Volume ends lower across the board with solid price gains

Stocks advance in front of President Obama’s State of the Union Speech.  Preliminary volume shows stocks advanced in lighter trade compared to Friday’s inflated figure due to options expiration.  Price gains were mostly had by big cap technology stocks with AAPL leading the way.  Early session selling gave way to buyers pushing the market back to Friday’s high by early afernoon.  The NASDAQ was the clear winner on the day with the Dow Jones Industrial average not too far behind.  Small caps lagged, but it was the S&P 500 limping far behind all the averages into the close.  A good rebound from last week’s selling, but do we have the buyers to build upon today’s action the market will try to answer this week.

The NASDAQ was able to recapture its 20dma, but failed to retake its 10dma.  Today’s buying spree wasn’t as powerful as we’d like to see, but it did take the sting out of last week’s selling.  However, plenty of stocks continue to show plenty of damage from the selling beginning on Wednesday.  A few leaders rebounded, but the majority of leaders were in tepid volume and not showing the type of conviction for a solid rebound.  The moral of the story is stick to the price and volume performance of the individual stock you hold.

A few major names reported earnings in after-hours trading one being a leading cloud computing stock VMW.  The company beat expectations across the board, but is struggling to maintain positive action in after-hours trading.  Volume at the moment is large almost a one million shares traded, but buyers aren’t stepping up just yet.  AMGN posted earnings and the market is cheering its release pushing the stock in after-hours trading.  AXP posted disappointing results and sellers are taking to the stock in after-hours trading.  AMGN will certainly provide the NASDAQ with a boost tomorrow, but it will need a few other names to help out the index.

We could certainly see the market’s fortune turn for the better here despite the selling last week.  It is far more likely we’ll roll over.  Why?  It certainly doesn’t matter why, but with leadership showing plenty of cracks and the lack of quality “setups” it is realy hard to get excited for this market to push higher.  Be prepared and take signals from the market.  My opinion of the market means very little, as does yours, make sure you keep your eyes on the price and volume action.

Keep your eyes on the price and minimize those losses!