/ April 24
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Thursday:
Durable Goods Orders MoM (2% exp.)
Initial Jobless Claims (221K exp.)
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Friday:
Michigan Consumer Sentiment Final (50.8 exp.) -
Thursday:
Merck
Alphabet
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Friday:
AbbVie
Phillips 66
Colgate-Palmolive
Daily Briefing
*The stock market registered solid gains, building on the previous rally; the major equity indices closed off their highs, but maintained gains between +1.1% and +2.5%; the Nasdaq Composite traded up as much as +4.5% at its high, settling +2.5% higher than the day before;
*The market is feeling good about recent commentary from president Trump, indicating that he has no intention of firing Fed Chair Powell and that he will not "play hardball" in trade talks with China, adding that tariff rates will come down substantially if the two sides reach a deal;
*SPY got rejected from its most immediate resistance level during the intra-day session ($541 - lower technical trendline) and also closed below its 20-DMA; there are some positive overtones building beneath the index-level surface, however, especially as it relates to the broader market performance; for SPY, a close above $541 would indeed be a bullish signal, while a break below downside support ($509) would put the bears back in charge again;
*The MACD signal is turning increasingly bullish, favoring short term gains (or at least a modicum of stability);
*Positive price action in stocks that reported earnings also boosted sentiment; Tesla (TSLA, +5.4%) was a standout in that respect, and shares jumped despite disappointing Q1 results; the positive response follows comments from Elon Musk indicating he will be curtailing his DOGE work;
*Market makers have also turned bullish in terms of GEX for many major sector ETFs, at least for the next couple of days; in the chart below, we’ve plotted both the short and medium term GEX; note that for both SPY and QQQ, short term GEX (2-3 days) is now positive, while still negative for the medium term (50-60 days);
*According to Carson Research, whenever advancing issues and volume on the NYSE were over 89% twice in 9 days, equity markets were close to bottoming; to a certain extent we are starting to see that as well in the Dark Pools and options data;
*Many stocks benefitted from buying interest, leading the Invesco S&P 500 Equal Weight ETF (RSP) to close +1.0% higher and nine of the S&P 500 sectors to close in the green; five sectors rose more than 1.0%, including the top weighted technology sector (XLK, +2.9%);
*March New Home Sales were reported at 724K, versus expectations of 684K; the key takeaway from the report is that new home sales in March were aided by several factors that included better weather, more stable mortgage rates, and lower prices, but questions will remain about the sustainability factor given the jump in mortgage rates and stock market losses that have been seen in April;
*The 10-yr yield was unchanged from the day before, at 4.39%;
*TLT has continued the recent recovery, gaining +0.97% and bouncing from support at $86; GEX has also turned positive for TLT both in the medium and in the short term;