In yesterday’s blog, I discussed the trifecta of worries over the Chinese government tightening up lending, the Greek economy, and quality of earnings. Well, many of us (myself included) were a bit taken aback by the discussions in Washington, DC yesterday. It was long expected that President Obama was to make a speech yesterday morning on financial reform. What was not expected was the depth and meaning of the speech in squashing the young year’s stock market gains. Culling to prospective voter fury over the bank bailouts, Obama called for limiting the trading activities and size of financial institutions as a means to reduce systemic risk as a means of preventing another financial panic. The prospective tenets would prohibit banks from operating proprietary trading operations solely for their own attempted gains as well as those of sponsoring private equity funds as well as hedge funds. Furthermore, a 10% market-share cap on deposits to include liabilities such as non-deposit funding to restrict consolidation much less growth would be expanded; this would level out risk in theory. The tricky part here is that companies such as GS, MS, and of course JPM are technically banks/bank holding companies. The announcement (occurring on a day in which GS announced earnings) absolutely thrashed the stocks of those three companies intra-day. As the afternoon progressed, Barney Frank (chairman of the House Financial Services Committee) noted he favored a more modified form of the plan which would take 3-5 years to implement; this in turn led to a bit of a rally in the stocks before equities sold back off as it became clear that there is going to be an attempt to regulate.. But the overriding theme here is this: political interference is not good for stocks. This is not going to go away. So particularly over the next few days, every headline that concerns this matter will direct impact the stocks involved much less the broader market so this is but one more thing to monitor on the ol’ newswires.
Markets in Hong Kong fell 2/3% last night while Tokyo had a nasty decline of 2.5% on the strengthening yen. European bourses are down about 1% across the board. Gold has fallen below $1,100 and oil is approaching $75. The dollar is marginally stronger. Futures are a bit weaker as well largely due to the GOOG fiasco, but off of their lows and it’s truly a mixed picture earnings-wise. For today, it truly is a stock picker’s day; focus on the earnings flow as well as the stocks in the sectors of the major earnings entities, i.e. relative strength plays. Focus also on sectors such as the financials and techs due to the newsflow. Look also for a bit of a bounce overall based on GE albeit ranges today should be contained on both sides of unchanged.
Reiterating-
If the whole story is not there -
If something is good, assume either a short thru unchanged or an A-B-A2 (preferably to the downside in a downside market and the upside in an upside market) based on direction of the market unless specified.
If something is bad, assume either a buy thru unchanged or an A-B-A2 (preferably to the downside in a downside market and the upside in an upside market) based on direction of the market unless specified-
Good- The following stocks have good news and/or a strong technical pattern
SOMX- soared in after-hours last night after providing an update on its new drug application for insomnia treatment; the FDA indicated its application for its drug is now complete
WDC- great earnings
IGT- good earnings
ISRG- great earnings
CNXT- great earnings
KMP, XLNX, PNRA- featured on “Mad Money” last night
NRG- going to be added to the S&P 500 on a date to be determined
AIZ- closed near a high after reaching a minor civil settlement with the SEC
PLXS- closed near a high after posting great earnings
GE- decent earnings
JCI- good earnings
MCD- decent earnings
Bad-The following stocks have bad news and/or a weak technical pattern
COF- poor earnings
AXP- poor earnings
SYNA- terrible earnings
MSCC- poor earnings
AMD- poor earnings guidance
NAT- share offering
GOOG- poor earnings
IBKR- terrible earnings
ED- bad earnings
FCX- closed near a low despite posting good earnings amid worries that there will be a tax on miners in Australia
APWR- closed near a low after plunging on a private placement
CXW- closed on a low after worries about state budget cuts in Arizona
ANV- closed near a low
HEAT- closed near a low
PPG- closed near a low
CLF- closed near a low
LM- closed near a low after posting bad earnings
PCX- closed near a low
X, AKS, NUE - closed near a low
SLB- poor earnings
STI- poor earnings
KMB- poor earnings
HOG- poor earnings
Earnings:
FRI JAN 22 BEFORE
APD BBT ERIC
EXC GE HBAN
HOG JCI KMB
MCD SLB STI
WBS
Good luck today.
Epiphany Trading, LLC
www.epiphanytrading.com
Erik R. Kolodny- Chief Markets Strategist
Brendan P. Byrne- President
Joseph R. McCandless- Managing Partner
D. Timothy Seaquist- Managing Partner
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