Category Archives: Daily Market Update

Daily Market Update – June 20, 2016 (9:00 AM)

What a difference a poll makes.

Mid week of just a few days ago the numbers seemed to be increasing on the “exit” side of the vote. With the increasing certainty that a British withdrawal from the European Union was going to be the case, there was the usual disagreement about what that would mean and then how long it would take for anything to really happen.

As they were all debating those issues, London’s bookies were still leaning fairly strongly in the other direction.

As the week came to its close the sentiment was reportedly shifting, perhaps due to the tragic shooting of a member of Parliament in a country where shootings are exceedingly rare.

This morning, with just days to go the polls are catching up with the bookies and markets all over the world are voting with their local currencies and buying stocks.

To me it seemed odd that so soon after being against Scotland’s withdrawal from Great Britian, there would even be discussion about withdrawal from the European Union. You would think that the reasons voiced against Scotland’s proposed move would hold fro Britain’s proposed move.

This morning all of the world’s market’s are much higher. Our own, as the futures are getting closer to the opening bell is actually the laggard, even as it is up by more than 1%.

I’m not one to buy stocks on a Monday when the market has such a climb, so my hope is that the tide carries many along with it and perhaps offers some opportunities to sell calls on existing and uncovered positions.

For one, I wouldn’t mind the first week of summer continuing the general pattern of 2016.

That hasn’t resulted in very much trading for me, but at least it has allowed some catch-up after the commodity and energy related losses in 2015.

With summer getting underway and perhaps both interest rates and “Brexit” being put to rest for a little while, I’d like to see some seasonal strength in energy prices drag the market higher, as they’ve been doing through most of 2016.

Daily Market Update – June 17, 2016 (7:00 AM)

The Week in Review will be posted by 10 PM and the Weekend Update will be posted by Noon on Sunday:

The following trade outcomes are possible today:

Assignments:   none

Rollovers:  MRO

Expirations:  DOW, HPQ, UAL

The following were ex-dividend this week:  M (6/13 $0.38), HPQ (6/13 $0.12), BBBY (6/14 $0.12)

The following will be ex-dividend next week:  LVS (6/20 $0.72), JOY (6/20 $0.01)

Trades, if any, will be attempted to be made prior to 3:30 PM EDT

Daily Market Update – June 16, 2016 (Close)

Yesterday was in sharp contrast to the way the previous day came to its close.

Today was in sharp contrast to itself.

Yesterday, immediately after Janet Yellen’s press conference concluded, the market sold off what modest gains it had made and ended the day lower.

While she spoke, the market pretty much treaded water. It had rallied upon the release of the FOMC Statement, but then really didn’t know what to make of the increasingly dovish tone adopted by Yellen and it just traded in a narrow range through the prepared text and the question and answer period.

But when it all ended came the realization that if the economy wasn’t good enough to support even a 0.25% interest rate increase, maybe it’s not good enough to be a place to park your money.

If your job was to record events, the uptick and the downturn were very easily identifiable as were their causes.

Today, the change, from a decidedly negative open to a close just off of its decideldly positive highs wasn’t as easy to pinpoint as to its catalyst.

This morning’s futures were just modestly weaker as overseas markets had a rough session and oil is again falling.

Using those as guides, we were looking to open on the negative, but still faring far better in comparison to others around the world.

When the end came, that distinction to what was going on elsewhere was cemented and gave a little bit of hope for me as far as tomorrow’s monthly ending option cycle goes.

My aspirations are still meek, though.

I would just like to rollover a position or 2 or see an assignment or two.

With a number of losing sessions having been strung together before today’s surprising gain, those aspirations are getting a little more difficult, but as the market’s recent weakness has driven volatility higher, there may at least be some opportunity to get some relatively larger premiums and look at longer term expiration dates to lock in those premiums while awaiting what is hopefully coming.

Hopefully, tomorrow will see it fit to add a little more to today’s gains and make July a little easier to swallow.

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Daily Market Update – June 16.5, 2016 (7:00 AM)

Yesterday was in sharp contrast to the way the previous day came to its close.

Yesterday, immediately after Janet Yellen’s press conference concluded, the market sold off what modest gains it had made and ended the day lower.

While she spoke, the market pretty much treaded water. It had rallied upon the release of the FOMC Statement, but then really didn’t know what to make of the increasingly dovish tone adopted by Yellen and it just traded in a narrow range through the prepared text and the question and answer period.

But when it all ended came the realization that if the economy wasn’t good enough to support even a 0.25% interest rate increase, maybe it’s not good enough to be a place to park your money.

If your job was to record events, the uptick and the downturn were very easily identifiable as were their causes.

This morning’s futures are just modestly weaker as overseas markets had a rough session and oil is again falling.

Using those as guides, we may have fared quite well yesterday in comparison to others around the world.

With just 2 days remaining in the week, my aspirations are meek.

I would just like to rollover a position or 2 or see an assignment or two.

With a number of losing sessions now being strung together each of those aspirations is getting a little more difficult, but as the market’s weakness drives volatility higher, there may at least be some opportunity to get some relatively larger premiums and look at longer term expiration dates to lock in those premiums while awaiting what is hopefully coming.

.

Daily Market Update – June 15, 2016 (Close)

Yesterday ended much better than it had been looking earlier in the day.

With a reasonably strong loss on Monday, had the losses continued to that degree on Tuesday, there would have been some good chance of getting some kind of relief rally on Wednesday, almost regardless of what would have been contained in the FOMC Statement release.

With some early morning strength, almost enough to offset yesterday’s loss, that could have left markets easily going in either direction at 2 PM and maybe even again afterward, as Janet Yellen was to hold her press conference.

The expectation seems to be that there may be more dove than hawk today both from the statement itself and then during the press conference.

Unless a real shocker were to come and interest rates were raised, there wasn’t too much reason for the market to behave badly.

That is, unless another bombshell were to hit, such as any mention of the word “recession.”

That latter bombshell seemed very unlikely, but it’s the unlikely that gets people’s attention and flames fears or greed.

For today, I would have  just liked to have see something that helped the market move higher.

That’s not the way it worked out, though.

As it was, there wasn’t much chance of me spending any money prior to the FOMC and not much likelihood of doing so after the press conference.

What we saw was the market hit its high point right at the release, although not a really tremendous gain, no matter how you looked at it and then fall to close at its lows beginning immediately after the end of the press conference.

What can we learn from that behavior?

Nothing, except that maybe traders realized that dovishness at this point isn’t reflective of the kind of economy to write home about.

At this point, I’d just like to see this week come to an end and get the July 2016 option cycle going.