Tuesday, April 21, 2020

The Morning Call--What happened to oil?


The Morning Call

4/21/20

The Market
         
    Technical

The Averages  (23560, 2823) got whacked yesterday.  The S&P ended right on the lower boundary of its very short term uptrend while the Dow finished below (if it remains there through the close today, that trend will be voided).  My assumption remains that the indices are headed for a challenge of their 100/200 DMA’s; but as I noted in the Closing Bell, their current rate of ascent simply isn’t sustainable.  So, any consolidation is to be expected; but probably not enough to halt upward momentum.

TLT, GLD and UUP were up.  TLT and GLD remain in solid uptrends, while UUP appears to be breaking out of a pennant formation to the upside.  This performance suggests the need for safety.

QE and gold.

Monday in the charts.
           
    Fundamental

       Headlines

One datapoint yesterday. The March Chicago Fed national activity index came in slightly lower than anticipated.

            The economic data is about to get weird.
           
            Overseas, the February EU trade balance and March German PPI were better than expected.

            The coronavirus

***overnight update.

            Another view of the coronavirus math.
           
            A slightly different take.

The beginning of the end of the shutdown.

            Lockdown socialism will collapse.

Sweden versus the rest of Europe.

Why herd immunity matters.

The coronavirus drives barrage of new lobbying activity.

Oil

What happened yesterday?

Why politicians should leave the oil market alone.

What is next?

The June contract is now plunging.

Bottom line:  the good news is that steps are being taken to re-open the US economy. The bad news is that it will likely take a long time, the risk exists of a rebound in the disease following the re-opening, there is still no treatment or vaccine for the virus and no one has a clue about the permanent changes that will occur in consumer social/spending habits.  

So, the current upward Market momentum notwithstanding, I think that any further progress to the upside will likely be erratic.  Plus, even though I have been proven wrong so far, the risk remains of a test of the March 23rd low should any of the aforementioned unknowns prove more negative than currently discounted.    I have no intent of chasing stock prices in that environment.

Overvalued?
      
Ditto.



    News on Stocks in Our Portfolios
 
Emerson Electric (NYSE:EMR): Q2 Non-GAAP EPS of $0.89 beats by $0.14; GAAP EPS of $0.84 beats by $0.14.
Revenue of $4.16B (-9.0% Y/Y) misses by $130M.

Economics

   This Week’s Data

      US

            Month to date retail chain store sales declined from the prior week.

     International

            February UK average earnings were up 2.8% versus consensus of +3.0%.

            The April EU economic sentiment index was reported at 25.2 versus estimates of -62.0; the German index was 28.2 versus -42.3.

    Other

Hotel occupancy rates decline to all-time low.

What I am reading today

            What do I do now?
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