{"id":5080,"date":"2011-12-01T08:23:59","date_gmt":"2011-12-01T13:23:59","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/leavittbrothers.com\/blog\/?p=5080"},"modified":"2011-12-01T08:23:59","modified_gmt":"2011-12-01T13:23:59","slug":"before-the-open-dec-1-3","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.leavittbrothers.com\/?p=5080","title":{"rendered":"Before the Open (Dec 1)"},"content":{"rendered":"

Good morning. Happy Thursday.<\/span>
\nThe Asian\/Pacific markets closed with solid across-the-board gains. Hong Kong rallied more than 5%, South Korea and Taiwan more than 3% and Australia, China, India and Singapore more than 2%. Europe is currently mixed; there are no 1% movers. Futures here in the States are flat.
\n<\/span>
\nThanks to yesterday, the single biggest up day we’ve had in a long time, the Dow and Russell finished November with a gain, and the S&P only dropped 6 points for the month. Not bad considering October was one of the best months in decades. <\/span>
\nWe entered this week with the indexes in no-man’s land. It was too late to go short and not wise to try to pick a bottom. My plan was to short a bounce or wait for a total washout. <\/span>
\nWe’ve gotten a bounce, but the bounce has not been a lazy grind up on light volume. Instead we’ve gotten two big up days and massive volume yesterday – this hardly would be considered a dead-cat bounce. It’s all been news-induced, and since news has the ability to trump everything, blindly shorting this move would not be smart. Based on the news, things are different now than they were just a couple days ago. We must re-evaluate and decide if shorting a bounce is still a good idea.<\/span>
\nMy initial reaction to that question is: no. The market dropped in mid November because the financial troubles in Italy, Spain and other places were growing. But if the coordinated effort by the six central banks I mentioned yesterday gives financially unstable countries a place to go to raise money, there is little fear they’ll miss a debt payment soon. This news alone could prop the market up. It doesn’t solve the problem. In fact it just buys them a little time. But what the heck, if kicking the can down the road means the market will rally for a few more months, let’s go with it and make money. <\/span>
\nThe home builders are doing well. Several have broken out from tradeable patterns. I expect other patterns to emerge in the next few days. More after the open.<\/span>
\nheadlines at Yahoo Finance<\/a><\/span>
\ntoday’s upgrades\/downgrades<\/a><\/span>
\nthis week’s Earnings<\/a><\/span>
\nthis week’s Economic Numbers<\/a><\/span>
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