Friday, February 19, 2016

The Morning Call---Risk off trades strong again

The Morning Call

2/19/16

The Market
         
    Technical

The indices (DJIA 16413, S&P 1917) ended their winning streak on a low volume, lower volatility, and mixed breadth day.

Oversold rally (short):

   The Dow closed [a] below its 100 day moving average, now resistance, [b] below its 200 day moving average, now resistance, [c] below the lower boundary of a short term downtrend {16748-17499}, [c]  above the lower boundary of its intermediate term trading range {15842-18295}, [d] in a long term uptrend {5471-19343}, [e] and still within a series of lower highs but voided a very short term downtrend.

The S&P finished [a] below its 100 day moving average, now resistance, [b] below its 200 day moving average, now resistance [c] below the lower boundary of its short term downtrend {1888-1975}, [d] within its intermediate term trading range {1867-2134}, [e] in a long term uptrend {800-2161} and [f] still within a series of lower highs but voided a very short term downtrend. 

The long Treasury was up 1%.  It ended [a] within its short and intermediate term trading ranges, [b] well above its upward trending 100 day moving average and [c] back above the lower boundary of a very short term uptrend, negating Wednesday’s break. 

GLD jumped 2.5%, remaining within very short term and short term uptrends as well as above an upward trending 100 day moving average. 
           
Bottom line:  yesterday’s pause in the recent advance left the indices with yet another lower high.  Of course, the decline was shallow and on low volume.  Plus it doesn’t undo Wednesday’s reset of the intermediate term to a trading range.  On the other hand, they had every reason to rise in light of Bullard’s dovish comments.  Interestingly, the two recent risk off trades (TLT and GLD) were quite strong despite a very ho hum decline in stocks.  I am not sure what this all means but whether there is any significance to yesterday’s pin action will be decided by subsequent follow through or lack thereof.
           
            The latest from Doug Kass (medium):

            Update on best stock market indicator (medium):


    Fundamental

       Headlines

US economic data was mixed yesterday: weekly jobless claims were lower than anticipated, the February Philly Fed manufacturing index was below expectations and the January leading economic indicators were in line.  However, with only one indicator left to be reported today, the tone of this week’s stats will be mildly negative.

The Fed remained center stage after Wednesday night comments by St. Louis Fed chief Bullard that further interest rate hikes would be ‘unwise’ and that more QE might be appropriate.

I will leave it to Stephen Roach to critique current central bank policies (medium and an absolute must read):

Overseas, Japanese January exports declined for the fourth month in a row and Chinese January PPI fell year over year, while CPI was up but below expectations.  In addition, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development lowered its 2016 global GDP outlook, mentioning Brazil, Germany and the US as slowing.

***overnight, UK January retail sales were stronger than anticipated.

Finally, Iran gave verbal support to the production freeze being pushed by Russia and Saudi Arabia.  While encouraging, remember all these guys have cheated on prior agreements and flat supply in the face of falling demand is not a prescription for higher prices. (must read):

Bottom line: the sum of economic indicators for the last six months both here and abroad is discouraging; and this is despite more QE from multiple central banks.  Every day I link to articles written by guys who are smarter and have deeper background on monetary policy than me; and they are all concerned about the risks associated with unwinding QE. I have extreme difficulty believing that the Averages, currently only 10% off their all-time highs, properly reflect the odds of a recession or those risks about which the aforementioned experts are concerned.

I am not suggesting that investors run for the hills.  But it does make sense to use the current rebound to take some profits in winners that have held up during recent decline.

       Investing for Survival
   
            The benefits of dollar cost averaging.

    News on Stocks in Our Portfolios
 
Coca-Cola (NYSE:KO) declares $0.35/share quarterly dividend, 6.1% increase from prior dividend of $0.33

Tiffany (NYSE:TIF) declares $0.40/share quarterly dividend, in line with previous.

V.F. (NYSE:VFC): Q4 EPS of $0.95 misses by $0.06.
Revenue of $3.41B (-4.7% Y/Y) misses by $230M

AbbVie (NYSE:ABBV) declares $0.57/share quarterly dividend, in line with previous.

Economics

   This Week’s Data

            The January leading economic indicators were reported down 0.2%, in line; but December’s reading was revised from -0.2% to -0.3%.

            January CPI came in flat versus expectations of -0.1%; ex food and energy, it was up 0.3% versus estimates of up 0.1%.

   Other

Politics

  Domestic

  International War Against Radical Islam







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