Market Comment - April 17

(Marco Bonelli) Wait a moment..., are you saying if the US dropped its paralyzing focus on European problems and concentrates on the great domestic developments, stocks will do a lot better?

And if the speculation and/ or risk premium in energy prices miraculously evaporates, the economic recovery and consumer spending will really take off and stocks will do a lot better? (Yesterday, the Dow Jones Transportation Index sharply outperformed on back of the second meaningful decline in gasoline prices since the commodity took off for a 28.8% run three months ago.)


And if the strong performances of market-leaders like large-cap technology and financials gets respected and earnings don't get scrutinized down to the basement, the Q1 rally and future perspectives will get appreciated more, will be more seen as a catch-up to the sharp losses from August and September last year and stocks will do a lot better?

And if market participants stop talking about this silly 2011 / 2012 "deja-vu" moment, stop wetting their pants every time the Dow Jones has a triple-digit decline and finally acknowledge that the major averages need a little bit of consolidation after a 30% plus performance since the October lows, stocks will do a lot better? ($60Bln in lost market-cap in five trading days sounds like the end of the world but AAPL is still up 43% year-to-date.)

Unfortunately the great domestic performance - according to recent macro economic data- just fits into the "modest to moderate" picture with little excitement to the upside but quite a few exceptions to the downside: weak Jobless Claims, weak Empire Manufacturing Index, weak Housing Starts, weak Industrial Production, weak rail traffic (which has been mostly dragged down by low coal shipments in the past months, but last week, iron, steel and scrap metal joined on the weak front) versus better Retail Sales, better PC growth in Q1!

Unfortunately the strong earnings performance in the financial sector was mostly achieved by cost cutting, reserve reduction, share buy-backs and a favorable trading environment. Revenues however were mostly down on a year-over-year comparison and as we all know, estimates have been sharply lowered until February.

Nevertheless, today, global downside risks are suddenly perceived as significantly lower, central banks around the world are perceived to be strongly committed to accommodate life in general, AAPL is perceived a strong buy at current levels and risk is perceived as good! Let's see how the picture looks like 30 minutes after the opening...

Trade well.


(Marco Bonelli is the Managing Director of International for CL King & Associates in New York. The opinions expressed are his own.)