“Weekly applications for unemployment benefits fell 11,000 last week to a seasonally adjusted 271,000, the Labor Department said Thursday. The less volatile 4-week average was essentially unchanged at 271,000.” Story at…
http://abcnews.go.com/Business/wireStory/fewer-americans-filed-unemployment-aid-week-35818582
PHILLY FED – NEGATIVE AGAIN (MarketWatch)
“A measure of manufacturing activity in the Philadelphia area fell back into negative territory in December, another indicator of the difficult times facing the manufacturing sector. The Philadelphia Fed said on Thursday that its manufacturing index in December fell to negative 5.9, the third month in the last four where the readings were below zero.” Story at…
http://www.marketwatch.com/story/philadelphia-fed-manufacturing-index-returns-to-negative-level-for-december-2015-12-17
LEI (Bloomberg)
“The Conference Board’s measure of the economic outlook for the next three to six months rose 0.4 percent after climbing 0.6 percent in October, the New York-based research group said Thursday.” Story at…
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2015-12-17/leading-u-s-economic-indicators-increased-0-4-in-november
MARKET REPORT / ANALYSIS
-Thursday, the S&P 500 fell about 1.5% to 2042 at the close.
-VIX rose about 6% to 18.94.
-The yield on the 10-year Treasury fell to 2.24.
Market Internals remain positive relative to the S&P 500; thus I remain bullish in the short-term. This methodology appears to be a significant improvement in market analysis so it will be interesting going forward to see how this indicator works out.
Thursday was another statistically-significant down-day and that means simply that the price-volume move exceeded my statistical parameters and, in about 60% of the time, that leads to an up-day the next session.
The Traders Index (TRIN) was 3.2 at the close and that is a relatively high number that usually indicates a bottom. This is good for the bulls.
MARKET INTERNALS (NYSE DATA)
(I am getting data from various sites. Some of the numbers are subject to minor revision later today so the previous day’s numbers may be slightly different than reported previously.)
The 10-day moving average of the percentage of stocks advancing (NYSE) rose to 42.7% Thursday vs. 41.1% Wednesday. (A number below 50% is usually BAD news for the markets. On a longer term, the 150-day moving average of advancing stocks dipped to 48.6%. A value below 50% indicates a down trend.
The McClellan Oscillator (a Breadth measure) declined and remained negative Thursday.
New-lows outpaced New-highs Thursday. The spread (new-highs minus new-lows) was minus-142. (It was -70 Wednesday.) The 10-day moving average of the change in spread was -1 Thursday. In other words, over the last 10-days, on average; the spread has decreased by 1 each day. Market Internals remain neutral Thursday, but are trending slightly upward. They were so bad that this indicator may take a while to improve.
NTSM
Thursday, Sentiment, Price, Volume & VIX indicators are neutral.
MY INVESTED STOCK POSITION:
TSP (RETIREMENT ACCOUNT – GOV EMPLOYEES) ALLOCATION
Thursday I increased my invested position in my retirement account to 50% invested in stocks thru an S&P 500 Index fund (“C”-fund in the TSP).
I may not maintain a bullish stance for long; I’ll just see what the indicators have to say and I will move on the short term indicators.
