{"id":9661,"date":"2016-05-06T08:01:49","date_gmt":"2016-05-06T13:01:49","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/leavittbrothers.com\/blog\/?p=9661"},"modified":"2016-05-06T08:01:49","modified_gmt":"2016-05-06T13:01:49","slug":"before-the-open-mar-6-5","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.leavittbrothers.com\/?p=9661","title":{"rendered":"Before the Open (Mar 6)"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span style=\"font-size: medium;\"> Good morning. Happy Friday. Happy Employment Numbers Day. <\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: medium;\"> The <strong>Asian\/Pacific<\/strong> markets closed with a lean to the downside. China fell 2.8%; Hong Kong and Singapore dropped more than 1%. <strong>Europe<\/strong> is currently mostly down. France, Austria, the Netherlands, the Czech Republic, Turkey and Italy are down more than 1%; London, Germany, Norway, Switzerland, Russia, Spain and Portugal are also weak. Prior to the release of the employment numbers, futures here in the <strong>States<\/strong> pointed towards gap down open for the cash market. <\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: medium;\"><!--more-->The dollar is down. Oil and copper are down. Gold and silver are up. Bonds are mixed. <\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: medium;\"> <strong>Here are the employment numbers\u2026<\/strong><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: medium;\"> unemployment rate: 5.0% (was 5.0% last month)<br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: medium;\"> nonfarm payrolls: +160K<br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: medium;\"> private payrolls:<br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: medium;\"> average workweek: up 0.1 hour to 34.5 hours<br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: medium;\"> hourly wages: up 0.3% to $25.53<br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: medium;\"> labor participation rate: 62.8%<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: medium;\"> March job gain reduced from 215K to 208K<br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: medium;\"> February job gain cut from 245K to 233K.<\/span><\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: medium;\"> S&amp;P futures immediately dropped on the news. As of this writing they&#8217;re down 8 points. <\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: medium;\"> Barring a pretty solid rally, the S&amp;P will post back-to-back down weeks for the first time since the February bottom was established. The index is approx. unchanged since the middle of March, so now the duration of this topping range has lasted as long as the directionaly move off the low. The market does, after all, trade range bound more than it trends. Recognition of this is paramount for your success because different trading techniques are needed. <\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: medium;\"> I have not liked the market for several weeks. In fact this past weekend I stated: There just isn&#8217;t much worth playing. We&#8217;d all be wise to lay low in the near term.<\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: medium;\"> A perfectly normal pullback would have the S&amp;P drop another 50 points down to 2000, so don&#8217;t jump the gun going long. I&#8217;m content to lay low. As a swing trade who prefers to hold for several weeks or longer, I&#8217;d prefer to back up and see the big picture instead of zooming in very close. I&#8217;m aggressive long during up swings and am mostly flat during corrections. I&#8217;ve been mostly flat for a couple weeks. More after the open. <\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: medium;\"><strong>Stock headlines<\/strong> from barchart.com&#8230;<\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: medium;\"> Activision Blizzard (ATVI +1.84%) gained 5% in after-hours trading after it reported Q1 adjusted EPS of 23 cents, well above consensus of 12 cents, and then raised guidance on 2016 adjusted EPS to $1.78 from a February 11 estimate of $1.75<\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: medium;\"> Fluor (FLR +0.85%) dropped over 8% in after-hours trading after it reported Q1 EPS of 74 cents, weaker than consensus of 85 cents, and then lowered guidance on 2016 EPS to $3.25-$3.65 from a February 18 estimate of $3.50-$4.00.<\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: medium;\"> Yelp (YELP -1.02%) jumped over 10% in pre-market trading after it reported Q1 adjusted EPS of 8 cents, four times consensus of 2 cents, and then raised guidance on 2016 net revenue to $690 million-$702 million from a February 8 estimate of $685 million-$700 million.<\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: medium;\"> Herbalife Ltd. (HLF +0.71%) surged 14% in after-hours trading after it said it is in late-stage talks, which include litigation or settlement, to resolve a FTC probe into whether the company is a pyramid scheme.<\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: medium;\"> Square (SQ -2.54%) slumped over 10% in after-hours trading after it expressed concerns about financing for its small-business customer-loan program and said it faced &#8220;challenging credit market conditions&#8221; and cited delays signing new investors to help back its lending business.<\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: medium;\"> Post Holdings (POST +0.50%) jumped over 6% in after-hours trading after it raised guidance on full-year adjusted Ebitda to $893 million-$913 million from a February 4 estimate of $810 million-$840 million.<\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: medium;\"> Cerner (CERN -0.47%) fell over 5% in after-hours trading after it reported Q1 adjusted EPS of 53 cents, right on consensus, but said it sees Q2 adjusted EPS of 56 cents-58 cents. below consensus of 58 cents.<\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: medium;\"> Arista Networks (ANET +1.65%) gained 5% in after-hours trading after it reported Q1 adjusted EPS of 68 cents, higher than consensus of 60 cents.