Markets opened lower on Monday prior to DIA diverging to the downside.  SPY opened down 0.11%, DIA opened 0.05% lower, and QQQ gapped down 0.22%.  At that point, QQQ rallied sharply to recross the opening gap and reach the high of the day at 10:20 a.m. before selling off sharply again, finding the low of the day at 11:30 a.m.  From there, QQQ slowly rallied slowly back up across the gap before meandering sideways around Friday’s closing level and closing on the plus side.  Meanwhile, after its open, SPY slowly meandered back up across the opening gap to find its high of the day at 10:20 a.m. Then it traded in-sync with QQQ, selling off hard to reach the low of the day at 11:35 a.m. and then slowly drifting higher but never quite getting back to its opening level.  For its part, after the open, DIA immediately sold off sharply until 11:30 a.m. and then traded sideways along the lows the rest of the day. This action gave us divergent daily candles. SPY printed a black-body Doji that retested its T-line (8ema) and passed that test.  DIA gave us a large, black-bodied candle that also retested its T-line and closed just barely above.  Finally, QQQ printed a white-bodied candle (that retested and passed the test of its T-line) that was about half lower wick.  This happened on below average volume in all three major index ETFs.

On the day, nine of the 10 sectors were in the red with Communication Services (-1.25%) out in front, leading the market lower.  On the other side, Technology (+0.16%) was the only sector in the green.  Meanwhile, SPY lost 0.16%, DIA lost 0.76%, and QQQ gained 0.19%.  VXX was just on the plus-side of flat to close at 51.35 and T2122 dropped all the way back into the bottom third of its mid-range to close at 33.14.  At the same time, 10-Year bond yields fell to close at 4.192% while Oil (WTI) climbed 1.68% to close at $70.38 per barrel. So, the Bulls were in-charge pretty much all day on what was also an indecisive day.  NFLX (+11.09%) was among the leaders of this charge after its blowout earnings Thursday evening.  (For the week, SPY gained 0.86%, DIA gain 0.91%, and QQQ gained 0.22%.  This was the sixth-straight week of gains for all three major index ETFs.)

The major economic news scheduled for Monday was limited to the September US Leading Economic Indicators Index, which came in lower than expected at -0.5% (compared to a -0.3% forecast and a -0.3% August reading).

In Fed news, on Monday, Dallas Fed President Logan indicated she sees both more rate cuts and Balance Sheet shrinkage ahead. She said, “The economy is strong and stable, but, meaningful uncertainties remain in the outlook.” Logan continued, “If the economy evolves as I currently expect, a strategy of gradually lowering the policy rate toward a more normal or neutral level can help manage the risks and achieve our goals.” Regarding Quantitative Tightening, she said, “At present, liquidity appears to be more than ample” … “one sign liquidity remains in abundant supply, and not merely ample, is that money market rates continue to generally run well below the Fed’s interest on reserve balances rate.”  She went on to say that the FOMC should be able to tolerate normal, temporary volatility in the money markets. However, she went on to say that, “reducing the (reverse repo) interest rate could incentivize participants to return funds to private markets.”  However, Logan concluded by saying that getting mortgage bonds off the Fed Balance Sheet is “not a near-term issue in my view.” (i.e. not a massive priority).

Later, Minneapolis Fed President Kashkari said he also expects modest rate cuts ahead.  Kashkari said, “Right now I see modest cuts over the next several quarters.”  However, he also indicated that a weakening of the labor market might need to be met with stronger cuts.  He said, “If we saw a weakening, like real evidence that the labor market is weakening quickly, then that would tell me, as one policymaker, ‘Hey, maybe we ought to bring down our interest rate more quickly than I currently expect,’” Kashkari continued, “We want to keep the labor market strong and we want to get inflation back down to our 2% target.”  He then concluded with the normal Fed boiler plate statement that “interest rates will depend on the data.”  Elsewhere, Kansas City Fed President Schmid said that he supports “a cautious and deliberate” approach to rate cuts.  Schmid said, “While I support dialing back the restrictiveness of policy, my preference would be to avoid outsized moves, especially given uncertainty over the eventual destination of policy and my desire to avoid contributing to financial market volatility.” He continued, “Lowering rates in a gradual fashion would provide time to observe the economy’s reaction to our interest rate adjustments and give us the space to assess at what level interest rates are neither restricting nor boosting the economy.”  Finally, San Francisco Fed President Daly said Monday that she has not seen anything to suggest the FOMC would stop cutting interest rates.  She said interest rates are “absolutely still high enough that they are restraining the economy.”

