Wang’s Happy Trading

The market got an early jump as better-than-expected retail sales report came in. But, it seemed like there was still selling pressure on the market. The market started sliding in the late morning and went into the red in the afternoon. However, it was able to get a nice pop right before the close to record a win.

MSFT and YHOO broke off their talks without any deal being made. But, YHOO turned to GOOG to make an advertising partnership. The news came out in the afternoon and accelerated the slide in the market. MSFT shares jumped on the news, gaining +4.13% to close at $28.24. YHOO, on the other hand, dropped as low as $22.5 before bouncing up to close at $23.52, down 10.06%. GOOG added $7.75, or +1.42%

LEH announced the removal of two top officers from their posts this morning, as the firm took a loss of nearly $3 billion. LEH traded as low as $21.17 from yesterday’s close of $23.75. LEH closed at $22.70, down 4.42%. But, this shake-up did not appear to affect the rest of the financial sector much today. XLF ended the day with a +2.72% gain!

The Dow was up +57.81 points; SPX added +4.38 points; Nasdaq gained +10.34 points:

Techs were a little stronger today with SOX (semiconductors), BTK (biotech), and SWH (software) closing in the green. GLD (gold) was weak again. USO (oil) and UNG (natural gas) both closed with small gains. MOO (agriculture) slid 2.61%. FXI (Chinese ADRs) bounced +2.46%.

SPX

SPX added +4.38 points to close at 1339.87. Its daily MAs and MACD went lower.

Nasdaq

Nasdaq gained +10.34 points to close at 2404.35. It closed just above the 2400 support. But, its 10-day MA went below the 30-day MA and the MACD dropped.

The market still seems weak. Nasdaq is threatening to start a new bearish formation, while SPX has been extending deeper into its bearish phase. The market gave up early gains to squeeze out a win. The better-than-expected retail numbers gave buyers some reasons to jump back in, but, the selling pressure did not go away. Tomorrow, we have the CPI number, which could be a big driving factor in this nervous market. I’m still staying mostly in cash and will look to play on the downside if the CPI number is hot. If not, we’ll have to be patient and see how the market reacts.

Good night and HappyTrading! ™