MARKET COMMENT
January 24, 2007
.
January has been like a thrill ride that’s for sure.
And another thing that’s true, I’m glad we
primarily focus on “weekly” chart analysis because if you were trading day-to-day
you’d have to pretty active and nimble.
First,
we’re told “sell energy, buy tech”, then that chorus is muted only to “buy tech
and energy” today.
The idea that the administration would be doubling the
strategic petroleum reserve has put a floor for now on oil prices.
That surely made rascals like Chavez happy
and I wonder why we needed to make that announcement just as prices were
falling.
Just do it and shut-up would seem
to make more sense and be shrewder.
And then moving to the much discussed energy and commodity
sector we get the perhaps unintended consequences of the Bush speech regarding
SPR.
And, overseas all remains well removed from the concerns of
Wall Street and Main Street.
Two articles caught my interest today.
The first is this article from MarketWatch here
regarding how Davos forum participants were thinking
that other markets could decouple from US markets.
This is a notion that would have been scoffed
at just a year or two ago.
But given the
action of Emerging Markets and other well established markets in Europe and elsewhere the idea suggests that [ahem] “it could
be different this time.”
The other is a Bloomberg article which I can’t locate at the
moment that pointed-out as oil prices were falling OPEC countries were selling
US Bonds.
The article noted that during
the previous quarter over $10 billion in US bonds were sold.
The recycling of petrodollars back into US
Treasury securities has been a hallmark for this market.
Perhaps Bush’s announcement on the SPR helps bonds
as an unintended consequence.
Have a pleasant evening.
Disclaimer:
Among
other issues, the ETF Digest maintains positions in: FDN, IGM, QQQQ, IGV, SPY,
MDY, IWM, GLD, KCE, EFA, EEM, ILF, FXI, INP, EPP, EWJ and EWM