Monday, August 17, 2009

Today's Market was a Spanking

A quick roundup, starting with three headlines from MarketBeat:

How Low Will It Go?: Is This Pullback the Long-Awaited Correction?
The bears are probably struggling mightily to keep a smirk off their muzzles today....
Sustained Recovery Needed for Stocks to Go Higher

VIX Jump Signals Market Concerns, at Least in Short-Term

From the Wall Street Journal:

Investors Scatter to Safe Havens

Stocks and commodities suffered a broad-based decline Monday as fear spread around the globe that an economic rebound may be further off than previously thought.

Weighing on stocks were fears that U.S. consumers won't resume the sort of brisk spending that has fueled recent expansions. Weak sales data and poor earnings from major chains began to chip away at investors' confidence in a U.S. recovery last week.

Monday, China's Shanghai Composite Index posted its biggest single-day percentage drop since November, falling 5.8% and rattling investors who unloaded riskier bets and rushed into safer havens including the dollar and Treasurys....MORE

And from Schaeffer's Research:

Daily Wrap-up - A 186-Point Loss for the Dow Jones Industrial Average


The day started with a rush of selling and the market wasn't able to get up off the mat. The Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJIA) closed with a loss of 186 points, which was only about 20 points off its lows of the session. The S&P 500 (SPX), Nasdaq Composite (COMP), and Russell 2000 (RUT) each lost well over 2%.

The iShares Treasury Bond (TLT) was the only gainer on my list. The Amex Gold Bugs Index (HUI), PowerShares Clean Energy ETF (PBW), Regional Bank HOLDRS (RKH), and Cyclical Index (CYC) were among the hardest hit groups.

My midday post summed up my overall thoughts on the action. We are pulling back from overbought/overextended levels. Today's drop, while relatively dramatic to what we have seen recently, wasn't enough to push the broad market indexes to oversold levels or to support. In other words, we are still in the middle of the "wiggle room" I discussed last week. And that is where I will pick up in the morning. Have a nice evening...


Chart Courtesy of Thomson Reuters



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