After the close, BOKF, CADE, NUE, SAP, and ZION all reported beats on both the revenue and earnings lines. Meanwhile, AGNC, ARE, SIGI, and WTFC beat on the revenue line while missing on earnings.  On the other side, MEDP and WRB missed on revenue while beating on earnings.  However, TFII missed on both the top and bottom lines.

In stock news, on Monday, RCDOF announced it plans to divest its Defense business in order to focus on Environmental Consulting.  (No details were announced, but they recently got a $385 million US Army contract extension that runs through 2027.) Later, XLMDF announced it has a conditional agreement to sell its North American business to SRAD for $30 million in cash ($20 million up front and up to $10 million based on unit performance). At the same time, SNY said it has entered exclusive talks to sell a 50% controlling stake in its consumer health unit to private equity firm Clayton Dubilier & Rice. (The unit had been valued at $17 billion earlier this year.)

Meanwhile, UBS announced it agreed to a deal to sell a 50% stake in the Swisscard business acquired in the CS acquisition to AXP.  (The terms of the deal were not disclosed.) At the same time, DIS announced it will appoint former MS CEO Gorman as the new DIS Chairman in as of January. Later, SAN announced it has launched a digital bank in the US to help it fund over $30 billion in auto lending and broaden its retail banking reach in the US market.  At the same time, shipping giant AMKAF (Maersk Moeller) raised its profit outlook on what it called a “strong shipping market.”  Later, according to the Wall Street Journal, activist investor JCP Investment Mgmt., which has a 2% stake in the company, has issued a letter urging CAKE to spinoff three of its smaller brands (North Italia, Flower Child, and Culinary Dropouts).

In AI news, LUMN announced a strategic partnership with META aimed at increasing network capacity to support the META AI infrastructure. Later, HON announce it had signed a deal with GOOGL to bring the latter’s AI technology to the industrial data market.  At the same time, IBM announced it launched a new AI model called Granite 3.0. (The model is open source, but IBM sells a paid version to be run on enterprise data centers.) Later, MSFT announced they will allow customers to build autonomous artificial intelligence agents using its Copilot Studio application starting in November.  (This is a move to compete with CRM, which is already offering such AI agents for particular business tasks.) At the same time, QCOM announced that it is bringing chips designed for laptop CPUs to its mobile phone offerings. (The idea is to make phone processing more powerful to support AI.)  Meanwhile, MEAT announced a batch of AI models, including one specifically created to check the quality of other AI models.

In stock legal and governmental news, on Monday, Nigeria blocked the SHEL sale of its entire Nigerian onshore and shallow-water operations for $2.4 billion.  However, at the same time, Nigeria approved a similar deal for the sale of XOM’s operations for $1.28 billion.  At the same time, the High Court of London ruled that BHP is “cynically trying to avoid responsibility” for Brazil’s worst environmental disaster (which came after a dam holding BHP mining waste collapsed).  This came as the $47 billion lawsuit began its final phase with 600k Brazilians, 46 local governments, and about 2k Brazilian companies as the plaintiffs. (BHP had argued the case should be thrown out because it had paid almost $8 billion to everyone effected in Brazil.) 

Elsewhere, LLY filed suit against three more medical spas (online vendors) of products that claim to contain the main ingredient of its popular Zepbound weight-loss medicine.  At the same time, investment advisor WisdomTree Asset Mgmt. agreed to pay $4 million to settle SEC charges of misleading marketing of three funds (greenwashing).  Later, movie studio Alcon Entertainment sued TSLA and WBD, alleging the defendants used images from the file “Blade Runner 2049” in the promotion of TSLA’s new cycbercab. Meanwhile, a bipartisan group of dozens of Congressmen (52 in total) urged the White house to toughen the sanctions on Russia and specifically questioned sanction exceptions for oilfield services firm SLB.

