Paul Shread

Didn’t take long for sellers to show up, but at least the bulls had some fight in them today. The Nasdaq (first chart below) remains stuck in a steep downtrend here. Resistance is 1950, and support is 1923-1924, a short-term uptrend line. The S&P (second chart) also has a short-term uptrend going. Support is 1146 […]

Blow-out results from Google were no help for stocks, which found themselves back on the defensive Friday after Thursday’s big gains. Google rose 5.7% on the day after reporting a 477% jump in first quarter net income to $1.29 a share, a stunning 37 cents a share more than analysts were expecting. Revenues beat estimates […]

In a move that could fuel efforts to change data storage practices, records management giant Iron Mountain has admitted losing a customer’s backup tapes and is recommending that customers begin encrypting tapes. “Iron Mountain performs upwards of five million pickups and deliveries of backup tapes each year, with greater than 99.999% reliability,” the company said […]

Very impressive strength and momentum today; is it more than a long overdue bounce? The S&P (first chart below) will provide the first clue; above 1164 and the index could run, with 1178 the next big level above that. We’d like to see 1154 hold to the downside. The Nasdaq (second chart) faces resistance at […]

Google continued to dazzle Wall Street in its third quarter as a publicly traded company, blowing past analysts’ estimates after the close on Thursday. Google’s net income soared 477% in the first quarter to $369.2 million, or $1.29 a share — a stunning 37 cents a share more than analysts were expecting — and net […]

It’s been a long time since we’ve seen a pullback this relentless. The Nasdaq (first chart below) has three downtrend lines in play now, each steeper than the last, a sign of a strengthening downtrend. Rallies get sold, bearish sentiment is no help, and the index is unable to mount a sustained rally even from […]

Strong earnings from the likes of Intel and Yahoo were no help for stocks on Wednesday, as the broader market tumbled on the latest signs of inflation. Yahoo gained 4% on the day, and Intel eked out a small gain, but the rest of the market sank under a stronger than expected consumer inflation reading […]

The indexes are trying to mount a rally here, but once again, the bounce is less forceful than we’d like to see. The Nasdaq (first chart below) faces resistance at 1940-1950 and 1968-1970, and support is 1915-1923 and 1900. The S&P and Dow (second and third charts) will need a strong day tomorrow just to […]

Fears of an economic slowdown eased on Tuesday after a number of top tech companies reported strong earnings. Intel beat estimates soundly after the bell, with earnings of 34 cents a share on sales of $9.4 billion, driven by strong mobile chip sales. Gross margins of 59% also topped forecasts. The chip giant’s second quarter […]

Back to weekly charts after the recent carnage. The Nasdaq (first chart below) looks pretty broken after last week’s action — 1900 and 1850 are possible supports, but 1750 looks like a much stronger support at this point. That said, we had extreme readings in the put-call ratios on Friday, so some bounce appears likely, […]

Earnings season swings into high gear this week, as some of the biggest technology and Internet names try to quell growing fears of an economic slowdown. Yahoo and Intel will report quarterly results after the close on Tuesday. Yahoo is expected to report earnings of 11 cents a share, up from 7 cents in the […]

The market the last few days has been a study in what can happen when traders position one way and the market heads the other. After Tuesday’s strong intraday reversal, it appeared that the market had put in a short-term low. When that clearly wasn’t the case, traders had to reverse positions, which fueled the […]