After yesterday’s late selloff on the increasing geopolitical tensions, the market followed through on the downside today. It was disappointing earnings that accounted for the declines as much as the war of words and threats between the U.S. President and his North Korean counterpart. The DOW lost 36 points today, while the NASDAQ fell 18 and the S&P 500 was down by a fraction.
The NASDAQ was lowered by weakness in PCLN, AMZN, GOOG…and NFLX on DIS not sending their streaming services to this site anymore. On the other hand, AAPL was higher ahead of its ex-dividend date tomorrow and both HD and TRV gave some support to the DOW. The financials were weak on the lower interest rate structure.
Breadth numbers were around 1 to 2 on the downside and the VIX went higher to 11.19.
We are also seeing the three classic “flight to quality” items: the 10-year Treasury Note is down to 2.22%, gold is at a two-month high at $1,275. and the Japanese yen is at an eight-week high against the dollar.
The overall bull market is now in its 100th straight month. This compares to the average length of 59 months for the 11 bull markets since 1949. It is now the second longest bull market in history trailing only the run from 1987 to 2000.
Donald M. Selkin
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.