money spends just as well as day time money!
New Home Sales report Wednesday…hoping it’s not as big a stinker as existing home sales were today. But we also have Durable goods before and oil inventories after. Oh boy, another quiet day! 
It’s time for the retailers to be reporting earnings, and many are doing it this week. But since we know retailers and consumers have been sucking wind, it should all be priced in. But, we also have PPI, housing starts and leading indicators, so looks like another news driven week coming up.
The major indicies are trapped in a sideways pattern from Thursday. You could tell from the big time chop and whipsaws while waiting until we get a breakout on either side. By the early evening action today of the futures, that breakout may be to the downside.
Japan reported a much worse than expected Q2 GDP, and futures reacted immediately down, but are recovering slowly. We’ll see what morning brings.
Thanks for checking in and good luck tomorrow!
I hope everyone had a great day trading today! It looks like tomorrow may get a little wild also. INTC had blowout earnings and the futures reacted with splendor immediately, gapping up at the open and staying up there.
The SPX closed while wrestling with its 50ma.
Sure, it’s a speed-bump maybe, but a test of the 200 should be in the cards.
And look at these Advance/Decline volumes today: Russell 2000 +16:1 and both NYSE and Nasdaq +12:1 Those are some impressive numbers. Do they continue? I think tomorrow should be a high volume day…all the people sitting on the sidelines will say, “What the fuck? I’m going in!” and all the shorts will say, “I’m fucked! Let me out.”
And people wonder how I got the name of this blog. 
This market could not make up it’s mind on what direction to go. Maybe it was just waiting for the earnings reports this evening. There must have been a lot of people waiting because nobody was trading….volume pathetic again. Options Expiration week….hours of boredom….with minutes of panic and/or excitment thrown in!
Earnings season looks like it may be just what the bulls were waiting for. AA CSX and NVLS all came in with better-than-expected results and the S&P futures were taking off before they closed at 4:15 PM EDT. And later on this evening, it looks as if they would like to continue their move up. Of course there is still 11 hours before Tuesday’s open.
Speaking of AA, it’s been going down ever since the last earnings report 3 months ago.
So does it go up for 3 months now?
It would be nice if the markets tomorrow just continue up in a nice-n-easy manner, slow but steady. What I would not like to see is a gap-n-crap in a wild opex kind of way….but, then again, it is opex week.
It was a typical quiet sideways to flat day after a large up move the day before. And then the last hour came and all indexes moved up to close near their highs. I continued to shine away from individual stocks and just traded the index futures.
The Baltic Dry Index continues to drop, now below 2000. It is the longest continuous decline on record: 31 straight days! Is this predicting a big swoon in the world economy?
I spent all evening waiting for “The Decision.” Living in Northeast Ohio, I was disappointed. Oh well, life goes on. Now back to the charts.
Bad news for sure! I think we have fallen enough from the highs to be in an official bear market now.
The SPY, along with the S&P, confirmed a head ‘n shoulders pattern by breaking through the neckline.
Oh my!
Check out some of these other shenanigans: TSLA after being up $8 for the day, closes in the red; DNDN after closing about 4% in the red ($32.22) continued to dive after hours, trading at about $25; Oil is running down and BP is running up…What the $%@&*!
This evening, China PMI came in below expectations, so futures are in the toilet, at least for now. The bear is back! When a market opens higher and closes near or at the lows…THAT is classic bear market price action. 
Our one salvation is to see what the European reports come in like. I think I’ll go and by some firecrackers for the weekend. 
The news from the G20 meeting sounds encouraging and oil looks like it wishes to be a leader. But the weekly S&P chart put in an ugly bearish engulfing pattern.
The daily chart though, looks like it poked out a bottom on Friday and may want to try the green side of the market for at least a few days.
The week prior to a holiday is usually bullish, so we have that seasonal advantage working for the bulls. Next Monday the markets will be closed for the 4th of July holiday, but this Friday morning we have the always fun and wild monthly employment report. So the markets will be fun again this week. Be careful and happy trading!
Now that June options and future contracts have all rolled over, time to move on.
Volume was very low for an options expiration Friday. That USA vs Slovenia soccer match really took a lot of traders out of the mix! 
Actually, the entire week was a low volume boring time for an opex week.
This week should be a bit more news driven than last. A Fed rates decision is due on Wednesday. During the week we’ll see New Home sales, Durable goods orders, GDP and consumer sentiment…plus a rash of treasury bill auctions.
Futures are taking off Sunday evening!! Dow e-mini (YM) is already up +140, the S&P e-mini (ES) is up +17…if this holds up overnight we will get a big bang at the open! Oil is up almost 2 dollars and other commodities are following suit. Get ready for a rip roarin’ Monday!
Sometimes, entranced by the screens, watching equities, options and futures change colors, charts moving in a wave, and indicators pointing in every direction, I just have to scream....
