Need to Know
AUGUST 12, 2013
5 gut checks before the stock market's opening bell
By Shawn Langlois
|
|||||||
|
|
|
Flickr/jurvetson
|
Good morning.
With earnings season just about all wrapped up, the summertime stench of a stagnant stock market is really starting to waft across Wall Street.
There'll be a few more data points worth watching than there were last week, like retail sales numbers and initial jobless claims, but there's nothing that particularly jumps off the screen. Which means we're left with more taper talk. At this point, $100 will get you get you $200 if you accurately wager that the cash spigot will start to tighten in September, according to Paddy Power .
Feeling a bit more risk-on? That same $100 will fetch you $50,000 if Julian Assange leaves the Ecuadorian Embassy via jet pack.
While the Irish bookmaker isn't putting any odds on whether the S&P 500 will retake 1,700, more and more analysts are predicting that level will be in the rear-view mirror by the end of 2013. When the year started, nobody on Wall Street saw it as a real possibility . Standing in its way is the dreaded Hindenburg Omen , which reared its head four times during last week's weak market showing.
Ill-fated balloon or not, stocks are drifting further away from that number in premarket trading, while gold is looking at another in a series of positive trading days.
Key market gauges: Asian stocks closed mostly higher, though the Nikkei sat out the rally after Japan posted weaker-than-expected growth in the April-June period. Shanghai and Hong Kong benefited from word that Beijing was "quietly offering financial stimulus" to key cities and provinces to support the local economies.
Europe stocks aren't following China's lead in the early going, while futures on the Dow and the S&P are stumbling premarket. Gold is up nicely, heading toward a fourth-straight win as a bigtime gold ETF logged its first increase in holdings since June.
The buzz: Trading in BlackBerry will stay halted until 8:30 a.m. Eastern. The company said its exploring strategic alternatives via a special committee.
Tesla has hardly budged from the spotlight after last week's frenetic rally, and it remains the top business story on Google's business news page.
Ever heard of Arinc? Me neither. But aerospace firm Rockwell Collins has and just agreed to pay Carlyle Group $1.39 billion for it.
With gold mounting a steady rally in recent sessions, the gold-related tickers are trending all over StockTwits, including Randgold Resources and two Direxion gold bear funds .
Apple's price target was cut to $595 from $710 by Needham Research.
Sheryl Sandberg is back in the public glare after a filing indicated that she unloaded almost $100 million in Facebook shares last week.
Vical shares are tumbling 60% in premarket
The chart of the day: It's the beginning of the end for Walter White, and that could spell trouble for the stock that seems to have benefited mightily from what ChessNWine calls "the best production on television of all-time." He said it's "poetic" that the AMC Networks chart is showing a bearish rising-wedge pattern at the same time as "Breaking Bad" hits the home stretch. "A weekly close below $61 would be strong evidence of a topping-out process at hand," he wrote.
With earnings season just about all wrapped up, the summertime stench of a stagnant stock market is really starting to waft across Wall Street.
There'll be a few more data points worth watching than there were last week, like retail sales numbers and initial jobless claims, but there's nothing that particularly jumps off the screen. Which means we're left with more taper talk. At this point, $100 will get you get you $200 if you accurately wager that the cash spigot will start to tighten in September, according to Paddy Power .
Feeling a bit more risk-on? That same $100 will fetch you $50,000 if Julian Assange leaves the Ecuadorian Embassy via jet pack.
While the Irish bookmaker isn't putting any odds on whether the S&P 500 will retake 1,700, more and more analysts are predicting that level will be in the rear-view mirror by the end of 2013. When the year started, nobody on Wall Street saw it as a real possibility . Standing in its way is the dreaded Hindenburg Omen , which reared its head four times during last week's weak market showing.
Ill-fated balloon or not, stocks are drifting further away from that number in premarket trading, while gold is looking at another in a series of positive trading days.
Key market gauges: Asian stocks closed mostly higher, though the Nikkei sat out the rally after Japan posted weaker-than-expected growth in the April-June period. Shanghai and Hong Kong benefited from word that Beijing was "quietly offering financial stimulus" to key cities and provinces to support the local economies.
Europe stocks aren't following China's lead in the early going, while futures on the Dow and the S&P are stumbling premarket. Gold is up nicely, heading toward a fourth-straight win as a bigtime gold ETF logged its first increase in holdings since June.
The buzz: Trading in BlackBerry will stay halted until 8:30 a.m. Eastern. The company said its exploring strategic alternatives via a special committee.
Tesla has hardly budged from the spotlight after last week's frenetic rally, and it remains the top business story on Google's business news page.
Ever heard of Arinc? Me neither. But aerospace firm Rockwell Collins has and just agreed to pay Carlyle Group $1.39 billion for it.
With gold mounting a steady rally in recent sessions, the gold-related tickers are trending all over StockTwits, including Randgold Resources and two Direxion gold bear funds .
Apple's price target was cut to $595 from $710 by Needham Research.
Sheryl Sandberg is back in the public glare after a filing indicated that she unloaded almost $100 million in Facebook shares last week.
Vical shares are tumbling 60% in premarket
The chart of the day: It's the beginning of the end for Walter White, and that could spell trouble for the stock that seems to have benefited mightily from what ChessNWine calls "the best production on television of all-time." He said it's "poetic" that the AMC Networks chart is showing a bearish rising-wedge pattern at the same time as "Breaking Bad" hits the home stretch. "A weekly close below $61 would be strong evidence of a topping-out process at hand," he wrote.
|
|
The call of the
day: It's been a relatively rough ride for apparel retailers of
late, considering the strength of the broader market. But back-to-school is
around the corner (thank the Lord), and it's time to take a closer look at
American Eagle Outfitters , Urban Outfitters and Abercrombie & Fitch
, according to the Stockpucker blog . "There's no
promises that there won't be more volatility to come for the industry, but it
does appear that the apparel retailers are offering investors an opportune time
to jump into the industry," he wrote.
Random reads: In the barrel ... surrounded by used-up noodle packets . A good surf spoiled in Indo. Gross, sure, but still better than the dangers lurking off the coast of Sweden . "Testicles sit nicely in their mouth," apparently.
"We're going to smoke Obama, man!" Missouri's finest at the state fair .
The ultimate pet. Lab-grown glow-in-the-dark rabbits .
The world championships for pole dancing ... a father can dream.
Did Goldman overstep in criminally charging its ex-programmer?
Need to Know starts early and is updated as needed until the opening bell, but sign up here to get it delivered once to your e-mail box. Be sure to check the Need to Know item. The e-mailed version will be sent out at approximately 8:45 a.m. Eastern. Follow @slangwise on Twitter.
Random reads: In the barrel ... surrounded by used-up noodle packets . A good surf spoiled in Indo. Gross, sure, but still better than the dangers lurking off the coast of Sweden . "Testicles sit nicely in their mouth," apparently.
"We're going to smoke Obama, man!" Missouri's finest at the state fair .
The ultimate pet. Lab-grown glow-in-the-dark rabbits .
The world championships for pole dancing ... a father can dream.
Did Goldman overstep in criminally charging its ex-programmer?
Need to Know starts early and is updated as needed until the opening bell, but sign up here to get it delivered once to your e-mail box. Be sure to check the Need to Know item. The e-mailed version will be sent out at approximately 8:45 a.m. Eastern. Follow @slangwise on Twitter.
No comments:
Post a Comment