{"id":9746,"date":"2016-06-15T07:50:19","date_gmt":"2016-06-15T12:50:19","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/leavittbrothers.com\/blog\/?p=9746"},"modified":"2016-06-15T07:50:19","modified_gmt":"2016-06-15T12:50:19","slug":"before-the-open-jun-15-5","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.leavittbrothers.com\/?p=9746","title":{"rendered":"Before the Open (Jun 15)"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span style=\"font-size: medium;\"> Good morning. Happy Wednesday. Happy Fed Day. <\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: medium;\"> The <strong>Asian\/Pacific<\/strong> markets closed with a lean to the upside. India and China rallied more than 1%; New Zealand, Taiwan, Japan and Hong Kong did moderately well. <strong>Europe<\/strong> is currently mostly up. Germany, France, London, Austria, Italy, Spain, Portugal, Sweden, Switzerland, the Czech Republic, Denmark, Turkey and Hungary are up more than 1%. Futures here in the <strong>States<\/strong> point towards a positive open for the cash market. <\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: medium;\"><!--more-->&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;<br \/>\n<strong>Join our <a style=\"font-weight: bold; font-size: medium;\" href=\"http:\/\/www.leavittbrothers.com\/email-subscribe.cfm\">email list<\/a> &#8211; get technical research reports sent directly to you.<\/strong><br \/>\n&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;<\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: medium;\"> The dollar is down. Oil is down; copper is up. Gold is down; silver is flat. Bonds are down. <\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: medium;\"> So it&#8217;s Fed day. Two weeks ago Wall St. had warmed up to the idea of higher rates, but after the latest employment figures came in weaker than expected and &#8220;Brexit&#8221; talk ramped up, odds now favor the Fed standing pat. <\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: medium;\"> The Fed held off raising rates for a very long time, choosing to play it safe and err on the side of inducing inflation and allowing the economy to heat up too much, so they aren&#8217;t going to suddenly get reckless. They probably would like to raise rates, but their history is to pull the trigger only if the situation is perfect&#8230;which it isn&#8217;t.<\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: medium;\"> So they&#8217;ll keep rates the same, and then tomorrow morning the media can begin the obsessive debate for the next meeting. Oh joy. <\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: medium;\"> There are no easy &amp; obvious trades right now. There aren&#8217;t any that jump off my screen at me. The best group (commodities) are suspect, and most other groups are just bouncing around in a range. Unless you&#8217;re a skilled day trader, I think laying low is best. There&#8217;s no sense pushing it when there just aren&#8217;t many good set ups to be had. 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;\"> U.S. Steel (X -4.44%) was upgraded to &#8216;Neutral&#8217; from &#8216;Under Perform&#8217; at Bank of America\/Merrill Lynch<\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: medium;\"> Cisco (CSCO +0.42%) was downgraded to &#8216;Neutral&#8217; from &#8216;Buy&#8217; at Goldman Sachs.<\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: medium;\"> Best Buy (BBY -0.58%) was downgraded to &#8216;Neutral&#8217; from &#8216;Outperform&#8217; at Credit Suisse.<\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: medium;\"> United Therapeutics (UTHR -2.54%) was downgraded to &#8216;Neutral&#8217; from &#8216;Buy&#8217; at HC Wainwright &amp; Co. LLC.<\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: medium;\"> Select Equity Group cut its stake in Shake Shack (SHAK +3.44%) to 5.5% from 7.4%, according to a Schedule 13D.<\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: medium;\"> Salesforce.com (CRM -0.49%) was rated a new &#8216;Outperform&#8217; at BMO Capital Markets with a target price of $98.<\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: medium;\"> Cynapsus Therapeutics (CYNA +0.14%) was rated a new &#8216;Buy&#8217; at Janney Montgomery with a 12-month price target of $24.<\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: medium;\"> LinkedIn (LNKD -0.30%) was downgraded to &#8216;Sector Perform&#8217; from &#8216;Outperform&#8217; at RBC Capital Markets.<\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: medium;\"> Infinity Pharmaceuticals (INFI -69.16%) was downgraded to &#8216;Market Perform&#8217; from &#8216;Outperform&#8217; at Wells Fargo Securities.<\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: medium;\"> Bob Evans Farms (BOBE +0.95%) lost nearly 6% in after-hours trading after it lowered guidance on full-year adjusted EPS to $2.00-$2.15, below consensus of $2.19.<\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: medium;\"> Hi-Crush Partners LP (HCLP +0.85%) dropped over 6% in after-hours trading after it announced a public offering of 3 million common units.<\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: medium;\"> Liberty Tax (TAX +3.52%) slid over 2% in after-hours trading after it reported fiscal 2016 non-GAAP EPS of $1.41, below consensus of $1.79.<\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: medium;\"> Scorpio Bulkers (SALT -7.71%) tumbled over 7% in after-hours trading after it announced a public offering of 20 million shares of common stock.<\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: medium;\"> <strong>Today&#8217;s Economic Calendar<\/strong><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: medium;\"> 7:00 MBA Mortgage Applications<br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: medium;\"> 8:30 Producer Price Index<br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: medium;\"> 8:30 Empire State Mfg Survey<br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: medium;\"> 9:15 Industrial Production<br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: medium;\"> 10:30 EIA Petroleum Inventories<br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: medium;\"> 2:00 PM FOMC Announcement<br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: medium;\"> 2:00 PM FOMC Forecast<br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: medium;\"> 2:00 PM Chairman Press Conference<br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: medium;\"> 4:00 PM Treasury International Capital<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/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\/06\/13-17\/\">Earnings<\/a><\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: medium;\">this week&#8217;s <a href=\"https:\/\/www.briefing.com\/investor\/calendars\/economic\/2016\/06\/13-17\">Economic Numbers<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Good morning. Happy Wednesday. Happy Fed Day. The Asian\/Pacific markets closed with a lean to the upside. India and China rallied more than 1%; New Zealand, Taiwan, Japan and Hong Kong did moderately well. Europe is currently mostly up. Germany, France, London, Austria, Italy, Spain, Portugal, Sweden, Switzerland, the Czech Republic, Denmark, Turkey and Hungary [&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\/9746"}],"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=9746"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blog.leavittbrothers.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9746\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.leavittbrothers.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=9746"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.leavittbrothers.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=9746"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.leavittbrothers.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=9746"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}