ADP Employment ... ISM Non-Manufacturing ... EIA Crude Inventories ... Momentum Trading DOW Stocks & ETFs … Stock Market Analysis ...

 
“Trade what you see; not what you think.” – The Old Fool, Richard McCranie, trader extraordinaire.
 
“After a very strong rally off the March lows I am still seeing the masses hate and disavow the rally. That’s good and I love it. But that trend shouldn’t continue. Sooner than later we should see people begin to get excited. I can’t still be one of few people calling this a bull market.” – Paul Schatz, President Heritage Capital.

Political commentary at...
https://michaelpramirez.com/index.html
Yes, it’s very weird.  California was a free state, not a slave state, so slavery reparations in California?
 
ADP EMPLOYMENT CHANGE (CNBC)
“Private sector hiring decelerated in March, flashing another potential sign that U.S. economic growth is heading for a sharp slowdown or recession, payroll processing firm ADP reported Wednesday. Company payrolls rose by just 145,000 for the month, down from an upwardly revised 261,000 in February...” Story at...
https://www.cnbc.com/2023/04/05/adp-march-2023.html
 
ISM NON-MANFUFACTURING INDEX (ISM)
“Economic activity in the services sector expanded in March for the third consecutive month as the Services PMI® registered 51.2 percent, say the nation's purchasing and supply executives in the latest Services ISM® Report On Business®. The sector has grown in 33 of the last 34 months, with the lone contraction in December...There has been a pullback in the rate of growth for the services sector, attributed mainly to (1) a cooling off in the new orders growth rate, (2) an employment environment that varies by industry and (3) continued improvements in capacity and logistics, a positive impact on supplier performance. The majority of respondents report a positive outlook on business conditions.” Report at...
https://www.ismworld.org/supply-management-news-and-reports/reports/ism-report-on-business/services/march/
 
EIA CRUDE INVENTORIES (EIA)
“U.S. commercial crude oil inventories (excluding those in the Strategic Petroleum Reserve) decreased by 3.7 million barrels from the previous week. At 470.0 million barrels, U.S. crude oil inventories are about 4% above the five year average for this time of year.” Report at...
https://ir.eia.gov/wpsr/wpsrsummary.pdf
 
MARKET REPORT / ANALYSIS
-Wednesday the S&P 500 dropped about 0.3% to 4090.
-VIX rose about 0.4% to 19.08.
-The yield on the 10-year Treasury slipped to 3.302%.
 
PULLBACK DATA:
-Drop from Top: 14.8% as of today. 25.4% max (on a closing basis).
-Trading Days since Top: 315-days.
The S&P 500 is 3.7% ABOVE its 200-dMA and 1.5% ABOVE its 50-dMA.
*I won’t call the correction over until the S&P 500 makes a new-high; however, evidence suggests the bottom was in the 3600 area.
 
MY TRADING POSITIONS:
I am not trading as much as in the past. You may wish to use the momentum charts and/or the Monday 40-day gain charts for trading the Dow stocks and ETFs.
XLK – Technology ETF.
XLE – Energy Sector ETF. It hasn’t been doing much recently, but Russia is cutting production and that should help the sector.  We have a good dividend in the meantime.
BA – (Boeing) I am late on this one, but we’ll see. They have more work than they can handle and are hiring. They should do well going forward. Boeing reports earnings 4/26/2023. Boeing was downgraded 4/4/2023 based on fears that they will not be able to ramp up production to meet demand.
XLY - Consumer Discretionary ETF.
KRE – Regional Banking ETF. This is a small position for me.  I have no cash left.
 
SHY – Short term bonds. 30-day yield is 4.6%. (Trailing 1-year yield is 1.3%.) I’ll hold this, but if the market retests the lows, I’ll sell it and buy stocks.)
 
TODAY’S COMMENT:
50-dMA of issues advancing on the NYSE dropped below 50% yesterday and was again below 50% today. Buying pressure minus selling pressure is falling into negative territory indicating that selling pressure is greater now. My Money Trend indicator is a similar indicator, but it is currently looking bullish so no smoking gun.  Nothing really stands out as overly bearish.  I sold leveraged positions due to an abundance of caution.  The WSJ reported today that retail investors are pulling back.  If that continues, markets may see some more trouble. 
 
Today, the daily spread of 20 Indicators (Bulls minus Bears) slipped from +4 to +2 (a positive number is bullish; negatives are bearish); the 10-day smoothed sum that smooths the daily fluctuations improved from +40 to +40. (The trend direction is more important than the actual number for the 10-day value.) These numbers sometimes change after I post the blog based on data that comes in late. Most of these 20 indicators are short-term so they tend to bounce around a lot.
 
LONG-TERM INDICATOR: The Long Term NTSM indicator slipped to HOLD: VOLUME is positive; SENTIMENT, VIX & PRICE are neutral.
 
(The important BUY in this indicator was on 21 October, 7-days after the bottom. For my NTSM overall signal, I suggested that a short-term buying opportunity occurred on 27 September (based on improved market internals on the retest), although without market follow-thru, I was unwilling to call a buy; however, I did close shorts and increased stock holdings. I issued a Buy-Signal on 4 October, 6-days before the final bottom, based on stronger market action that confirmed the market internals signal. The NTSM sell-signal was issued 20 December, 8 sessions before the high of this recent bear market, based on the bearish “Friday Rundown” of indicators.)
 
Bottom line: I remain a Bull.
 
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)
DOW 30 momentum ranking follows:

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
 
WEDNESDAY MARKET INTERNALS (NYSE DATA)

My basket of Market Internals remained HOLD. (Market Internals are a decent trend-following analysis of current market action, but should not be used alone for short term trading. They are most useful when they diverge from the Index.) 
 
 

...My current invested position is about 65% stocks, including stock mutual funds and ETFs. I’m usually about 50% invested in stocks.
 
I trade about 15-20% of the total portfolio using the momentum-based analysis I provide here. If I can see a definitive bottom, I’ll add a lot more stocks to the portfolio using an S&P 500 ETF.