Author Archives: TheAcsMan

Daily Market Update – July 16,  2015  (Close)

Yesterday was another one of those breather kind of days when you could have reasonably expected some fireworks.

Instead, it was a boring day in which not even the first of 2 days of Janet Yellen’s Congressional Humphrey-Hawkins testimony could get markets excited. There were no inciteful moments, no great insights during the testimony and probably more of the same is expected today.

While Greenspan always said whatever was on his mind and the market went wild in trying to decipher what he had said, often gyrating back and forth in magnitude with his words, Bernanke and now Yellen, are much more measured and thoughtful of their words. 

Both, still were able to move markets, but did and do so much less frequently, although both Bernanke and Yellen were more likely to move markets higher, rather than unpredictably, as did Greenspan.

The only real excitement yesterday came in the final hour of trading as some attempts of rioting in the streets of Athens in advance of the Parliamentary vote on the proposed Greek debt relief proposal was about to get underway. It was in the final hour that market gains disappeared as maybe for a moment some doubt was cast as to the outcome of the scheduled vote, although most of the doubt was whether the vote would be able to take place and not its actual outcome.

With pretty much everyone disavowing support of the proposed plan, even the person who has agreed to it and has to implement the increased austerity measures, ultimately the vote was as expected in favor of accepting the deal.

That may have been the impetus for this morning’s moderately higher trading in the futures and certainly the lack of any bad news as the day progressed helped to create a very bene3volenty environment, especially as earnings news coming forth has not scared any one off.

Otherwise, earnings continue and so far there is no over-riding theme casting negativity on the past quarter, nor more importantly on the quarter ahead. There are some important companies reporting earnings today, both before the opening bell and after the closing bell and then again tomorrow morning. They could at least get the market to be responsive to fundamentals for the time being as international events may begin to fade for now.

With only a very small number of positions set to expire this week and with only one of those in a position for wither expiration or assignment, it’s going to be a quiet week right through until the end.

With the market up strongly for the week, most of which came on Monday, there’s not too much reason to think that the week will see those gains evaporate, as the technical lows were decisively tested and only served as a springboard to begin approaching record highs. After yesterday’s failure to add to the string of higher moving days the market was still only 1.5% below its all time record highs and the pattern of the past 3 years has been fairly unequivocal.

After today’s close we got even closer to those records, almost as if nothing had recently happened to have brought us to a 5% decline and at the precipice of testing a technical level of support.

Hopefully that pattern of moving higher as a springboard to even greater heights will continue, even if it means not taking the opportunity to add to the roster of new positions. At this point I would prefer to see asset value go along for the ride higher and to be able to take whatever opportunity may present itself to add additional income through the sale of calls on uncovered positions.

Daily Market Update – July 16,  2015  (7:00 AM)

Yesterday was another one of those breather kind of days when you could have reasonably expected some fireworks.

Instead, it was a boring day in which not even the first of 2 days of Janet Yellen’s Congressional Humphrey-Hawkins testimony could get markets excited. There were no inciteful moments, no great insights during the testimony and probably more of the same is expected today.

While greenspan always said whatever was on hos mind and the market went wild in trying to decipher what he had said, often gyrating back and forth in magnitude with his words, Bernanke and now Yellen, are much more measured and thoughtful of their words. 

Both, still were able to move markets, but did and do so much less frequently, although both Bernanke and Yellen were more likely to move markets higher, rather than unpredictably, as did Greenspan.

The only real excitement yesterday came in the final hour of trading as some attempts of rioting in the streets of Athens in advance of the Parliamentary vote on the proposed Greek debt relief proposal was about to get underway. It was in the final hour that market gains disappeared as maybe for a moment some doubt was cast as to the outcome of the scheduled vote, although most of the doubt was whether the vote would be able to take place and not its actual outcome.

With pretty much everyone disavowing support of the proposed plan, even the person who has agreed to it and has to implement the increased austerity measures, ultimately the vote was as expected in favor of accepting the deal.

That may be the impetus for this morning’s moderately higher trading in the futures.

Otherwise, earnings continue and so far there is no over-riding theme casting negativity on the past quarter, nor more importantly on the quarter ahead. There are some important companies reporting earnings today, both before the opening bell and after the closing bell and tomorrow and they could at least get the market to be responsive to fundamentals for the time being as international events may begin to fade for now.

