Stock Market Blog -Mar 24th

The market stalled this week, seemingly on the Cyprus financial situation. We're on track however to finish this quarter as one of the best in recent memory for this market. What we've seen so far is a nice rally in both stocks and the Dollar (normally they move in opposite directions!), and the first extended drop we've seen in Bonds for a long time. We also saw a huge drop in the Yen, the Pound, and more recently the Euro.

Fedex and Oracle dropped after reporting earnings, while NKE rallied on good numbers.

New all time highs:   AMGN, CVX, DFS, HCA, HON, JNJ, NKE, TJX, TRV, VMED, etc.
All time lows: --
Pops: NKE,   -Drops:  FDX, LULU, ORCL, 

Next week: Economic reports 
Earnings reports:  DG, MOS

Market Commentary

 
The market reversed direction a bit last week, as we head in to the end of the 1st quarter next week. We could see a correction take shape in Q2 after this extended rally. If we do get a correction, we'll see the VIX rally, and we might also see Bonds rally (TLT).

Are we due for a pullback here?

This week's charts:

Weekly Unemployment claims
S&P 500 -rally running out of steam?
OptionsMakeSense

Commodities/Futures (charts):
Crude Oil was up, closing near $93.71
Natural Gas was up, closing near $3.93
Gold was up, closing at $1606 -finally above 1600
The 30 year Bond was up, closing near $143.62
The US Dollar was up a bit, closing near 82.53

NEWS:
Nike shares rise on strong 3Q earnings
Senate Passes $3.7 Trillion Budget, Its First in 4 Years
Bond crash dead ahead: tick, tick ... boom!
Are bond funds a ticking time bomb?
BlackBerry Z10 review: A noble failure

Precious Metals Dearer Than Ever 
Gold Can Still Break Through $2,000: Analysts
Chinese Solar Panel Giant Is Tainted by Bankruptcy
Cyprus endgame: What happens if its banks collapse?