In miscellaneous news, on Monday, South Korea and Ukrainian intelligence services confirmed North Korea has sent 10k troops to fight on behalf of Russia.  This includes some North Korean special forces troops.  Elsewhere, the disgraced ex-President continued to spread lies and long-debunked conspiracy claims about FEMA hurricane relief efforts at campaign events in NC on Monday.  (Once again, FEMA and NC officials had to try to correct the serial-liar’s spew in hope people will not forgo (and as was recently seen) even hinder the recovery.)  Meanwhile, his opponent, Vice President Harris, called for an unspecified increase to federal minimum wage levels in campaign events in PA, MI, and WI.  The events held alongside several Republican supporters (like former Congresswoman Liz Cheney), who support Harris but did not comment on Harris’ minimum wage call. At the same time, the FTC rule banning fake online reviews went into effect Monday. (The rules allow the agency to issue penalties of up to $51,744 per violation for knowing violations of the rule.)  Finally, Germany’s six-month trial with a four-day workweek has ended.  However, Bloomberg reports that many of the 45 businesses that participated in the experiment will not go back.  (73% of the participating companies said they were prepared to either extend the experiment or make the change permanent.)

In Middle East news, on Monday, Israel continued its attacks on both Gaza and Lebanon.  In the latter, Israel said it had bombed 32 targets ranging from the North of the country to the South.  However, the largest batch of Israeli bombing strikes was in Beirut where numerous buildings were collapsed.  This included the headquarters of what Israel (and the US) called Hezbollah’s bank (Al-Qard Al-Hassan, which translates to “benevolent loan”) which Israel also designated as a “terrorist organization.”  (It is worth noting that while the bank has links to Hezbollah, it also is involved in Lebanese government, NGO/charity, and civilian banking.)  Meanwhile, US intelligence services said they were investigating online leaks of US surveillance data showing preparations for Israel’s retaliatory strike on Iran.  (The leaked information included satellite images and written materials showing Israel is preparing long-range missiles and drone attacks.  The information also said Israel would not use a nuclear weapon.  The latter had not even been part of public discussion given there were no casualties and limited damage from Iran’s missiles and those were in response for Israeli bombings in Iran.)

Overnight, Asian markets were mostly in the red with just the three Chinese exchanges in the green.  Japan (-1.39%), India (-1.25%), and Thailand (-1.24%) paced the losses.  In Europe, with the lone exception of Oslo (+0.37%) we see red across the board at midday.  The CAC (-0.76%), DAX (-0.35%), and FTSE (-0.75%) lead the region lower in early afternoon trade.  In the US, as of 7:30 a.m., Futures are pointing toward a second straight down open.  The DIA implies a -0.44% open, the SPY is implying a -0.45% open, and the QQQ implies a -0.51% open at this hour.  At the same time, 10-Year bond yields have hit 4.20% while Oil (WTI) popped another 0.94% to $71.22 per barrel in early trading.

The major economic news scheduled for Tuesday is limited to the API Weekly Crude Oil Stocks report (4:30 p.m.).  We also hear from Fed member Harker (10 a.m.).  Major earnings reports scheduled for before the open include MMM, AOS, DHR, FI, FCX, GE, GM, GPC, HRI, IPG, IVZ, KMB, LMT, MCO, NSC, PCAR, PNR, PM, PII, PHM, DGX, RTX, SHW, and VZ.  Then, after the close, AGR, BKR, CNI, CSGP, EWBC, ENVA, MTDR, NBR, PKG, PFSI, RRC, RHI, STX, LRN, TXN, VMI, VLRS, and WFRD report.

In economic news later this week, on Wednesday, September Existing Home Sales, EIA Weekly Crude Oil Inventories, and the Fed Beige Book.  We also hear from Fed Governor Bowman.  On Thursday, we get September Building Permits, Weekly initial Jobless Claims, Weekly Continuing Jobless Claims, Preliminary Oct. S&P Global Mfg. PMI, Preliminary Oct. S&P Services PMI, Preliminary Oct. Composite PMI, Sept. New Home Sales, and the Fed Balance Sheet.  Finally, on Friday, Preliminary Sept. Core Durable Goods Orders, Preliminary Sept. Durable Goods, Michigan Consumer Sentiment, Michigan Consumer Sentiment, Michigan 1-Year Inflation Expectations, and Michigan 5-Year Inflation Expectations are reported.

