Tail of 2 Days

Please check out my YouTube channel for my audio description of the market this week.  

After the market close on Tuesday, Apple announced a lower revision of

their earnings expectation for the first quarter of 2019. This is crazy since we are about to enter earnings season for fourth quarter of 2018. Regardless it drove the market down hard on Thursday with the exception of Netflix and Verizon.

Apple cited reduced sales in China and the trade war having an impact. I was surprised that Amazon and Alphabet (GOOGL) weren't down more. Amazon just broke below 1500 and Alphabet didn't go below 1022. I felt this was a strong sign.

China's market went up on Friday with the expectation of trade talks sooner than later. It drove the US markets up from open and they rallied more after Fed President Powell spoke with Janet Yellin and Ben Bernanke. The market heard positive news that they are reading the market and inflation is not rising. They don't believe that rates will increase more, but they are all wrong.

Inflation is muted because of the huge drop in oil, gasoline and other commodities. As they rise, they will show in I is real as well as s full employment will drive up the price of goods. The Fed will raise rates as planned 2 to 3 times this year.

With more rate increases, the market will experience more volatility. The

best case for a sustainable rally in the market is from great earnings, larger sales and a trade deal with China. Sales will work themselves out as Americans will experience the largest tax reduction and spend that money.

Trading: Thursday was such a negative day that you could have bought Puts at open or waited for everything to come back near the open price to buy Put Options. Selling at the end of the day was best.

Friday proved to be completely opposite of Thursday and Call Options were the best. I traded QQQ on Thursday and Home Depot on Friday.

Fed Rate Hike = Down Market

The Federal Reserve raised the Federal Funds Rate again as expected. Once that was announced at 2pm, banks went down. Technology stocks moved up after the announcement, but everything fell in the last half hour of trading. I would expect to see more downward movement to start Thursday with a reversal mid day that will turn into a end of the month sell for the last 2 hours and into Friday.

The market is near new highs with many stocks near recent resistance levels that

many stocks moved through, but retracted beneath in the last hour and in the case for Boeing earlier in the week. I drew them up on my watch list to share here.

Based on the higher interest rates, move lower from resistance levels, and end of the month sell off I would expect things to move down for Thursday and Friday. I would expect stocks to break through resistance levels in the next 2 weeks. 

Tech and Media Up, Retail and Banks Down

• With the rise in the Fed Funds Rate you would expect the banks to be up. Interest rates actually dropped this morning and took the banks with them. JP Morgan actually dropped below 108 and bounced up some from there. 
• Boeing spiked up this morning shortly after the market opened to 367 and then fell sharply to 359 where it bounced up. I would expect a bigger bounce for the day on Friday, but don't believe I will be trading it.
• FANG participated to the upside today with Amazon, Netflix and Nvidia hitting new highs today. Alphabet opened up, dipped to where it opened and drove higher until 1:30pm when it gave back 10 points to go up another 5.  I traded the movement from 9:40am to 10:20am for a nice gain. 
• I heard this morning that Amazon Prime membership might have peaked and is feeling pressure from Walmart. Amazon is so much more that just shopping and apparently the market didn't believe that as Amazon hit a new high and Walmart faltered with the rest of retail.
• A retail name that did not falter much was Best Buy. Best Buy trades like a tech on some days and like a retail on others, but more like a tech. 
• Macy's, L Brands, Home Depot, Walmart and almost everything else retail related was down today after there was a very positive number regarding retail price index this morning at 8:30am. Verizon hit a nice bottom around 47.30 where it went up from there. Home Depot hit a bottom around the same time at 198.25. I would expect Home Depot to have it's regular Friday morning run tomorrow and hit 202 by the end of the day.
• Towards the end of the day there was news that the Department of Justice will not challenge the court ruling allowing AT&T to acquire Time Warner. Disney, Comcast and Netflix were up nicely. According to a chart maker, they see Netflix will hit 415 soon.