Before the Open (Feb 21)

Good morning. Happy Tuesday. Hope you had a good weekend.
The Asian/Pacific markets closed flat. Japan, China and South Korea moved up; Hong Kong, Indonesia and Malaysia moved down. Europe is currently mostly up. Greece and Poland are up more than 1%; Germany, Norway, Sweden, Portugal and Russia are also doing well. Futures in the States point towards a positive open for the cash market.
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The dollar is up. Oil and copper are up. Gold and silver are down. Bonds are down.
The S&P is in the midst of an “11 out of 13” win streak, and Friday’s close was its highest close ever. In fact all the indexes (except the S&P 600 small caps) hit new highs last week.
Per some stats I gave in the report posted over the weekend, the market’s strength is well supported. Besides the indexes, the groups and individual stocks are doing very well. This isn’t a case where the indexes are masking trouble behind the scenes.
Yes the market will correct at some point, but for now the trend is up and strong and dips should be bought. Don’t over-analyze. Don’t fight this. More money is lost not riding trends than by loses themselves.
Stock headlines from barchart.com…
Wal-Mart (WMT +0.73%) rose 2% in pre-market trading after it reported Q4 adjusted EPS of $1.30, above consensus of $1.29, as it said Q4 comparable sales were up +1.8%, higher than consensus of up +1.3%.
Colgate-Palmolive (CL +4.32%) was upgraded to ‘Outperform’ from ‘Neutral at Exane BNP Paribas with a price target of $90.
Dick’s Sporting Goods (DKS +2.66%) was downgraded to ‘Market Perform’ form ‘Outperform’ at Oppenheimer.
Henry Schein (HSIC +0.51%) reported Q4 adjusted EPS of $1.88, better than consensus of $1.84.
Avangrid (AGR +0.32%) reported Q4 operating revenue of $1.49 billion, below consensus of $1.55 billion.
Verizon Communications (VZ +1.51%) was upgraded to ‘Buy’ from ‘Neutral’ at MoffetNathanson with a price target of $54.
Freeport-McMoRan (FCX -1.06%) was downgraded to ‘Sell’ from ‘Hold’ at Deutsche Bank.
Eaton Vance (EV +0.35%) was upgraded to ‘Neutral’ from ‘Underperform’ at Bank of America/Merrill Lynch.
Credit Acceptance Corp. (CACC -5.14%) authorized an additional 1 million shares to its stock repurchase program.
Sucampo Pharmaceuticals (SCMP +0.43%) jumped nearly 6% in after-hours trading after it was announced that it will replace Blue Nile in the S&P SmallCap 600 at the open of trade Thursday, February 23.
DryShips (DRYS +2.76%) plunged 20% in after-hours trading after it entered into a pact with Kalani Investments where DryShips may sell up to $200 million of stock to Kalani over a period of 2-years.
Today’s Economic Calendar
9:45 PMI Manufacturing Index Flash
12:.00 PM Fed’s Harker: Economic Outlook
1:00 PM Results of $26B, 2-Year Note Auction
Other…
today’s upgrades/downgrades from briefing.com
this week’s Earnings from Morningstar
this week’s Economic Numbers/Reports powered by ECONODAY