The week ahead will no doubt start off with more trade and tariff talk after last week volatility. Let me first recap Friday. Friday was a bull's nightmare starting off with President Trump adding $100 billion in more tariffs after China's response and saying markets could face some short term pain. It was a surprise as Larry Kudlow calmed the markets on Wednesday but he couldn't when he spoke on Bloomberg at the open Friday. Just ahead of that was a big miss on
the Non Farm Payroll report. As I said yesterday the rationalizations started right after the number was released (weather, 3 month average is fine etc). Then Treasury Secretary Mnuchin (for sure the most important financial person in Trump's orbit) said there's a "level of risk" the trade war could worsen. Lastly, Fed Chairman Powell didn't respond to the volatility in the markets sticking with his outlook for inflation and jobs supports further gradual rate hikes. Internally the market had terrible breadth and ended down on the week just holding the 2600 key support level. Sentiment started the week at 9% bulls and moved up to 35% on Thursday and back to 20% late Friday. Risks are high for a serious breakdown and my cautious bias won't change until some stability is seen. Antidotally, I still very little fear and many people who won't give up their bullish bias.
I'm out Monday traveling and there will not be a Daily Note (I might have some
comments out if the plane wifi will allow my Bloomberg to log on).
The Q1 earnings begins starting Thursday and Friday with banks starting to report. Notable reports include but are not limited to BLK, BBBY, OZRK, JPM, FRC, WFC, PNC. The economic calendar will also be relatively slow, domestically we will see PPI and CPI data in the US on Tuesday and Wednesday as well as trade import prices on Thursday. FOMC meeting minutes will be published on Wednesday. Abroad we will see German trade balance on Monday, China CPI and PPI on Tuesday night / Wednesday morning, Euro-zone Industrial production on Thursday and China Trade balance on Friday.
I've had a lot of positive feedback with the recent upgrades on the Daily Note and Hedge Fund Telemetry site. The Trade Ideas section on the Daily Note will track ideas and force me to be on the record - win, lose, or draw. Depending on demand, we might offer some form of separate email distribution
when a trade idea is added or taken off. We have some more "Talk Your Book" features from hedge fund and buyside portfolio managers in the works. If you want to contribute, either with using your name or anonymously, please let me know. I have one idea from a PM in the works that will get a lot of notice. The website's look and navigation is getting a big update soon too. The sentiment charts will be next to be updated and enhanced. The DeMark Indicator Primer feedback was positive and we have plans to do more on how to use sentiment and the PPO monitor. And we will be doing more webinars in the coming weeks. Shorter 15-20 minutes - more idea focused. My overall vision for the site has been as the great Colin Chapman said (founder of Lotus) "Simplify and add lightness." The goal is to have what you need, when you want it so you can make changes to your portfolio. No cartoons, no banner ads, no wasting your time. Thank you for your
continued support. If you have any ideas or feedback send me an email.
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