{"id":5213,"date":"2012-01-06T08:43:48","date_gmt":"2012-01-06T13:43:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/leavittbrothers.com\/blog\/?p=5213"},"modified":"2012-01-06T08:43:48","modified_gmt":"2012-01-06T13:43:48","slug":"before-the-open-jan-6-3","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.leavittbrothers.com\/?p=5213","title":{"rendered":"Before the Open (Jan 6)"},"content":{"rendered":"

Good morning. Happy Friday.<\/span>
\nThe Asian\/Pacific markets closed mostly down. Hong Kong, Japan and South Korea dropped more than 1%. Europe is currently (before the employment data) mostly up, but there are no 1% winners. Futures here in the States point towards a positive open for the cash market.
\n<\/span>
\nThe employment numbers are out. Here they are:<\/span>
\nunemployment rate: 8.5% (from 8.6%)
\nnonfarm payrolls: up 200K
\nprivate payrolls: up 212K
\naverage workweek: up slightly to 34.4 hours
\nhourly earnings: up 0.2% to 23.24<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span>
\nThe futures market reaction was very muted. <\/span>
\nI continue to think the market is in decent shape. Not great shape, just decent shape. My bias leans to the upside. Several key groups are doing well. Many leading stocks are breaking out. Overall, there are many more good looking patterns than bad. If you didn’t have access to the index charts and instead had to judge the market based on individual stocks that comprise the indexes, you’d come to the same conclusion – that the market leans to the upside. <\/span>
\nA concern I have right now is the dollar. Here’s an updated chart included this morning’s movement. It’ll be much harder for the market to rally if the dollar moves up.<\/span>
\n\"\"
\nheadlines at Yahoo Finance<\/a><\/span>
\nheadlines at MarketWatch<\/a><\/span>
\ntoday’s upgrades\/downgrades<\/a><\/span>
\nthis week’s Earnings<\/a><\/span>
\nthis week’s Economic Numbers<\/a><\/span>
\n