D&D Note (8-14-2012)
Stocks got an early boost from Europe with better-than-expected Q2 GDP numbers from France and Germany. Retail sales in the U.S. gained for the first time in four months which also boosted equities early on in the trading day. The rally however faded into the day leaving markets mixed. Data globally continues to come in just good enough to dampen expectations of central bank easing, at least most poignant in the United States.
Traditionally during Presidential election years markets rally into the elections, then modestly correct and rally into the end of the year. If that holds true this year we would end the year about 18% up in the markets. Although this year we could see a few mini corrections before going full blown into a Santa Claus rally. The Jackson Hole meeting of the FED and the ECB‘s next meeting both could cause pullbacks if investors don’t get what they want (more liquidity sugar).
Not to mention… the elephant in the room, Israel/Iran. Whispers are starting to abound that Israel is planning a strike on nuclear facilities in Iran following the U.S. elections.
What does that all mean? As a bull there could be a few potential buying opportunities coming up in the next month or two. For a bear… well more mattress stuffing.
A big drag on the Nasdaq and S&P 500 today where Cloud related stocks. Almost all companies that deal with the cloud fell on the day. EMC (EMC) down -3.85%, 21Vianet Group (VNET) down -3.55%, Salesforce.com (CRM) down -1.78%, NetApp (NTAP) down -1.23%, Rackspace (RAX) down -1.94%, Red Hat (RHT) -2.23%, VMware (VMW) -2.38%.
13F Filings where released today on what the major hedge funds have added and dropped in their portfolios. Some interesting additions listed where: iShares High Yield Bond ETF (HYG), Market Vectors Oil Services ETF (OIH), Phillips 66 (PSX), and the iShares MSCI Brazil Index ETF (EWZ). And then some highlighted closed positions: Broadcom Corp (BRCM), Yahoo! (YHOO), El Paso Corp (EP), Intel (INTC).
The DOW (INDU) gained 2.71 points at 0.02%. The Nasdaq (COMP) lost 5.54 point at -0.18%. And the S&P 500 (SPX) remained rather UNCH falling just 0.18 points at 0.01%.
Oil gained 69 cents to close at $93.42 a barrel.
Gold lost $10.20 to close at $1,602.40 an ounce.
The 10-Year Note fell pushing yields up to 1.73%.
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