All Blog Entries

Stocks were down sharply on Friday morning, but once again the bulls were able to stop the bleeding, held the indices at key support levels, and muster another impressive positive reversal. The Dow, down 360-points at the lows, closed up 114-points. It did turn out to be the worst week for the S&P 500 this year, but it was a lot worse about 4 hours before the close on Friday, so we head into Monday with the bulls having some momentum.

...

Turmoil in trade negotiations between the U.S. and China triggered broad selling across the stock market. Progress in trade negotiations has been a contributor to the success in stocks so far this year. Last week it seemed negotiations were nearing an end but the established negotiations nearly collapsed last weekend due to accountability disputes that left the U.S. unsatisfied. A threat by President Trump to add more tariffs to Chinese goods sparked a four straight days of losses across stock indices ...

Stocks were down modestly on Thursday, but that certainly wasn't the story. Down 449 at the lows, the Dow closed with a loss of "just" 139-points after a dovish trade statement from President Trump stopped the bleeding and initiated a big rally into the afternoon. The VIX (Volatility Index) went from a morning lofty high of 23.4 to close down on the day at 19.2. That is still elevated but that's huge intraday decline. Large gaps were opened on at the opening bell, but they were closed ...

Some very late selling turned a positive day into a negative one for most indices, although the Dow did hang onto a 2-point gain despite tanking over 120-points in the final half hour of trading. The small caps and Nasdaq lagged again, but most of the major indices reversed after some negative news from Intel was released.

...

Despite Monday's positive reversal day, stocks resumed their downside on Tuesday and the decline was significant as the Dow, down 473-points, had its worst one-day since the Apple Warning sell-off on January 3. The good news may be that there was a 200-point rally off the late afternoon lows. The Nasdaq, Transports, and small caps were all down about 2% on the day with many indices stabilizing at some support area that could be meaningful, but make or break levels.

...