Even the biggest number-crunchers, the fundamental analysts on Wall Street, peek at the charts when the sledding gets tough, and it’s been very tough lately.
Speaking of gyrations, after the crumbling at the start of trading, the market rebounded into the green and then the battle was joined. With the buy-on-dips crowd making their move, the bears loathe giving up momentum, pouring on the pressure.
The good news is that while the major indices all finished lower, unlike prior sessions this week, the market finished at the low of the day.
By the way, lots of traders are talking about the so-called black crows – the S&P closing at session lows three days in a row. I don't take much stock into those things; in fact, it's been more of a buyers strike than wholesale panic, except in areas like biotechnology, where TV talking heads who missed the entire rally have been chasing people out as quickly as possible.
Broadening out, the chart displays the long-term trend of higher lows, but if we temporarily take out the March 11th low, then on a closing basis, the Dow is looking at 17,164.
So, what should you do about this latest bout of anxiety?
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Friday’s Session
Right now, it looks like the bulls and bears are exhausted as the market will open flat, but the bias is still to the downside. Perhaps nothing reflects this lackluster aura than the third update of Q4-2014 gross domestic product (GDP) reading being unchanged from the previous release of 2.2%, but down from the advance report of 2.6%.
Interestingly, consumer spending is at 4.4%, up from 4.2%, and countering other data points that say the consumer has pulled it in.
Then there’s corporations which lost money during the quarter, but domestically and abroad, still paid out big dividends.
The market is still struggling for some form of leadership, or a catalyst for reversal to the upside. I’m not sure how that happens today. So a session that sees the Dow off less than 100 points could be considered a moral victory.
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