Jobless Claims ... Oil Inventories ... Momentum Trading DOW Stocks & ETFs … Stock Market Analysis ...

 
CHRISTMAS QUIZ: In France, what do children call Santa Claus? Answer at bottom of blog.
 
“Trade what you see; not what you think.” – The Old Fool, Richard McCranie, trader extraordinaire.
 
“I’m worried that his [Trump’s] style of governance, his continuing to pander to anger and frustration versus a constructive approach to solving our problems, is going to be chaotic and not accomplish very much...[he] needs people around him who will push back and help keep him on the straight and narrow.” – Bill Barr, Attorney General under Donald Trump.
 
"You have to have your head in the sand to really be bearish at this juncture. Markets are moving from their fear stage to greed stage. If you look at history, it is an extraordinarily bullish signal for the market." - Andrew Slimmon, senior portfolio manager at Morgan Stanley Investment Management.
          
AS A FORMER PROFESSOR, I’M ASHAMED OF TODAY’S COLLEGE STUDENT (Virginian Pilot)
“As a professor and dean for the last 30 years, I’ve been a lucky man...Today, as I reflect back on my professional life, I have never felt so ashamed. The previous generation, the Greatest Generation, saved the world... But now our young people, in large numbers, along with the leaders of some of our previously great universities, stand in direct opposition to the principles they died for. The latest Programme for International Student Assessment survey was released on Dec. 5. In 2022, nearly 700,000 15-year-old students from 81 Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OCED) members and partner economies took the Programme for International Student Assessment test... We finished 34th in math, ninth in reading, and 16th in science. And where do you think this level of ignorance stops? Not with math, reading and science... “From the river to the sea” has become a campus code for awful things. Of course, consistent with other areas of glaring ignorance, surveys show that fewer than half of today’s campus-based antisemites can even name the river or the sea ... It may be time to marginalize the true haters and their enablers, provide courageous leadership unencumbered by tribalism, and grow up as a nation.” - Steven D. Papamarcos, Ph.D. was a professor at William & Mary; a professor and business school dean at Norfolk State University and St. John’s University in New York. Story at...
https://www.pilotonline.com/2023/12/23/opinion-as-a-former-professor-im-ashamed-of-todays-college-students/
 
JOBLESS CLAIMS (The Hill)
“The number of initial jobless claims rose the week before Christmas as the once-hot labor market continues to cool, according to U.S. Labor Department data released Thursday. Initial applications for unemployment benefits rose by 12,000 to 218,000 for the week ending Dec. 23.” Story at...
https://thehill.com/business/4380201-jobless-claims-rose-for-second-straight-week-after-ticking-up-before-christmas/
 
EIA CRUDE INVENTORIES (EIA)
“U.S. commercial crude oil inventories (excluding those in the Strategic Petroleum Reserve) decreased by 6.9 million barrels from the previous week. At 436.6 million barrels, U.S. crude oil inventories are about 1% below the five year average for this time of year.” Report at...
https://ir.eia.gov/wpsr/wpsrsummary.pdf
 
MARKET REPORT / ANALYSIS
-Thursday the S&P 500 rose about 1pt to 4783.
-VIX dipped about 0.2% to 12.45.
-The yield on the 10-year Treasury rose to 3.846%.
 
PULLBACK DATA:
-Drop from Top: 0.3%. 25.4% max (on a closing basis).
-Trading Days since All-Time Top: 499-days. (The top was 3 January 2022.)
The S&P 500 is 10% ABOVE its 200-dMA and 6.4% ABOVE its 50-dMA.
*I won’t call the correction over until the S&P 500 makes a new-high; however, evidence suggests the major bear-market bottom of the 25% decline was in the 3600 area and we called a buy on 4 October 2022.
 
MY TRADING POSITIONS:
XLK – Technology ETF (holding since the October 2022 lows).
XLY - Consumer Discretionary ETF. (Holding since the October 2022 lows - I bought more XLY 8/21/23.)
 
INTC – Added 12/6/2023.
BA – Added 12/6/2023.
 
DWCPF - Dow Jones U.S. Completion Total Stock Market Index. – Added 12/7/2023. This is a large position in my retirement account betting on Small Caps.
 
TODAY’S COMMENT:
On the year, IWM (Russell 2000) is still underperforming the GSPC (S&P 500) by about 10% as shown in the chart below. The small caps can catch up, assuming the economy doesn’t tank. In other words, the IWM can still outperform the S&P 500 by about 10% until it catches up.
 

Overall, not much change: The Overbought / Oversold Index is no longer overbought and has slipped to a neutral indication.  RSI slipped to neutral, too.  Both are close to overbought so it wouldn’t take too much more bullish movement to send some warning top-signals.
 
Bollinger bands are stretched, but not yet signaling a top. Even if we do see top indication, it is not likely to be more than a 3-5% pullback.
 
On a bullish note, the Short-term, Fosback High/LowLogic indicator improved from neutral to BUY, today. This indicator signalled BUY at the major low (25% decline) in October 2022. Unfortunately, it also signaled BUY around the 31 July high (10% decline) so this short-term indicator is somewhat suspect.
 
The daily spread of 20 Indicators (Bulls minus Bears) declined from +6 to +3 (a positive number is bullish; negatives are bearish); the 10-day smoothed sum that smooths the daily fluctuations declined from +104 to +93. (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: VIX is bullish; PRICE, VOLUME & SENTIMENT are neutral.
 
(The important major BUY in this indicator was on 21 October 2022, 7-days after the bear-market 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 21 December, 9 sessions before the high of this recent bear market, based on the bearish “Friday Rundown” of indicators.)
 
BOTTOM LINE
I remain 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)
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
 
THURSDAY MARKET INTERNALS (NYSE DATA)

My basket of Market Internals remained HOLD. (My basket of Market Internals is 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.)  THIS INDICATOR GET’S CONFUSED WHEN VOLUMES ARE CONSISTENTLY LOW, LIKE DURING THE HOLIDAYS.
 

...My current invested position is about 65% stocks, including stock mutual funds and ETFs. I’m usually about 50% invested in stocks. I’m “over invested” now expecting new, all-time highs this year. That burns all the cash.  I have about 25% of the portfolio in bonds.
 
I trade about 15-20% of the total portfolio using the momentum-based analysis I provide here. When I see a definitive bottom, I add a lot more stocks to the portfolio using an S&P 500 ETF as I did back in October.
 
CHRISTMAS QUIZ: Ans. " In France, the name for Santa is simply Père Noël, which translates to Father Christmas. You might also hear the little ones calling him Papa Noël, but it all amounts to the same thing.” From...
https://lifeinruralfrance.com/what-do-they-call-santa-in-france/#:~:text=In%20France%2C%20the%20name%20for,amounts%20to%20the%20same%20thing.