Another Late Day Rally Lifts Stocks near the Highs of the Session

The S&P 500 continued its yo-yo action finishing in the green today as volume fell across the board ahead of the Non-Farm Payroll figures. Once again in the last 15 minutes buyers stepped up and pushed stocks higher into the close. It has become clock work at the end of the day buyers are appearing supporting the market. Jobless claim figures jumped more than expected just as momentum had been to the upside. Small caps were able to jump into the lead after lagging the broader market this week. Major market averages remain above their respective 50 day moving averages and we remain in an uptrend. Commodities fell again today even as the dollar rose on the day. Natural gas still is in an uptrend completely ignoring what is going on with other commodities. SLV and GLD continued to slide lower confusing many inflationist. Remember, GLD and SLV represent paper and are not replacements for actual coinage. There is a reason gold and silver coins are in high demand and is not translating over to the paper representation of the metals. The entire commodity complex is not saying to the market the global economy is healthy. Interesting to see the number of Bulls remain in the mid-30s from the AAII survey respondents. Bears remained in the 20s. II Bears continue to come in under 20% and bulls above 50%. QE certainly has kept many bullish expecting the money printing to keep prices high. This may be true, but we are in unchartered waters and with the Bank of Japan jumping the shark anything is possible. Tomorrow Non-Farm Payroll figure will dominate CNBC for majority of the morning. The Federal Reserve has now put the Unemployment rate in big bright neon lights. Given our PMI figures released earlier this week it wouldn’t surprise me if the jobs number comes in slightly under expectations. This is just a guess and I wouldn’t even bet my worse enemy’s money on what I think may happen. We are in an uptrend and while we are seeing signs of it weakening we aren’t going to guess when this uptrend will end. We’ll stay disciplined. Cut your losses and have a great weekend!

AAPL weighs on the NASDAQ as the S&P 500 Closes in the Green for the 6th day in a Row

AAPL was the talk of the street as the stock took a plunge on fourth quarter earnings. Initial jobless claims came in better than expected helping out on the job front (we’ll forget the surging number of people receiving food stamps and long-term disability). The market appeared poised to continue much higher with the market shaking off AAPL’s move. Just before noon time the NASDAQ had almost erased all of the day’s losses but sellers took over. Sellers dominated into the 2:00 pm EST hour when so when the VIX began to fall back helping the market come off the lows. NYSE and NASDAQ volume were higher giving the NASDAQ a day of distribution and a stall day for the S&P 500. We still have our uptrend and a rest here would make sense. However if this were to turn more sinister we have our exit plan. Gold and silver took a big hit today while other commodities were able to hold up. Gold and silver have yet to push higher despite the Federal’s Reserve’s desire to print $85 billion a month without an expiration date. Perhaps the medals know something about next week’s Fed meeting that the other market don’t. For now, both remain in their short-term uptrends despite their action today. Sentiment is at extremes with many surveys at multi-year highs. The AAII survey showed bulls at 53% highest since last February. Hulbert’s Financial Digest reading is at a level not seen since 2000. While this may be an indication upside may be limited we simply cannot trade off of it. The market may very well turn over here and head lower, but it is anyone’s guess and why we have sell rules in place. Stick to your game plan and execute. Short-term ETF Trends: TICKER ST TREND TREND CHANGE DATE CLOSE % SPY UPTREND NO CHANGE 1/24/2013 149.41 0.03% IWM UPTREND NO CHANGE 1/24/2013 66.66 -1.38% USO UPTREND NO CHANGE 1/24/2013 34.76 0.43% UNG UPTREND NO CHANGE 1/24/2013 19.53 -2.35% GLD UPTREND NO CHANGE 1/24/2013 161.42 -1.10% SLV UPTREND NO CHANGE 1/24/2013 30.65 -1.73% DBC UPTREND NO CHANGE 1/24/2013 28.07 -0.07% FXY DOWNTREND NO CHANGE 1/24/2013 108.66 -1.69% FXE UPTREND NO CHANGE 1/24/2013 132.7 0.41% TLT UPTREND CHANGE 1/24/2013 120.09 -0.35% TLT signals a change in trend from downtrend to uptrend. Have a great weekend.