Friday, March 12, 2021

Producer Price Index ... Univ of Michigan Sentiment … Coronavirus (Covid-19) … Stock Market Analysis … ETF Trading … Dow 30 Ranking

“Trade what you see; not what you think.” – The Old Fool, Richard McCranie, trader extraordinaire.

 

“The big money is not in the buying and selling. But in the waiting.” - Charlie Munger, Vice Chairman, Berkshire Hathaway

 

This country was founded by the bayonet; it survives by the ballot.  Those who falsely disparage the honesty of our elections are striking a blow at the foundations of our nation and should be charged with sedition.” – Meade Stith

 

PPI (Reuters)

“U.S. producer prices increased strongly in February, leading to the largest annual gain in nearly 2-1/2 years, but considerable slack in the labor market could make it harder for businesses to pass on the higher costs to consumers... In the 12 months through February, the PPI accelerated 2.8%, the most since October 2018.” Story at...

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-economy/u-s-producer-prices-increase-underlying-inflation-moderate-idUKKBN2B41LT

 

UNIV OF MICHIGAN SENTIMENT (Sharecast.com)

“US consumer sentiment improved by more than expected at the start of the month, led by improved expectations, the results of a very closely-followed survey revealed. The University of Michigan's consumer confidence index strengthened from a reading of 76.8 at the end of February to 83.0.” Story at...

https://www.sharecast.com/news/international-economic/american-consumer-confidence-jumps-in-early-march-university-of-michigan-says--7840421.html

 

CORONAVIRUS (NTSM)

Here’s the latest from the COVID19 Johns Hopkins website as of 6:00pm Friday Wednesday. US total case numbers are on the left axis; daily numbers are on the right side of the graph with the 10-dMA of daily numbers in Green.

 

Ruh-roh! New cases more than doubled today, according to the Johns Hopkins website.


MARKET REPORT / ANALYSIS

-Friday the S&P 500 rose about 0.1% to 3943.

-VIX fell about 6% to 20.69.

-The yield on the 10-year Treasury rose to 1.629%.

 

I noted yesterday that the advance was broad with 15.6% of stocks making all-time highs on the NYSE. I should have said “15.6% of issues” made all-time highs. I don’t have access to stock-only data for the NYSE.  That makes my numbers higher than some, but they are still valid; breadth looks good.   

 

Here’s Friday’s run-down of some important indicators. These tend to be both long-term and short-term, so they are somewhat different than the 20 that I report on daily.

 

BULL SIGNS

-The smoothed advancing volume on the NYSE is rising.

-The 10-dMA of issues advancing on the NYSE (Breadth) is above 50%

-The 50-dMA % of issues advancing on the NYSE (Breadth) is above 50%.

-The 100-dMA of the % of issues advancing on the NYSE (Breadth) is above 50%.

-Cyclical Industrials (XLI-ETF) are outperforming the S&P 500.

-The size of up-moves has been larger than the size of down-moves over the last month.

-My Money Trend indicator is bullish.

-MACD of the percentage of issues advancing on the NYSE (breadth) made a bullish crossover 10 Mar

-MACD of S&P 500 price made a bullish crossover 11 Mar.

-McClellan Oscillator is positive.

-8 Mar, the 52-week, New-high/new-low ratio improved by 3.5 standard deviations – very bullish and also rare.

-There have been 7 Statistically Significant days in the last 15-days. This signal can be Bearish or Bullish. This time the Index has bounced higher, so its bullish.

-Long-term new-high/new-low data is rising.

-Short-term new-high/new-low data is rising.

-The 5-10-20 Timer System is BUY; the 5-dEMA and 10-dEMA are both above the 20-dEMA. 

-Slope of the 40-dMA of New-highs is rising.

-93% of the 15-ETFs that I track have been up over the last 10-days – bullish.

-The S&P 500 is outperforming Utilities ETF (XLU).

 

NEUTRAL

-Bollinger Bands extended, but neutral.

-Breadth on the NYSE compared to the S&P 500 index is neutral.

