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Time for Rotation?
There was some interesting sentiment news today from NASDAQ. They announced the creation of NASDAQ OMX indexes, four new benchmark indexes that will “help international investors better manage their exposure to these increasingly important global sectors”.
YTD Comparison of $SPX, BBH, KOL, SLX, GDX
Is the timing of the launch somewhat late? Three of the benchmarks are commodity-related and the biotech benchmark has been on momentum player’s watch.
Consumer Staples and Healthcare
While reviewing the weekend reading, another sentiment-related article caught my attention by none other John Murphy:
Two Sector Leaders Are Staples and Healthcare
Until proven otherwise, the two strongest market sectors [...]
Portfolio Strategy for August 18
The July portfolio review has been published.
ACTION FOR THIS WEEK
The Strategic Performance and Ex-U.S. model portfolios should be adjusted as necessary at the open on Monday. The Conservative Retirement and Thrift Savings Plan model portfolios were re-allocated on August 1, 2008 and are not due for adjustment until September 2, 2008.
ALLOCATION FOR THE STRATEGIC PERFORMANCE PORTFOLIO
This portfolio should be adjusted at the open on August 18 to the following percentages:
16.43% VXF
14.16% EEM
10.18% GSG
27.45% FXF
31.78% TLT
ALLOCATION FOR THE EX-U.S. PORTFOLIO
This portfolio should be adjusted at the open on August 18 to the following percentages:
18.88% IEV
12.04% EEB
15.33% [...]
Taleb Fooled by Leverage
Tom Keene did two must-listen podcasts this week:
Fisher Says Consumption Slowdown May Cause Bond Defaults[DOWNLOAD PODAST]
Peter Fisher, managing director and co-head of fixed income at BlackRock Inc., talks with Bloomberg’s Tom Keene about the Federal Reserve’s relationship with the U.S. Treasury, assumption of the Treasury’s distressed pool of assets onto the Fed’s central bank balance sheet and the potential impact of an economic slowdown on bond default rates.
Taleb Says Crisis Continues Until Banks’ Management Changes[DOWNLOAD PODCAST]
Nassim Taleb, author of “The Black Swan: The Impact of the Highly Improbable,” talks with Bloomberg’s Tom Keene about the globalization of financial [...]
Portfolio Review: July 2008
If June 2008 capped a difficult quarter for equities, July was a tough month for portfolios with exposure to the deflating commodity bubble.
Trading Ideas for Monday
The stock scan conducted after the close on Friday found 88 winners and 64 losers: [VIEW SPREADSHEET]
The entire list was then ranked and sorted relative to performance against the S&P 500 and the NASDAQ 100 indexes. Click File > Export to save the spreadsheet to your own computer.
The scan is designed to find stocks that are current “in play”; criteria includes price movement, range and liquidity (500,000 shares on the day, 20-day average volume of 1.5 million shares). Please refer to the podcast for background information.
Trading Ideas for Friday
The stock scan conducted after the close on Thursday found 91 winners and 23 losers: [VIEW SPREADSHEET]
Let’s try something new today. I’ve uploaded the spreadsheet to Google so that readers can see the list of winners and losers. The entire list was then ranked and sorted relative to performance against the S&P 500 and the NASDAQ 100 indexes. Click File > Export to save the spreadsheet to your own computer.
The scan is designed to find stocks that are current “in play”; criteria includes price movement, range and liquidity (500,000 shares on the day, 20-day average [...]
Giddy Biotech Bulls?
While going through stories from the major financial news outlets, we can’t help but notice that a major theme has emerged. It seems like they have finally clued in to the performance of the biotech sector.
While market participants were losing sleep in the month of July with the major weakness everywhere, biotechs quietly outperformed and are now belatedly getting the ’something has changed’ media exposure.
Let’s make a list of some bullish biotech talk:
The Momentum Crowd Runs Into Biotech
“It really has nothing to do with the underlying facts and figures,” Worth says. “It’s the gambling nature of certain capital, coupled [...]
Trading Ideas for Thursday
The stock scan conducted after the close on Wednesday found 22 winners and 26 losers. The list of winners was ranked and sorted relative to performance against the S&P 500 and the NASDAQ 100 indexes. Click on the column headers below to sort other columns.
The scan is designed to find stocks that are current “in play”; criteria includes price movement, range and liquidity (500,000 shares on the day, 20-day average volume of 1.5 million shares). Please refer to the podcast for background information.
$SOX It To Them
Trading Ideas for Wednesday featured 25 winners in a weak market. Seven of the day’s winners were from the semiconductor sector.
This sort of price action gives more confirmation that money is flowing into technology with Jim Cramer leading the charge:
Momentum in Tech?
The market favors momentum over fundamentals right now, Cramer said during Tuesday’s edition of Mad Money at the Half. CNBC’s Bob Pisani told Cramer Tuesday that this tech momentum trade was just a short-term trend as investors look to make some money. Pisani agreed with Cramer that the U.S. dollar was going to be “a serious headwind” [...]
Trading Ideas for Wednesday
There are certain fundamental truths about market survival that people tend to ignore or forget, just when they need it the most. Let’s look at some recent examples.
First, it has been reported that Bill Miller averaged down big time last month and now has an Enron-sized bet on Freddie Mac. While Miller has vigorously — even defiantly — defended is actions in his Q2 Commentary [DOWNLOAD PDF], the fact is that he has fallen into the classic trap for which Daniel Kahneman was awarded the 2002 Nobel Prize in Economics: prospect theory. May his faith in … [...]
Money Flows Toward $DOT Index
Money rotating out of hot sectors is generally put to work elsewhere quickly. Looking at the Trading Ideas for Tuesday, we can see the stampede out of basic materials (gold & silver, metal mining, steel, chemicals) and energy (oil, coal).
Where it the money going? It seems like some of this money went into tech stocks. We can see this from the recent price action from the PHLX TheStreet.com Internet Index ($DOT). Momentum players love watching where the action is and it seems like technology will always be one of their favorite areas to trade.
The PHLX [...]
Trading Ideas for Tuesday
The stock scan conducted after the close on Monday found 176 winners and 77 losers. The list of losers was ranked and sorted relative to performance against the S&P 500 and the NASDAQ 100 indexes. Click on the column headers below to sort other columns.
The scan is designed to find stocks that are current “in play”; criteria includes price movement, range and liquidity (500,000 shares on the day, 20-day average volume of 1.5 million shares). Please refer to the podcast for background information.
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