Richard Suttmeier Market Quotations

If you are a short-term trader you like to see some more gyrations. But certainly from a longer term perspective you want to see the market broaden out, have a very nice looking pattern to it technically so that you are not getting hurt too much in a market that's going to grind higher. It looks like that will continue. My theme is productivity. The Federal Reserve stated that that is a very important point in moving the economy forward. The Fed will allow a stronger growth rate as long as productivity gains remain strong. And I think that's going to be the case.

The market is looking for that soft landing. If we can get through the productivity unit labor cost next week, and they are benign, and it takes the Fed totally off the radar screen, then we'll get a relief rally, but not a bull market. So we're in a non-bear market, non-bull market. We're in a trading-range environment.

I am optimistic about most of the stocks in the market because I think it's only the Dow and the transports that have a negative profile right now. We've evaluated and came up with 10 sectors that we thought were positioned the best in the year 2000, and moving forward in terms of providing leadership in the economy. And then in that