Before the Open (May 19)

Good morning. Happy Tuesday.
The Asian/Pacific markets closed mixed. China rallied better than 3%; Japan and Taiwan also did well. Australia and Malaysia fell 0.7-0.8%. Europe is currently mostly up. Greece is up almost 3%; Spain, Italy, Belgium, Amsterdam, Germany and France are up more than 1%. Russia is down 1.2%. Futures here in the States point towards an up open for the cash market.
Thanks for your votes on my public list at stockcharts.com. Keep ’em coming.
The dollar is up. Oil and copper are down. Gold and silver are down. Bonds are up.
Yesterday the the S&P and Dow hit new highs, but it was the small caps that did the best. This is one of the keys I’m looking for…the small caps catching up some.
The internals are mixed. Some support the market strength, others aren’t in bad shape but aren’t in a fully supportive mode.
Volume was weakish yesterday, the the entire picture is mixed.
The stage is set for the market to leg up…but I’d like to see some improvement.
The ECB will be increasing its QE efforts before the summer doldrums arrive. This put pressure on the euro and has caused the dollar to jump…which is putting pressure on commodities (oil is down almost a buck).
Wal-Mart is down after earnings…Home Depot is up.
Key time here. Either the market breaks out and forces shorts to cover or it gets smacked right back down into its range and the sloppy up and down action will continue. When in the middle of its range, there isn’t much interesting going on…but when at an extreme, we need to be ready. More after the open.
Stock headlines from barchart.com…
Wal-Mart (WMT +0.86%) reported Q1 EPS of $1.03, which was 1 cent below the consensus of $1.04. Q1 revenue of $114.83 billion was below the consensus of $116.3 billion. EPS was knocked down by 3 cents by currency effects. Walmart’s U.S. same-store sales were up +1.1%.
Home Depot (HD +0.86%) reported Q1 EPS of $1.21, higher than the consensus of $1.15. Q1 revenue of $20.89 billion was slightly above the consensus of $20.82 billion. Q1 same-store sales rose 6.1%.
Agilent (A +1.40%) reported Q2 EPS of 38 cents, slightly below the consensus of 39 cents. Q2 revenue of $963 million was below the consensus of $989.3 million.
Urban Outfitters (URBN +2.85%) reported Q1 EPS of 25 cents, below the consensus of 30 cents. Q1 revenue of $739.01 million was below the consensus of $758.25 million.
Earnings and Economic Numbers from seekingalpha.com…
Today’s economic calendar:
8:30 Housing Starts
8:55 Redbook Chain Store Sales
Notable earnings before today’s open: AINV, CMCM, DKS, EJ, HD, LEJU, RRGB, SSI, TJX, WBAI, WMT
Notable earnings after today’s close: ADI, ADSK, CSC, DY, ETSY, HEI, NDSN, QIHU, TEDU, VSAT
Other…
today’s upgrades/downgrades from briefing.com
this week’s Earnings
this week’s Economic Numbers