<\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: medium;\"> Depomed (DEPO -2.36%) slid over 6% in after-hours trading after it reported Q1 adjusted EPS of 12 cents, weaker than consensus of 17 cents.<\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: medium;\"> FireEye (FEYE -1.30%) dropped over 6% in after-hours trading after it forecast a Q2 adjusted EPS loss of -38 cents to -40 cents, a wider loss than consensus of -36 cents.<\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: medium;\"> Air Lease (AL -0.03%) climbed over 4% in after-hours trading after it reported Q1 adjusted EPS of $1.38, well above consensus of 77 cents.<\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: medium;\"> MercadoLibre (MELI +0.42%) rose over 5% in after-hours trading after it reported Q1 adjusted EPS of 68 cents, higher than consensus of 54 cents.<\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: medium;\"> Imperva (IMPV +0.44%) sank 20% in after-hours trading after it reported a Q1 loss of -25 cents, a small decline than consensus of -28 cents, but said it sees Q2 revenue of $65.5 million-$66.5 million, weaker than consensus of $70.2 million.<\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: medium;\"> Endo International PMC (ENDP -2.85%) plunged 25% in after-hours trading after it lowered guidance on fiscal 2016 adjusted EPS to $4.50-$4.80 from a March 17 estimate of $5.85-$6.20, well below consensus of $5.64.<\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: medium;\"> Bankrate (RATE +1.05%) surged 13% in after-hours trading after it reported Q1 adjusted EPS of 12 cents, above consensus of 8 cents, and said it sees Q2 revenue of $94 million-$98 million, above the midpoint of consensus of $87.3 million.<\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: medium;\"> <strong>Thursday&#8217;s Key Earnings<\/strong><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: medium;\"> 3D Systems (NYSE:DDD) -6.4% on a widening net loss.<br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: medium;\"> Activision Blizzard (NASDAQ:ATVI) +6.3% AH getting a lift from King Digital.<br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: medium;\"> Alibaba (NYSE:BABA) +3.9% boosted by gross merchandise volume growth.<br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: medium;\"> Chesapeake Energy (NYSE:CHK) +1.1% after in-line earnings, asset sale.<br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: medium;\"> EOG Resources (NYSE:EOG) +2.4% flat AH following mixed results.<br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: medium;\"> FireEye (NASDAQ:FEYE) -9.3% AH announcing soft guidance, CEO change.<br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: medium;\"> GoPro (NASDAQ:GPRO) -4.5% AH as sales plunged 50% from the prior-year period.<br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: medium;\"> Herbalife (NYSE:HLF) +13% AH entering advanced talks to settle FTC probe.<br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: medium;\"> Merck (NYSE:MRK) -1.3% falling on generic competition, currency.<br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: medium;\"> News Corp. (NASDAQ:NWSA) unmoved AH despite another quarterly drop in revenue.<br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: medium;\"> Square (NYSE:SQ) -13.3% AH as operating expenses surged.<br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: medium;\"> Yelp (NYSE:YELP) +9% AH on Q1 beat and solid guidance.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: medium;\"> <strong>Today&#8217;s Economic Calendar<\/strong><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: medium;\"> 8:30 Non-farm payrolls<br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: medium;\"> 1:00 PM Baker-Hughes Rig Count<br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: medium;\"> 3:00 PM Consumer Credit<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: medium;\">Today&#8217;s Earnings <a href=\"http:\/\/seekingalpha.com\/earnings\/upcoming\">here<\/a><\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: medium;\"><strong>Other<\/strong>&#8230;<\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: medium;\">today&#8217;s <a href=\"http:\/\/www.briefing.com\/investor\/calendars\/upgrades-downgrades\/\">upgrades\/downgrades<\/a> from briefing.com<\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: medium;\">this week&#8217;s <a href=\"https:\/\/www.briefing.com\/investor\/calendars\/earnings\/2016\/05\/02-6\/\">Earnings<\/a><\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: medium;\">this week&#8217;s <a href=\"https:\/\/www.briefing.com\/investor\/calendars\/economic\/2016\/05\/02-06\">Economic Numbers<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Good morning. Happy Friday. Happy Employment Numbers Day. The Asian\/Pacific markets closed with a lean to the downside. China fell 2.8%; Hong Kong and Singapore dropped more than 1%. Europe is currently mostly down. France, Austria, the Netherlands, the Czech Republic, Turkey and Italy are down more than 1%; London, Germany, Norway, Switzerland, Russia, Spain [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[2],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.leavittbrothers.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9661"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.leavittbrothers.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.leavittbrothers.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.leavittbrothers.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.leavittbrothers.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=9661"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blog.leavittbrothers.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9661\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.leavittbrothers.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=9661"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.leavittbrothers.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=9661"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.leavittbrothers.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=9661"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}