In terms of earnings reports later this week, on Wednesday, APH, T, AVY, BA, BSX, CME, KO, CSTM, DB, EVR, GEV, GD, HLT, KBR, LII, LAD, COOP, EDU, NEE, NTRS, ODFL, BPOP, PRG, ROP, TMHC, TDY, TMO, TRU, TNL, UNF, VRT, WAB, WSO, WGO, ALGN, AMP, ASGN, CACI, CP, CLS, CCS, CHDN, CYH, FAF, GL, GGG, ICLR, IBM, KALU, KNX, LRCX, LVS, MAT, MOH, NEM, ORLY, OII, PTEN, PLXS, RJF, ROL, SEIC, NOW, TMUS, TER, TSLA, TYL, URI, VLTO, WCN, WFG, WU, and WHR report.  On Thursday, we hear from ADT, ALLE, AAL, AIT, AMBP, BFH, BC, CRS, CARR, CBRE, DAR, COV, DOW, DTE, EQNR, EEFT, FCFS, FSV, FCN, GTX, HOG, HAS, HON, KDP, KKR, LH, LEA, LTH, LKQ, MSM, NDAQ, NOC, ORI, POOL, RDUS, RS, RCI, R, SPGI, SAH, LUV, TAL, FTI, TECK, TXT, TSCO, TPH, UNP, UPS, VLO, VC, WST, WEX, ATR, AJG, SAM, BYD, COF, CSL, CINF, FIX, DECK, DXCM, DLR, EW, HIG, LHX, MTX, MHK, NOV, OLN, DOC, PFG, RMD, SKX, SSNC, TXRH, TROX, UHS, VALE, WDC, WY, and WKC. Finally, on Friday, AON, AN, AVTR, BAH, CNC, CL, GNTX, HCA, NYCB, NWL, POR, SAIA, and SNY report.

So far this morning, MMM, BKU, DHR, FI, GE, GM, IPG, IVZ, MCO, PNR, PHM, DGX, and RTX all reported beats on both the revenue and earnings lines.  At the same time, AOS, KMB, PM, and VZ all missed on revenue while beating on earnings.  On the other side, HRI beat on revenue while missing on earnings.  However, GPC, PII, and SHW missed on both the top and bottom lines.

With that background, it looks like the Bears are in charge again early in all three major index ETFs. SPY and QQQ are again retesting their T-line (8ema) while DIA gapped down through its 8ema. All three are also mostly black body with a lower wick at this point. With that said, two of the three remain above their T-line with the third gapping below. So, the short-term trend remains modestly bullish. The mid-term and longer-term trends are obviously still strongly Bullish in all three. With regard to extension, none of the major index ETFs are too far extended from its T-line (8ema). In addition, the T2122 indicator is now back in the lower half of its mid-range. So, markets have room to run either direction if traders can find momentum, but the Bulls have just a little more slack to work with today. With regard to those 10 big dog tickers, nine of the 10 are in the red this morning. TSLA (-0.70%) leads on price move lower. The biggest dog, NVDA (+0.19%) is the only green member of the big dogs and has treaded 4.5 times as much dollar-volume as the next closest ticker so far this morning. (For what its worth, this has been typical of bullish days this year.)

As always, be deliberate and disciplined…but don’t be stubborn. If you have a loss, admit you were wrong and take that loss before it gets out of hand. And when the price does move in your direction, always move your stops in your favor and take a little profit off the table. You have to keep the “Legend of the Man in the Green Bathrobe” in mind. In a winning situation, it is NOT HOUSE MONEY you’re betting, it’s YOUR MONEY! There is no reason to keep raising your bet (risk) size just because you’ve had a win. Finally, remember that trading is not a hobby, it’s a job. The gains are real and so is the risk. So, treat it that way. Do the work and follow the process. Stick to your trading rules, trade with the trend, and take those profits when you have them. Do the work!

See you in the trading room.

Ed

🎯 Mike Probst: Rick, Got CTL off the scanner today. Already up 30%. Love it.

🎯 Dick Carp: the scanner paid for the year with HES-thank you

🎯 Arnoldo Bolanos: LTA scanner really works $$, thanks Ed.

🎯 Bob S: LTA is incredible…. I use it … would not trade without it

🎯 Malcolm .: Posted in room 2, @Rick… I used the LTA Scanner to go through hundreds of stocks this weekend and picked out three to trade:  PYPL, TGT, and ZS.   Quality patterns and with my trading, up 24%, 7% and 12%…. this program is gold.

🎯 Friday 6/21/19  (10:09 am) Aaron B: Today, my account is at +190% since January. Thanks, RWO HRC Flash Malcolm Thomas Steve Ed Bob S Bob C Mike P and everyone that contributes every day. I love our job.

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