With only a very small number of positions set to expire this week and with only one of those in a position for wither expiration or assignment, it’s going to be a quiet week right through until the end.

With the market up strongly for the week, most of which came on Monday, there’s not too much reason to think that the week will see those gains evaporate, as the technical lows were decisively tested and only served as a springboard to begin approaching record highs. After yesterday’s failure to add to the string of higher moving days the market is still only 1.5% below its all time record highs and the pattern of the past 3 years has been fairly unequivocal.

Hopefully that pattern will continue, even if it means not taking the opportunity to add to the roster of new positions. At this point I would prefer to see asset value go along for the ride higher and to be able to take whatever opportunity may present itself to add additional income through the sale of calls on uncovered positions.

Daily Market Update – July 15,  2015  (Close)

It looked as if the US stock market would be in a state of suspended animation until the question and answer period of Janet Yellen’s mandated Congressional testimony was to begin today.

The formal statement that she would be reading had already been released in the morning and the futures remained flat and completely unimpressed.

They ended up staying that way as both the DJIA and the S&P 500 were virtually unchanged for the day.

No one would have expected any bombshells to be contained in the prepared text anyway and for the most part, other than at her very first press conference as Chairman of the Federal Reserve, Janet Yellen has been very capable of measuring her words and not saying something that she neither meant nor meant to divulge.

Yesterday, flat was a good place to start the day as the market was able to find some reason to move forward and end the day just 1.5% away from its all time highs. It’s hard to believe that barely a week ago it seemed as if we were looking down the barrel of a gun. The market was already down 5% and right at a technical level of support on the S&P 500. That was all happening as the Chinese situation was seeming to unravel and the Greeks were technically in default on their loans and without any life preserver in sight.

Funny how quickly things can change.

For now all things are quiet on the overseas fronts and all we have to think about are earnings and whatever additional bits of information Janet Yellen may discide to parse out for us to digest tomorrow.

So far, as she’s had the opportunity to appear before Congress the questions have, for the most part been more gentle than had greeted her predecessors, so she has likely had a little easier time formulating answres that wouldn’t set off fireworks of any kind because of any slip ups or mis-statements on her part. For the most part this testimony has been the sort of place where elected officials could ask questions in order to capture sound bites to be used in the re-election campaigns that would help to make them look as if they were on top of things and against big government and pro-capitalism.

The most egregeous and long winded questions, as well as the ones who would consistently interrupt the answers would typically come from those who obviously were the least qualified to ask any questions of an esteemed economist.

That was definitely the case today as there were some long winbded statements that could have used Alex Trebeck to point out that a question is generally supposed to be in the form of a question.

Her testimony continues tomorrow, but it’s usually the first day that is more likely to see some fireworks. Of course, tomorrow we may be greeted by some kind of curveball coming from an expected vote by the Greek Parliament, but it’s unlikely that they’ll set the situation back to where it had been just 2 weeks ago. As with so many other things that we’ve seen, it’s better to take a deal or make a decision, even if it only means delaying the real decision that has to be made.

The rioting in the streets that is going on before the vote is likely just for show and probably won’t have any impact on anything.

As it is, this is shaping up to be a very quiet trading week, although there are still some potential trades that I might like to make, although at this point they would likely be considering the use of options expiring next week.

For now, I would be content watching the market go higher and challenge those all time highs in preperation for maybe being able to do something next week, instead.

Daily Market Update – July 15,  2015  (9:00 AM)

It looks as if the US stock market will be in a state of suspended animation until the question and answer period of Janet Yellen’s mandated Congressional testimony begins today.

The formal statement that she will be reading has already been released and the futures remains flat.

No one would have expected any bombshells to be contained in the prepared text anyway and for the most part, other than at her very first press conference as Chairman of the Federal Reserve, Janet Yellen has been very capable of measuring her words and not saying something that she neither meant nor meant to divulge.

Yesterday, flat was a good place to start the day as the market was able to find some reason to move forward and end the day just 1.5% away from its all time highs. It’s hard to believe that barely a week ago it seemed as if we were looking down the barrel of a gun. The market was already down 5% and right at a technical level of support on the S&P 500. That was all happening as the Chinese situation was seeming to unravel and the Greeks were technically in default on their loans and without any life preserver in sight.

