In the weekly summary, I mentioned a range of S&P 1150 to 1170 as a white noise area. Remarkably, almost that entire range was covered in today's trading. I can imagine people getting their heads handed to them this morning as they were handed the first opportunity in over a month to press shorts, which is why at times it is not even worth participating. I'd rather see a break out of the range to make higher probability forays (i.e. over 1170 or below 1150)
From here, itchy human fingers and silicon microchips wait to purchase on a break over 1170 as the next level of the stair step rally. Each time we cross a new rubicon, the "higher high" buyers come in. I'll be one of them. Again.
Other than that there is very little to add on the market action as it is monotonous in its repetition. The only reason there was a large range today was the negative premarket and poor open, otherwise it would have been another range bound narrow day. The remarkable rally in cyclicals continues as investors continue to pile into "the playbook"... Bloomberg reports:
- The cyclical index has also provided almost double the return since Feb. 8, when the S&P 500 began rebounding from a three-week drop that erased 8.1 percent, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.
- Manufacturing and industrial stocks in the S&P 500 are up 11 percent in 2010, beating nine other groups in the index by at least 2 percentage points, data compiled by Bloomberg show. This is the first time since 1985 that the measure, which includes Boeing Co., the world’s second-largest commercial plane-maker, and General Electric Co, the biggest supplier of power turbines, has led this far into a year.
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