Stock Market Today: February 12th - 16th, 2024

Top of the afternoon StonkForumers! Happy Tuesday to all of you and welcome to the new trading day and a frrrrrrrrrrrresh start. Here is a quick check on those futures as we are over 2 hours into the US cash market open.

GLTA on this Tuesday, February the 13th, 2024!

 

Morning Lineup - 2/13/24 - On Second Thought
Tue, Feb 13, 2024

Futures are getting off to a sluggish start this morning. US equity futures are lower as investors take a step back and assess whether sentiment towards equities has gotten a bit too giddy. Bank of America’s Fund Manager survey showed an increase in allocations to US equities, specifically in tech where exposure to the sector reached its highest level since August of 2020. That’s a far cry from November 2022 (right near the bear market lows) when sentiment towards the sector plunged to its lowest level since the Financial Crisis. The current reading in the percentage of funds overweight tech is at the highest level in more than three years, although that level also corresponds to the same range it hovered at for most of the period from 2010 to 2020 (see chart here).

The only two items on the economic calendar today were the NFIB’s Index of Small Business Optimism, which came in weaker than expected and fell below 90 for the first time since last May, and January CPI. Economists were expecting headline CPI to rise 0.2% m/m and 2.9% y/y, while the core reading was expected to rise 0.3% m/m and 3.7% y/y. On all measures, the January CPI came in ahead of expectations, so the widely expected drop below 3% in the headline y/y reading will have to wait at least another month. As you would expect, equity futures have added to their pre-market losses (S&P 500 down 1%), and bond yields are spiking as the 10-year yield tops 4.27% hitting its highest level since early December.

Yesterday looked like another one of those days where semiconductors were going to rip higher and close at new highs again. Early on, the SOX traded 1.7% higher to another record high, and Nvidia (NVDA) even pulled ahead of Amazon (AMZN) as its market cap briefly eclipsed $1.82 trillion. In just 29 trading days this year, NVDA has seen its market cap increase by $600 billion. $600 billion! That’s more than the market cap of all but eight companies in the S&P 500, including Tesla (TSLA)! Maybe traders sobered up from the Super Bowl parties and took a second to think about just how much $600 billion is, but at around lunchtime, the enthusiasm dried up. By the close, NVDA was flat, and the SOX erased all its early gains and finished down on the day.

Semis are an extremely volatile sector, so a reversal like Monday’s can pop up at any time, but they’ve been somewhat uncommon over the last three years. The red dots in the chart below show each time that the SOX hit a 52-week high intraday but then reversed lower finishing down on the day and more than 1% from the high. Outside of one occurrence in July 2021, every other since has come in bunches and shortly before a moderate to severe sell-off in the sector. With futures down sharply this morning, could yesterday’s reversal be another prelude to a sell-off?



While these types of reversals have recently been followed by a shaky performance from the SOX, from a less myopic vantage point, they have occurred at all different points in the cycle. Leading up to the peak in early 2022, there were several occurrences in the two-plus year period beginning in October 2019, and before that, there were several other extended runs where these types of reversals were sprinkled throughout, and the SOX didn’t miss a beat. There were other times, though, in the early 2000s when similar reversals occurred right before a moderate to severe sell-off. All of this is a long-winded way to say, that just as, or more often than, these reversals signaled a significant pullback, they also turn out to be meaningless.

 

Here is a final look at today's market and futures maps, as well as how each sector performed individually at the close on Tuesday, February 13th, 2024.

 

Top of the afternoon StonkForumers! Happy Hump Day to all of you and welcome to the new trading day and a frrrrrrrrrrrresh start. Here is a quick check on those futures as we are under an hour into the US cash market open.

GLTA on this Wednesday, February the 14th, 2024!

 

Morning Lineup - 2/14/24 - Any Love Left For Stocks?
Wed, Feb 14, 2024

Was yesterday a blip or the beginning of something else? This morning, futures are modestly higher heading into the midweek trading session, and European stocks are firmly in positive territory. The STOXX 600 is even trading right where it was before yesterday’s January CPI report. Interest rates are giving back some of yesterday’s gains, and cryptos are blistering higher with bitcoin firmly above $50K and Ethereum trading above $2,750.

While there haven’t been any 52-week highs at the index level this week, yesterday was the 30th trading day of the year, and already the S&P 500 has managed to close at a 52-week high 12 times. That’s the most 52-week highs in the first 30 trading days of a calendar year since 2018. It’s also the tenth most of any year since 1953, the first full year of the five-trading day week in its current form. The record for 52-week highs in the first 30 trading days of the year was 20 in 1971, and back in 2013, there were as many as 15.

In today's report, we looked at the performance of the S&P 500 for the remainder of the year following the 30th trading day of the year to see if there was any correlation between the number of 52-week highs and performance for the remainder of the year. As mentioned above, the last time there was as high of a reading was in 2018 when the S&P 500 went on to fall over 5% for the remainder of the year. So, is it a sign of a blow-off top or does strength beget strength?

 

Here is a final look at today's market and futures maps, as well as how each sector performed individually at the close on Wednesday, February 14th, 2024.

 

btw, in case any of you guys missed it here last night, there is a now a new domain name to which you all can use to get to the forums here.

simply typing in stockboards.net into your web browser should bring you to this site!

http://stockboards.net

think of this as a secondary link to get to the boards here.

was surprised to see that domain hadn't been taken yet so i went ahead and grabbed it for our site.

@stock1234 confirmed to have it working on his end, but hoping the rest of you guys also got it working fine. let me know for sure!

i hope this new link will be even more easier to remember.

let me know what you guys think!

hope y'all's having a great kickoff to your week thus far. markets finally getting a little interesting this week lol.

 

here is a quick preview of next week's notable earnings releases courtesy of reddit's wallstreetbets:

have yourself a terrific long 3-day weekend ahead guys!