Past week recap: Institutional trading behavior continued its whip-saw pattern, as investors responded to news events – mostly from Washington – in a seemingly constant knee-jerk manner. Last week’s concerns over trade wars with the Chinese suddenly subsided over just a few remarks from various government officials, and buying resumed – albeit volumes were low.
Still remains a very choppy market with many stocks unable to post intact trends of more than 3 weeks duration. Great uncertainty and lack of consensus among institutions as to how to react is keeping market conditions challenging for all investors, including us. Broad market short-term price trend is upward, but larger trend remains negative.
Many of our stocks remain stuck, whipsawing within a narrow price range, much like the major indexes. New weekly highs/lows, and number of large gainers remain limited in these conditions. At least some long positions rallied last week, including recent ones.
Highlights: 7 new weekly highs in long positions. 8 stocks with double-digit long gains:
- FMSA +10%
- CRC +26%
- FTK +35%
- URBN +80%
- BXC +279%
- PES +18%
- EVTC +27%
- PLSE +12%
1 new weekly low among short positions. No stocks with double-digit short gains at this time.
Stock list changes: Substitutions continue, as formerly productive stocks which have stalled from choppiness in this market are replaced by better-performing alternatives. Deleting AKTS and SNE after routine scheduled evaluation. Adding the following stocks with recent compound trading returns listed and trades indicated:
- China-based Aluminum Corp of China (ACH) [metals mining], +130.4% in past 23 months
- Calithera Biosciences Inc (CALA) [biotech/med research], +219.5% in past 18 months
- MDC Partners Inc (MDCA) [media & publishing], +238.9% in past 24 months
- XOMA Corp (XOMA) [biotech/med research], +789.2% in past 15 months