Market Talk / Feb. 22nd - 28th

[Spaf]

Market Talk
Sunday Edition
February 22, 2009​

General Commentary:

Sometimes it's best to stand back and take a look at the bigger picture of the market. Always looking at daily charts and talk can be quite numbing. Weekly, it looks like the market is stuck near a bottom. The fundamental conditions of housing and finance need to show some improvement. Job losses, executive bonuses, financial scams and such creates a lot of unwillingness on the part of investors. And, government bailout programs leave a taste of paying for the mistakes of others.

I see it as When will the smoke clear and a measure of confidence be restored? The system itself has to be shown to work for the investors, not against them. This same feeling also applies to the TSP. Taking adverse action on traders was acting out for no good reason, when they could have been watching the environment and advising accordingly. It's tough to watch one's savings drop in dollar value, but worse to see it disappear in selling shares low.

A look at the chart(s)
The S&P500 [$SPX] Weekly 07 -- 09 -
Large Caps

Charts courtesy of www.StockCharts.com​

Pricing remains under the 50dma and the 200dma. What got us here took some time to level out. One should not expect a quick climb out of this hole. A lot of pieces have to be put together, and work, and the investors regain some of their confidence.

Well, that's it for the weekend!​

Be careful out there!​

 

[tsptalk]

I wonder if someone got hold of tonight's speech from Obama? I'm not sure what he could say, except for giving more "clarity" which is what Wall Street seems to be craving.

 

[Rod]

I wonder if someone got hold of tonight's speech from Obama? I'm not sure what he could say, except for giving more "clarity" which is what Wall Street seems to be craving.

I'm hoping we can bounce off that too.

 

[tsptalk]

Well, the futures are not jumping for joy after the speech. The S&P and Naz are down a handful of points. That's actually a good sign. We don't need another gap up. Those gaps tend to get sold pretty quickly. I'd rather see a negative open get bought.

 

[KevinD]

I'd rather see a negative open get bought.

 

[hessian]

Sorry for this rant, Spaf, you'ld identified this a couple weeks ago. Something awefully familiar again today (2/25).

11:00 am: Selling pressure is stiff as each of the major indices are trading with losses in excess of 2%.
Losses are steepest among financial stocks. The financial sector is currently down 5.4%. Particular weakness is being exhibited by banks and financial services companies JPMorgan Chase (JPM 20.47, -0.55), Bank of America (BAC 4.43, -0.30), and Wells Fargo (WFC 12.44, -0.61).
Wells Fargo was the focus of an article in this morning's edition of The Wall Street Journal, which highlights the company's dividend and the capital the comany could conserve by cutting the dividend. JPMorgan opted to cut its dividend following Monday's close; the decision was made to help protect its balance sheet.DJ30 -172.76 NASDAQ -31.39 SP500 -17.82 NASDAQ Adv/Vol/Dec 539/602 mln/1839 NYSE Adv/Vol/Dec 517/379 mln/2400
10:30 am: Stocks drop to session lows as a dismal existing home sales report hits the wires at 10:00 AM ET.
http://finance.yahoo.com/marketupdate/update

- [I'd figured "dismal homes sales" was baked in, but what happened, between yesterday to today - with the Banks, oh the Banks! :suspicious:
- banks take'n us again this a.m. (crooks) - won't they let us at least finish green?]

 

[Viva_La_Migra]

Here's a man after our own hearts!

"Buy and hold was always a bad idea, he says." GENIUS!!!

http://finance.yahoo.com/tech-ticke...ll-Market?tickers=^dji,^gspc,SPY,DIA,QQQQ,GLD

 

[tsptalk]

Here's a man after our own hearts!

"Buy and hold was always a bad idea, he says." GENIUS!!!

It is probably like anything else. We knew for years here that buy and hold was dangerous. But once the herd (and birchtree ) come to that conclusion, it may be a time to buy and hold again. At least until that cycle ends.

 

[Frixxxx]

...But once the herd (and birchtree ) come to that conclusion, it may be a time to buy and hold again. At least until that cycle ends.

Um, tom....that ain't happening....Birch got his roots planted....We should start to call him OAKTREE!!!!!

 

[tsptalk]

Et tu, Dillon Radigan? As the market closed today, he did his NYSE floor walk saying you have to be impressed with the relative strength of the stock market considering the news. No matter how you slice it, I wouldn't say being down 2.4% and below major support, is impressive.

 

[Viva_La_Migra]

It is probably like anything else. We knew for years here that buy and hold was dangerous. But once the herd (and birchtree ) come to that conclusion, it may be a time to buy and hold again. At least until that cycle ends.

Maybe for the first year after the market starts to recover. I'm hoping for a repeat of 2003! The average return that year in CSI was around 37%. I'll buy and hold for that kind of return!:nuts:

 

[The_Technician]

Sorry for this rant, Spaf, you'ld identified this a couple weeks ago. Something awefully familiar again today (2/25).

11:00 am: Selling pressure is stiff as each of the major indices are trading with losses in excess of 2%.
Losses are steepest among financial stocks. The financial sector is currently down 5.4%. Particular weakness is being exhibited by banks and financial services companies JPMorgan Chase (JPM 20.47, -0.55), Bank of America (BAC 4.43, -0.30), and Wells Fargo (WFC 12.44, -0.61).
Wells Fargo was the focus of an article in this morning's edition of The Wall Street Journal, which highlights the company's dividend and the capital the comany could conserve by cutting the dividend. JPMorgan opted to cut its dividend following Monday's close; the decision was made to help protect its balance sheet.DJ30 -172.76 NASDAQ -31.39 SP500 -17.82 NASDAQ Adv/Vol/Dec 539/602 mln/1839 NYSE Adv/Vol/Dec 517/379 mln/2400
10:30 am: Stocks drop to session lows as a dismal existing home sales report hits the wires at 10:00 AM ET.
http://finance.yahoo.com/marketupdate/update

- [I'd figured "dismal homes sales" was baked in, but what happened, between yesterday to today - with the Banks, oh the Banks! :suspicious:
- banks take'n us again this a.m. (crooks) - won't they let us at least finish green?]

U know, I had the market in an upswing for the last several days, and it didn't look pretty (that's a warning sign).....now its in a down swing mode for the next few......

Either I'm wrong or the upswing was that bad.....I wonder whats in store early next week.....all indications from the CB's is its so so down to variably worse...

Have nice weekend.