What Virus?

June 7, 2020

Weekly Market Outlook

By Keith Schneider

US Equity Markets yet again tacked on some serious gains led by IWM (Grandpa Russell) which was up more than 8% for the week. It reduced its YTD loss to just- 9.355 while the S&P500 is now basically flat. The Dow Industrials (INDU), the S&P 500 and the Russell 2000 all gapped higher and continued to close strong. Risk off / safety plays got left in the dust and there was not one country fund that was down on the week.

This monster rally was all on the heels of a robust jobs report (released Friday morning) that showed unemployment is just 13.3%. Ok, not really and just kidding because the Labor Bureau decided that you are employed if you received a stimulus check due to being laid off.  You have to love the creativity. Looking on the bright side of life (thank you Monty Python) even after adjusting the unemployment rate up to a more realistic 16%, the numbers still look better than expected. Considering the unprecedented amount of bailout money, it is possible that Mr. Market has it right.  Maybe the second wave of the virus will only be ankle deep.

This week’s highlights are:

• Risk Gauges improved significantly from their already bullish reading
• Risk off plays such as Gold, Gold Miners, and Bonds got hit hard
• The NASDQ 100 made new all-time highs
• IWM cleared its 200 daily moving average and could be setting up for longer term leadership
• Volume patterns continue to show accumulation across all key US equity benchmarks
• Semi’s broke out to all-time highs
• Oil and the energy sector roared, up + 15.7% for the week
• Value and Small Caps outperformed
• Volume has picked up, showing bullish accumulation
• Volatility ($vix.x) broke down and closed under it 200 DMA for the first time since mid-February
• Market Internals and Short-Term Sentiment are both running rich with the number of stocks trading above both their 10- and 50-day moving averages showing overbought

Also, I filled in for Mish and did a video for Stockcharts tv where I cover some themes mentioned above using their new Advanced Charting Platform which will be used as this week’s video.

Stay Safe and Best Wishes for your trading

Keith Schneider

CEO -Marketgauge.com