Retail Sales ... Industrial Production ... Momentum Trading DOW Stocks & ETFs … Stock Market Analysis ...

 
“Trade what you see; not what you think.” – The Old Fool, Richard McCranie, trader extraordinaire.
 
“Far more money has been lost by investors in preparing for corrections, or anticipating corrections, than has been lost in the corrections themselves.” - Peter Lynch, former manager of Fidelity’s Magellan® fund.
 
"This is maybe the most dangerous market of my career, and that includes 1987's crash, that includes the savings and loan debacle market of the early '90s, that includes the 1999 to 2009 lost decade in the S&P 500 in the dot-com bubble. This is the most difficult market of my 45 years." -  Bill Smead, Smead Value Fund (SMVLX).
 
RETAIL SALES (Reuters)
“The largest decline in sales in four months reported by the Commerce Department on Tuesday added to moderate job growth last month in suggesting that domestic demand was softening... Retail sales fell 0.9% last month, the largest decrease since January, after a downwardly revised 0.1% dip in April...” Story at... 
https://www.reuters.com/business/retail-consumer/us-retail-sales-fall-sharply-may-2025-06-17/
 
INDUSTRIAL PRODUCTION (Bloomberg)
“US industrial production fell in May for the second time in three months as utility output declined and manufacturers struggled for traction against a backdrop of cooler demand. The 0.2% decrease in production at factories, mines and utilities followed a revised 0.1% gain a month earlier...” Story at...
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2025-06-17/us-industrial-output-declines-for-second-time-in-three-months
 
MARKET REPORT / ANALYSIS
-Tuesday the S&P 500 declined about 0.8% to 5983.
-VIX rose about 13% to 21.60.
-The yield on the 10-year Treasury declined to 4.399% (compared to about this time prior market day).
 
MY TRADING POSITIONS:
SPY – added 6/5/2025
 
CURRENT SUMMARY OF APPROXIMATELY 50 INDICATORS:
Today, of the 50-Indicators I track, 8 gave Bear-signs and 14 were Bullish. The rest are neutral. (It is normal to have a lot of neutral indicators since many of the indicators are top or bottom indicators that will signal only at extremes.)

TODAY’S COMMENT

The daily, bull-bear spread of 50-indicators slipped, and remained barely Bullish at +6 (6 more Bull indicators than Bear indicators). I consider +5 to -5 the neutral zone. The 10-dMA of the spread has reversed to the downside – a bearish sign. One can see from the above chart, a breakdown of the 10-dMA of Spread (purple line) often indicates a declining market.
 
Retail Sales and Industrial Production down? Not a good sign. It is not surprising to see indicators falling with the economy slowing and a middle east conflict underway. Some of the reports on declining retail sales noted that part of the reason was that sales had been pulled forward by buyers trying to beat the tariffs. Dan Niles, founder of Niles Investment Management, is bearish as he looks into the fall for that reason. Sounds reasonable to me. It will be interesting to see what the FED says about the economy tomorrow, Wednesday, when their meeting concludes. For now, I’ll worry if the lower trend-line is violated.

 
I’m still looking for new highs, but we’ll see. The S&P 500 is about 2.6% below its all-time high of 6144 on 19 February and it has been in this zone for a while.
 
BOTTOM LINE
I am cautiously Bullish.
 
ETF - MOMENTUM ANALYSIS:
TODAY’S RANKING OF 15 ETFs (Ranked Daily) ETF ranking follows:
 
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
 
DOW STOCKS - TODAY’S MOMENTUM RANKING OF THE DOW 30 STOCKS (Ranked Daily)

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
 
DAY MARKET INTERNALS (NYSE DATA)

My basket of Market Internals remained HOLD. (My basket of Market Internals is a decent trend-following analysis that is most useful when it diverges from the Index.) 
 
 
 

My current invested position is about 50% stocks, including stock mutual funds and ETFs. 50% invested in stocks is a normal, conservative position for a retiree. (75% is my max stock allocation when I am confident that markets will continue higher; 30% in stocks is my Bear market position.)
                                             
I trade about 15-20% of the total portfolio using the momentum-based analysis I provide here. When I see bullish signs, I add a lot more stocks to the portfolio, usually by using an S&P 500 ETF as I did back in October 2022 and 2023.