Funny how quickly things can change.

For now all things are quiet on the overseas fronts and all we have to think about are earnings and whatever bits of information Janet Yellen may discide to parse out for us to digest.

So far, as she’s had the opportunity to appear before Congress the questions have, for the most part been more gentle than had greeted her predecessors, so she has likely had a little easier time formulating answres that wouldn’t set off fireworks of any kind because of any slip ups or mis-statements on her part. FOr the most part this testimony has been the sort of place where elected officials could ask questions in order to capture sound bites to be used in the re-election campaigns that would help to make them look as if they were on top of things and against big government and pro-capitalism.

The most egregeous and long winded questions, as well as the ones who would consistently interrupt the answers would typically come from those who obviously were the least qualified to ask any questions of an esteemed economist.

Her testimony continues tomorrow, but it’s usually the first day thta is more likely to see some fireworks. Of course, tomorrow we may be greeted by some kind of curveball coming from an expected vote by the Greek Parliament, but it’s unlikely that they’ll set the situation back to where it had been just 2 weeks ago. As with so many other things that we’ve seen, it’s better to take a deal or make a decision, even if it only means delaying the real decision that has to be made.

This is shaping up to be a very quiet trading week, although there are still some potential trades that I might like to make, although at this point they would likely be considering the use of options expiring next week.

For now, I would be content watching the market go higher and challenge those all time highs in preperation for maybe being able to do something next week, instead.

Daily Market Update – July 14,  2015  (Close)

It looks as if the US stock market places greater value on a possible solution to the Greek debt crisis than it does to the agreement between the US and other nations with Iran over its nuclear programs.

Yesterday’s news from the EU and Greece helped to deliver a 200 point gain to the DJIA, while this morning’s news regarding the agreement with Iran had the futures trading virtually unchanged and left the market trading in a fauirly sedate fashion throughout the day.

Still, given the back and forth and the big give and take kind of moves over the past few weeks, even a flat day coming immediately after a 200 point climb could be considered a sort of victory, as the market has quickly gone from an intra-day 5% decline from its all time highs to now being less than 2% below those highs.

All during the course of the past week.

With news of the Iran deal greeting traders this morning and yesterday evening’s news of a proposed Chinese buyout of Micron Technolgies, bank earnings beginning today and tomorrow’s Congressional testimony from Janet Yellen, there’s enough going on to give markets plenty to ponder and digest.

Today it was neither ecstasy nor fear that dominated the market. Instead, it just cautiously moved higher after a tentative start to the day.

The initial earnings coming from the financial sector this morning were pointing in the right direction, although the financial sector’s performance  doesn’t necessarily mean much for the rest of the market. When banks are thriving and their earnings reflect those good times, the rest of the market can go in either direction. It’s when the financial sector releases earnings that are disappointing that you can reasonably well predict that everyone else will be following along in the same path.

So the early indication this morning at least offered some hope for things to come as companies may be in a position to report better than expected revenues thanks to a better than expected currency exchange rate. Additionally, with news of this morning’s Iran deal comes new pressure on the price of oil, which has already been under renewed pressure over the past 2 weeks.

Higher revenues and lower costs is a good way to see share prices move higher, especially if neither was really expected.

That combination could easily push the markets to new highs, especially if the efforts in China put a temporary lid on the sharp downward pressures that have been building in that market.

With a little bit of money to spend and a desire to see some additional income generated this week, I’m not resistant to trying to add any new positions this week, but would still continue to prefer some further advances and any possibility of rollovers or assignments of this week’s positions, although only one of the three may be in a position for either.

With what may be a pause, I’d be more inclined to spend that money, although you do have to be aware that lately there hasn’t been any kind of pattern in the overall market, other than there’s been no pattern. While the market may be taking a pause today, there’s as much reason to believe that the next move, maybe tomorrow’s move, can be much higher as it can be much lower.

As we await more earnings, perhaps Yellen’s testimony over two days beginning tomorrow can provide some optimism to send prices higher. The history of the Humphrey-Hawkings mandated testimony is that greater moves tend to come during the first day of testimony and Janet Yellen has been very much of a calming voice for markets, in general.

Hopefully, there will be a stream of good news for the rest of the week, or at least an absence of anything bad and maybe that will allow us to focus on some earnings fundamentals for a change.