The market direction opened with a huge jump on economic numbers out of Asia and with a rise in the US Dollar as it hit the highest level in over a month. As well manufacturing picked up in the US in August and that too buoyed investors. The news out of Syria while keeping investors on edge now appears to be something in the order of a small strike to make a point, but no troops on the ground which alleviated much of the fear from investors. On that news the S&P 500 opened up above 1650 at 1651.35 and then the selling started. It was limited at first but by 11:00 AM with news that Obama was pressuring for action on Syria and with the markets unable to push higher, sellers pressured the markets and wiped out all the gains in the Dow and pushed the S&P back to being up just 1.5 points by 1:00 PM. One word describes today’s market direction action – disappointing.
Market Direction Action Intraday For Sep 3 2013
You can see the big jump in the morning that pushed the S&P 500 back over the 1650 technical barrier. Within half an hour the S&P was back below 1650 and a small rally failed to break through. When that rally failed the sellers took charge. At 11:00 AM more sellers entered realizing that the market direction up was over and by 11:00 AM they had pushed the S&P 500 down to 1633.68.
Market Direction and Investor Concern
Investors remain very nervous about the Syria issue. Wiping out more than 100 points in the Dow’s rally and sending the Dow into negative territory just on “talk” about action in Syria, ended the rally that started the month of September.
Market Direction Intraday and Gold
Gold at the outset had drifted lower as the US dollar rose but by mid-afternoon, Gold was up $16.60 to $1412.70 just on worries about US involvement in Syria.
Microsoft Stock Off 5.9%
Meanwhile Microsoft stock was in the news as it plunged 5.9% on news it was spending 7.2 billion to buy Nokia’s handset business. Nokia rallied 31% on the news but investors are cautious about this move by Microsoft into an already troubled mobile field.
I had sold naked puts on Microsoft at the $31 strike for September expiry. On the plunge in Microsoft Stock I sold additional puts. Here is the trade alert.
Summary of Intraday Comments For Sep 3 2013
Technically a day like today does a lot of damage to both the market direction up and to investors’ sentiment. There are many headwinds facing the market direction from the Fed scaling back Quantitative Easing to Syria and with stocks already at historic highs a day like today normally leads to more downside action in the week. I will be looking at the technical indicators at the close of today but right now everything points to more downside market direction than up.
Market Direction Internal Links
Profiting From Understanding Market Direction (Articles Index)
Understanding Short-Term Signals
Market Direction Portfolio Trades (Members)
Market Direction External Links
Market Direction IWM ETF Russell 2000 Fund Info
Market Direction SPY ETF 500 Fund Info