Market Commentary: Markets Open Down As US Law Makers Squabble

Written by Gary

Opening Market Commentary For 10-14-2013

The premarket was down this morning with the SP500 futures off 12.55 (-0.74%) and SPY off 1.08 (-0.64%) mostly because the US law makers failed to make an agreement acceptable to both sides over the weekend.

Markets opened down in the minus -0.50+% area on mixed moderate volume as traders can’t make up their minds if this is bargain hunting time or not. By 10 am the averages were slowly melting up trimming opening losses fractionally on low to moderate volume.

October 17th is the technical deadline for default and it appears the fighting factions in Washington are still deeply divided over a number of issues. Investors are also divided over hope of an 11th hour deal being made by the US Congress, many are taking the safer position by lighting their exposure.

The odds of the Fed starting the ‘taper’ this month are not very good and that is the silver lining as the financial recovery is being severely hampered by the shutdown and a default will be highly undesirable.

For those traders that took inverse ETF positions before Friday’s close are going to realize a nice profitable trade before this session is over, but be ready for a sudden reversal. It is too bad the market volatility happens mostly during the market off hours and profited by the crooks that lurk in the shadow markets making profit taking nearly impossible for the cash crowd. The cash market has only moved 0.10% in the morning session and not the ¾ points the market dropped from Friday’s close. The little guy’s don’t have a chance unless you can guess really well.

I still have continuing issues with some pundits, writing continually, that there are good setups for day trading which has only been true for swing trading, but the Best Stock Market Indicator Ever: Confirms “Untradeable”. Maybe we have seen the top – but I wouldn’t count it as long as the Fed continues to hand out ‘Free Ice Cream”!

Further, the bullish trend line started in 2009 and tested in 2011 and 2012 has NOT been broken yet. Although weakened, the markets are still in an up trend and the SP500 needs to drop below 1638 to break out of this bull run. This current drop could be another consolidation or correction and further highs are on Mr. Markets mind.

The DOW at 10:15 is at 15164 down 73 or -0.48%.

The SP500 is at 1694 down 9 or -0.52%.

SPY is at 169.34 down -0.91 or -0.53%.

The $RUT is at 1078 down 7 or -0.61%.

NASDAQ is at 3776 down 16 or -0.42%.

NASDAQ 100 is at 3223 up 12 or 0.36%.

The longer trend is up, the past months trend is bullish, the past 5 sessions have been down and the current bias is negative.

How Oil Really Gets Priced

WTI oil is trading between 102.50 and 101.08 today. The session bias is negative and is currently trading down at 101.45.

Brent Crude is trading between 110.60 and 109.19 today. The session bias is negative and is currently trading down at 109.43.

Gold rose from 168.53 earlier to 1289.79 and is currently trading up at 1283.70.

Here’s why copper has lost its indicator role

Dr. Copper is at 3.298 rising from 3.245 earlier.

The US dollar is trading between 80.52 and 80.21 and is currently trading down at 80.25, the bias is currently down.

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Written by Gary