Wednesday Recap: A Look Inside the market

Futures are up over 8 points mainly due to the peace proposal in North Africa. Other news in the works is the ECB meeting, and we have data out later this morning, so we shall see. Yesterday, oil futures moved above $101 and stock futures moved correspondingly lower. Challenger, Gray & Christmas reported that planned job cuts rose in February. However ADP reported that the private sector job market expanded during the month of February. The report showed that private sector jobs rose by 217K jobs during the month, which was above the consensus expectations for a gain of about 167K.

The events in middle east and africa have been driving this market (mostly due to oil), this morning futures are up due to peace talks. That should take out the failed moves by a big margin. But will it hold?

The Wednesday session began without a significant gap, traded slightly lower briefly and then ascended until a bit after 11:00 am and put the high of the day on the chart. The following hour surrendered twelve points to put the low of the day on the chart at 12:02. The rest of the session whipsawed back and forth in a narrow but tradable range with a generally bullish bias. But the final hour wiped away several points of gains.

Once again we see a session with the high early in the day. Indeed, the character of the market has changed from what we saw for several months.

For the SPX Index there were 301 components advancing and 178 components declining. On the NYSE 3,129 issues were traded with 1,920 advancing issues and 1,106 retreating issues, a ratio of 1.74 to one advancing. There were 73 new highs and 18 new lows. The five day moving average of New Highs is 199 while the five day moving average of New Lows is 16 and the ten day moving average of Net Advancing is 189.

Advancing volume was higher at a ratio of 1.62 to one. The closing TRIN was 1.07 and the final tick was 741. The five day average of TRIN is 1.4 and the ten day average of TRIN is 1.26. The NYSE Composite Index gained 0.28% today while the SPX gained 0.16%. Today's volume pattern clearly shows a spike in volume as the index sold off just before noon and then diminishing volume later in the afternoon as the index rose.

Breadth was moderately strong today but advancing volume was unconvincing. Yet the broad NYSE Composite Index outperformed the SPX and the ten day Net Advancing is approaching 200. The data suggests caution either side as this is luke-warm data.

Total tick for the day was 120,000 and the average tick for the day was 77. There were 137 ticks greater than 600 and 84 ticks more extreme than -600. There were 2 ticks greater than 1000 and no ticks more extreme than -1000. The tick action suggests institutional accumulation.

Sectors Performance:
- Basic Materials -- Outperformed the SPX by +20%.
- Energy -- Outperformed the SPX by +41%.
- Industrials -- Outperformed the SPX by +31%.
- Technology -- Outperformed the SPX by +45%.
- Utilities -- Outperformed the SPX by +8%.
- Health Care -- Outperformed the SPX by +11%.
- Consumer Discretionary -- Outperformed the SPX by +23%.

Sectors weaker than the SPX for Wednesday:
- Financials -- Underperformed the SPX by -83%.
- Consumer Staples -- Underperformed the SPX by -50%.