Before the Open (Jun 10)

Good morning. Happy Friday.
The Asian/Pacific markets closed mostly down. Hong Kong dropped 1.2%; Singapore, Australia, Indonesia and Malaysia were also weak. Europe is currently posting sizable, across-the-board losses. Greece is down more than 3%; Germany, France, the Netherlands, the Czech Republic, Denmark, Spain and Italy are down more than 2%’ most other markets are down at least 1%. Futures here in the States point towards a relatively big gap down open for the cash market.
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List of Indexes and ETFs – here
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The dollar is up. Oil is down, copper is flat. Gold is down slightly; silver is up a small amount. Bonds are up.
For the second straight day we’re going to get a sizable gap down open. Yesterday the large caps chopped around, pushed a little lower but then trended up. They still posted a loss for the day but closed well off their low. The small caps just chopped around in a range all day.
Now we’re going to get another gap down. There’s been a steady bid under the market the last month. Every little dip has gotten bought. In fact it’s been almost four weeks since the last solid down day. Perhaps today will change that.
The market would benefit from a couple down days. My overall bias remains to the upside, but it’s hard to trade a 1-directional market that just keeps going. It’s much easier when there’s some back and forth movement within a trend. My point -> don’t mentally fight a little give back. Be happy we’ll get a chance to buy some stocks at better prices.
Next Wednesday we get the next FOMC. It’s a big one. There have been several meetings where everyone kind of knew they wouldn’t touch rates. This isn’t the case any more. Wall St. had warmed up to the idea of rates moving up…and then the latest employment numbers were released. Now there isn’t a consensus, so there’s room for a surprise. As I’ve said the last couple days, I don’t see much movement until after the Fed.
Will the bulls step up and do some buying for the second straight gap down day? We’ll see. My overall bias remains the same. More after the open.
Stock headlines from barchart.com…
Corning (GLW +0.24%) was downgraded to ‘Sell’ from ‘Hold’ at Drexel Hamilton LLC.
Amazon.com (AMZN +0.14%) was rated a new ‘Outperform’ at William Blair & Co.
Mobileye (MBLY -2.27%) gained over 1% in after-hours trading after it was rated a new ‘Overweight’ at Piper Jaffray with a price target of $50.
Delphi Automotive PLC (DLPH -0.16%) rose +0.3% in after-hours trading after it was rated a new ‘Overweight’ at Piper Jaffray with a price target of $82.
Cherokee (CHKE +1.62%) fell over 3% in after-hours trading after it reported Q1 EPS of 29 cents, well below consensus of 39 cents.
GigPeak (GIG +8.71%) dropped over 4% in after-hours trading after it started a secondary offering of 1.8 million shares of stock.
H&R Block (HRB +2.52%) climbed nearly 5% in after-hours trading after it reported Q4 revenue of $2.30 billion, above consensus of $2.28 billion, and boosted its dividend to 22 cents a share from 20 cents a share.
Urban Outfitters (URBN -1.34%) slipped over 6% in after-hours trading after it said that comparable retail segment net sales are “mid single-digit negative” thus far during fiscal Q1.
Mattress Firm (MFRM -2.24%) tumbled 13% in after-hours trading after it reported a Q1 adjusted loss/share of -10 cents excluding amortization, a bigger loss than consensus of -4 cents, and then lowered guidance on full-year adjusted EPS to $2.25-%4.235 from a March 21 view of $2.50-$2.60.
Wendy’s (WEN +0.68%) fell -0.3% in after-hours trading after the company said malware was found and disabled at some 50 of its franchise-operated restaurants and that payment cards used legitimately at Wendy’s may have been used fraudulently elsewhere.
Merck & Co will acquire Afferent Pharmaceuticals for $500 million.
Great Ajax Corp, (AJX +0.65%) fell over 3% in after-hours trading after it announced a public offering of common stock.
Organovo Holdings (ONVO -4.67%) jumped over 11% in after-hours trading after it reported a Q4 loss of -9 cents/share, a smaller loss than consensus of -11 cents.
Thursday’s Key Earnings
H&R Block (NYSE:HRB) +6% AH on FQ4 beat, dividend increase.
J.M. Smucker (NYSE:SJM) +7.9% after topping expectations.
Today’s Economic Calendar
10:00 Consumer Sentiment
1:00 PM Baker-Hughes Rig Count
2:00 PM Treasury Budget
Today’s Earnings here
Other…
today’s upgrades/downgrades from briefing.com
this week’s Earnings
this week’s Economic Numbers