{"id":9133,"date":"2015-11-30T08:51:57","date_gmt":"2015-11-30T13:51:57","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/leavittbrothers.com\/blog\/?p=9133"},"modified":"2015-11-30T08:51:57","modified_gmt":"2015-11-30T13:51:57","slug":"before-the-open-nov-30-5","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.leavittbrothers.com\/?p=9133","title":{"rendered":"Before the Open (Nov 30)"},"content":{"rendered":"

Good morning. Happy Monday. Hope you had a great weekend. <\/span>
\n The Asian\/Pacific markets closed mostly down. Indonesia dropped 2.5%, and South Korea fell 1.9%. Taiwan, Australia and Malaysia were also weak. Europe is currently mostly up. Denmark is up more than 1%; Germany, France, Norway, Sweden, Spain and Italy are also doing well. Futures in the States point towards an positive open for the cash market. <\/span>
\n—————
\nS&P Select Week in Review<\/strong><\/a> <\/span>
\n—————
\nThe dollar is up. Oil and copper are up. Gold and silver are up. Bonds are down. <\/span>
\n Last week the Dow, Nas and S&P were flat or up a little, closing on Friday close to their Monday opens. The small caps and mid caps posted solid gains. <\/span>
\n I’d consider the first three to be in consolidation mode – the August drop and subsequent October rally formed a “cup,” and the last couple weeks have started forming a “handle.” Here is the weekly S&P chart. The set up is bullish, but not overly bullish. There’s lots of resistance overhead and this handle can last many months. It’s not bearish either. I don’t see anything that would suggest the market is going to fall apart. <\/span>
\n\"\"
\n The internals improved some, but the quality and quantity of good set ups isn’t very good. When the market is super healthy, I typically have a hard time narrowing down my list. Now, it’s hard just to find a couple decent trades. <\/span>
\n My bias remains to the upside. I like the market, but I don’t love it. It’s doing fine but isn’t offering us many opportunities. More after the open. <\/span>
\nStock headlines<\/strong> from barchart.com…<\/span>
\n Helmerich & Payne (HP -1.93%) was upgraded to ‘Buy’ from ‘Neutral’ at Guggenheim.<\/span>
\n Microsoft (MSFT +0.45%) was raised to a ‘Strong Buy’ at Raymond James.<\/span>
\n Diamond Offshore Drilling (DO -3.62%) and Transocean (RIG -2.49%) were both raised to ‘Buy’ from ‘Neutral’ at Guggenheim.<\/span>
\n Dynavax Technologies (DVAX -0.64%) was rated a new ‘Outperform’ at RBC Capital Markets with a 12-month price target of $48.<\/span>
\n Prologis (PLD +0.83%) was downgraded to ‘Market Perform’ from Outperform’ at Wells Fargo Securities.<\/span>
\n Marriott International (MAR -0.50%) and Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide ({=HOT were both cut to ‘Hold’ from ‘Buy’ at Evercore ISI.<\/span>
\n Raytheon (RTN +0.54%) was cut to ‘Equal Weight’ from ‘Overweight’ at Barclays.<\/span>
\n FMC Technologies (FTI -1.56%) was upgraded to ‘Buy’ from ‘Neutral’ at Guggenheim.<\/span>
\n Lululemon (LULU -0.85%) was cut to ‘Under Perform’ from ‘Market Perform’ at FBR Capital.<\/span>
\n Paccar (PCAR +0.47%) was downgraded to ‘Sector Perform’ from ‘Outperform’ at RBC Capital Markets.<\/span>
\n Quest Diagnostics (DGX +0.34%) won dismissal of a class action lawsuit brought by consumers claiming it monopolized the Northern California diagnostic labs market.<\/span>
\n According to Catchpoint Systems, Neiman Marcus’ (NMG) webpage was down for nearly the entire day on Black Friday.<\/span>
\n According to people familiar with the company’s plans, American International Group (AIG +0.84%) is considering the sale of blocks of life policies.<\/span>
\nEarnings and Economic Numbers<\/strong> from seekingalpha.com…<\/span>
\n Today’s Economic Calendar
\n 9:45 Chicago PMI
\n 10:00 Pending Home Sales
\n 10:30 Dallas Fed Manufacturing Survey
\n 3:00 PM Farm Prices<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span>
\nToday’s Earnings here<\/a><\/span>
\nOther<\/strong>…<\/span>
\ntoday’s upgrades\/downgrades<\/a> from briefing.com<\/span>
\nthis week’s Earnings<\/a><\/span>
\nthis week’s Economic Numbers<\/a><\/span>
\n