-VIX is neutral.

-The Fosback High-Low Logic Index is neutral.

-RSI.

-Non-crash Sentiment indicator remains neutral, but it is too bullish and that means it is leaning bearish.

-The market has broadened out; 14.3% of all issues traded on the NYSE made new, 52-week highs when the S&P 500 made a new all-time-high today, 12 Mar. (there is no bullish signal for this indicator.)

-The Smart Money (late-day action) is mixed. This indicator is based on the Smart Money Indicator (a variant of the indicator developed by Don Hayes).

-We’ve seen 6 up-days over the last 10-days. Neutral. (There have been 4 straight up-days so Monday would be expected to be down – markets don’t go up forever.)

-There have been 9 up-days over the last 20 days. Neutral

-Statistically, the S&P 500 gave a panic-signal, 27 January. The signal has expired.

 

BEAR SIGNS

-Overbought/Oversold Index (Advance/Decline Ratio) is overbought.

-Distribution warnings. There have been 7 Distribution days in the last 25-trading days.

-The S&P 500 is 12.8% above its 200-dMA (Sell point is 12%.); when Sentiment is considered, the signal is bearish, too.

 

On Friday, 21 February, 2 days after the top of the Coronavirus pullback, there were 10 bear-signs and 1 bull-sign. Now there are 3 bear-signs and 18 bull-signs. Last week, there were 11 bear-signs and 6 bull-signs.

 

The daily sum of 20 Indicators slipped from +11 to +10 (a positive number is bullish; negatives are bearish); the 10-day smoothed sum that smooths the daily fluctuations improved from +4 to +22 (These numbers sometimes change after I post the blog based on data that comes in late.) Most of these indicators are short-term and many are trend following.

 

The Long Term NTSM indicator ensemble remained BUY. Price and Volume are bullish; Sentiment & VIX are neutral.

 

There are not many negative signs around. The S&P 500 remains relatively stretched above its 200-dMA. I think that will remain stretched. Investors are focusing on the unprecedented fiscal stimulus and the extreme FED-support keeping interest rates down. 

 

I remain bullish.

 

MOMENTUM ANALYSIS:

TODAY’S RANKING OF 15 ETFs (Ranked Daily)

The top ranked ETF receives 100%. The rest are then ranked based on their momentum relative to the leading

ETF.

*For additional background on the ETF ranking system see NTSM Page at…

http://navigatethestockmarket.blogspot.com/p/exchange-traded-funds-etf-ranking.html

 

TODAY’S RANKING OF THE DOW 30 STOCKS (Ranked Daily)

Here’s the revised DOW 30 and its momentum analysis. The top ranked stock receives 100%. The rest are then ranked based on their momentum relative to the leading stock.

For more details, see NTSM Page at…

https://navigatethestockmarket.blogspot.com/p/a-system-for-trading-dow-30-stocks-my_8.html

 

FRIDAY MARKET INTERNALS (NYSE DATA)

Market Internals remained BULLISH on the market. Market Internals are a decent trend-following analysis of current market action, but should not be used alone for short term trading. They are usually right, but they are often late.  They are most useful when they diverge from the Index. 

 

Using the Short-term indicator in 2018 in SPY would have made a 5% gain instead of a 6% loss for buy-and-hold. The methodology was Buy on a POSITIVE indication and Sell on a NEGATIVE indication and stay out until the next POSITIVE indication. The back-test included 13-buys and 13-sells, or a trade every 2-weeks on average.  

 


As of 9 March, my stock-allocation is about 60% invested in stocks. You may wish to have a higher or lower % invested in stocks depending on your risk tolerance. 50% is a conservative position that I consider fully invested for most retirees.

 

As a retiree, 50% in the stock market is about fully invested for me – it is a cautious and conservative number. If I feel very confident, I might go to 60%; if a correction is deep enough, and I can call a bottom, 80% would not be out of the question.

 

The markets have not retested the lows on recent corrections and that left me under-invested on the bounces. I will need to put less reliance on retests in the future.