Today looks like it will be the 13th straight day that the S&P will have moved less than 0.4%. The big overnight news on the President’s firing of the F.B.I. director does not seem to be having too much effect upon the markets. There is a little flight to quality buying as the 10-year Treasury Note is down to 2.38% while gold is moving up from low levels after its recent beating. Currently, gold is at $1,219 an ounce.
With about 1/2 an hour left before the close of today’s session, the DOW is lower by 44 points after having lost as much as 70 around 10:30 AM. Both the S&P and NASDAQ are nominally ahead at this time. If this pattern holds it will be the 31st record high for the NASDAQ this year. It is currently up 6 points without the help of AAPL, which is finally taking a breather after its astounding upside move the past three days.
In AAPL’s upside place is NFLX…exploding to another new all-time high at $161. NVDA is sharply higher on its earnings and BIDU and TSLA are also doing well today. The DOW is being hurt by DIS on its earnings while the financials and energy stocks are doing better…the latter on a nice gain in crude oil prices.
There are some big moves on earnings. Along with NVDA, EA and WEN are positive while PCLN is lower by 98 points after its historic move higher. Others doing poorly today include YELP, which is actually showing the largest percentage decline of all.
Breadth numbers are positive at a 16/12 upside ratio. The VIX is idle at 10.01. We had the fourth lowest close in history on Monday.
There was one economic report today which showed that April import prices rose by more than expected with a gain of 0.5% due to higher energy prices last month.
For 2017, earnings projections for the S&P are expected to be up by around 11% according to current estimates, and for 2018 the number is almost 12%, so what we have seen here is the stock market moving higher to justify those profit gains.
Donald M. Selkin
These are excerpts from Don Selkin’s Daily Market Notes, abbreviated and updated with permission from the author. Don Selkin is the Chief Market Strategist at Newbridge Securities Corporation, member FINRA/SIPC and provides the Fair Value analysis for CNBC each morning. The commentary provided in this Market Letter is intended to provide timely market analysis and should not be considered a research report. This Market Letter may contain, and is limited to: Discussions of broad based indices; Commentaries on economic, political or market conditions; Technical analyses concerning the demand and supply for a sector, index or industry based in trading volume and price; Statistical summaries of multiple companies’ financial data, including listings of current ratings; and, Recommendations regarding increasing or decreasing holdings in particular industries or securities. This Market Letter does not make a financial or investment recommendation or otherwise promotes a product or service of the firm. This Market Letter contains only news, facts, and commentary on information previously reported from a news source believed to be accurate and reliable by the author. These news sources include the following: Bloomberg Financial, Reuters, and the Associated Press.