Portfolio Management
Sector & Industry Stack-Up… Makes Sense, But Look at Bigger Picture
After a multi-week slump, financial stocks finally took off and led last week’s gains. Given how badly they’d underperformed since mid-September, any marketwide bullish tide should continue to prove very fruitful for the group.
On the losing end of the spectrum were health care stocks, though they still ended the week with a small gain.
Sector Rank
Here’s [...]
Stock Picks to Survive the Market’s Next Slaughter - CPL, TU, CMCSA, STZ, SYY, CCU
Which stocks are the best ones to own if this threat of a bear market is actually an omen of a double-dip recession? STZ, CMCSA, SYY, TU, CPL, CCU are a starting point.
Stop the Market, I Want to Get Off
Is that how you feel right now? You want to get off this crazy ride? If you’re like most investors, probably so. Here’s some perspective that will help you navigate through what is hopefully the last part of a volatile period (for better or worse).
First and foremost, know that a meltdown isn’t a forgone conclusions. [...]
May - In Like a Lion, Out Like a Lion
May was in like a lion, and out like a lion - stocks lost more than 8% for the month, which was the single worst month since the bull market began back in March of 2009. An omen of more trouble to come? There’s certainly not a lack of arguments to suggest that. On the [...]
Consumer Staples Wave a Red Flag - SYY, WMT, TSN, HRL Up
Tuesday was brutal for stocks, again, with the S&P 500 closing 1.4% lower to end the session at 1120.80. It was the tenth losing day of the last sixteen, and of those ten losing days, each has been made on higher volume than the previous day; none of the winners were technical ‘accumulation’.
While that clue [...]
Sector Performance Means Little, Industry Results More Telling - 05/14
Don’t read too much into last week’s sector result - it was more about a dead-cat bounce, where the harder a sector fell, the firmer the short-term bounce was. The coming week’s results along with the four-week results at the end of the coming week will really be a more telling description of any bigger-picture [...]
Add the NASDAQ’s Up & Down Volume, VXN to the List
Pick any index you want…. the Dow, S&P 500, or the NASDAQ - the story isn’t too different any way you go. While Monday’s bounce was encouraging, Thursday’s pullback and Friday’s harsh downside follow-through suggests the bulls are not ready to muster a permanent rebound yet.
The composite gained 3.58% for the week - the bulk [...]
The Rest of the ‘Sell in May’ Story
It’s that time of year again - time to “Sell in May and go away”, since the market’s average monthly returns suggest the beginning of May through the end of September is not only a weak patch, but usually so weak that this five month period is a net loser.
Are you actually going to take [...]
Sector Rotation Waving a Small Red Flag… So Far
Nothing was all that dramatic last week on the sector front in terms of total gains or losses. Yet, it was a huge week in terms of the paradigm shift we saw unfold. How so? It’s just that the market’s biggest habitual losers suddenly because the biggest winner (relatively), and the market’s strongest sectors of [...]
Retail Reality Check – Comparing March to What Number?
On the surface, the retail sales numbers unveiled last week looked at least promising for all merchants, and downright amazing for a few of these names. Take Saks Inc. (NYSE:SKS) and Nordstrom Inc. (NYSE:JWN), for instance. Saks saw a 12.7% increase in same-store sales last month, while Nordstrom fostered a 16.8% [...]
