Paul Shread

Stocks fell sharply early Friday on a warning from Intel and a dismal unemployment report, but finished in the green on hopes for more rate cuts and reports that Osama bin Laden may soon be captured. The UK, meanwhile, plans to introduce a UN resolution giving Iraq until March 17 to disarm. The Nasdaq gained […]

Nice reversal today, as we suspected might happen, but the internals were less than impressive, particularly on the Nasdaq. That could make the bounce short-lived, as it did on Wednesday. Until the Iraq situation is resolved, volatility will likely continue to be the watchword, as the market gets whipped around by each new development. If […]

Higher then expected weekly jobless claims and nervousness ahead of Friday’s UN meeting on Iraq sent stocks lower on Thursday. Intel warned after the close, and February unemployment numbers will be released Friday morning. The Nasdaq fell 11 to 1302, the S&P 500 lost 7 to 822, and the Dow dropped 101 to 7673. Volume […]

The Dow, S&P and Nasdaq (first three charts below) are getting oversold on short-term stochastics, and the equity put-call ratio is showing some decent fear, so the market could bounce soon. The news tomorrow will likely be mostly negative, with Intel warning tonight and nonfarm payrolls and the UN meeting tomorrow, but that’s probably no […]

The S&P (first chart below) is back testing yesterday’s breakdown out of a symmetrical triangle. That line should be at 832-833 tomorrow; above that, 836 and 840 are resistance. Support is 818, 806, 800 and 768-775. The Dow (second chart) is some distance from a good test of its breakdown; that broken triangle line should […]

Stocks climbed Wednesday despite escalating international tensions. Russia, France and Germany said they will oppose a new UN resolution on Iraq, while the U.S. said it is prepared to act alone. The Nasdaq rose 6 to 1314, the S&P 500 gained 7 to 829, and the Dow climbed 70 to 7775. Volume rose to 1.3 […]

Stocks fell sharply Tuesday on war fears, an earnings warning from Caterpillar, and comments by Warren Buffett that stocks remain overvalued. Homebuilders were hit hard on disappointing results from Lennar . The Nasdaq fell 12 to 1307, the S&P 500 lost 12 to 821, and the Dow dropped 132 to 7704. Volume rose to 1.21 […]

The Dow and S&P (first two charts below) broke down out of symmetrical triangles today. If those breakdowns are real, 7800 and 830 should stop any rally tomorrow. Support is 7629, 7500 and 7200 on the Dow, and 818, 806, 800 and 768-775 on the S&P. A measurement of those patterns gives minimum downside targets […]

A weaker than expected manufacturing report undercut a strong opening on Wall Street on Monday. Stocks initially rallied on news of the capture of terrorist mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, but fell when the national ISM report showed that manufacturing growth slowed to a crawl in February. Reports of a North Korean intercept of a U.S. […]

The Dow (first chart below) ran into the upper boundary of its symmetrical triangle today. If it can clear 8000, the index may have room to run. To the downside, if it breaks below 7790, it could fall a long way. The S&P (second chart) pushed through the upper boundary of its symmetrical triangle before […]

EMC and Veritas have agreed to exchange a wide range of application programming interfaces (APIs) for storage system and storage software technologies, making it easier for organizations to implement and integrate products from each company. The agreement unites the top two players in the storage management software market. EMC has a 30.4% share of the […]

Storage Area Networking (SAN) Switches were a bright spot in IT spending last year, with worldwide sales growing 15% to $954 million, according to a new report by Dell’Oro Group. “It was an exciting year for the SAN Switch industry, as many new products came to market in 2002,” said Dell’Oro senior analyst Paul Baranello. […]