No one is willing to make a big bet two days in a row. That's typical of the year: We've had a lot of great days, but no follow-through.
Right now, for the short term, the market is probably going to continue on this path for a little bit, ... Unless we get some dissipation of headwinds facing the market, we have a tough running ahead.
If we can spend enough time below $60, I think that may act as a positive for markets.
It is absolutely sideways action. I don't think anyone wants to do anything one way or another.
I think after yesterday's sell-off, when we turned off the lights and came back in the morning, we got a chance to say, 'You know what? We've overdone it here'.
I think that's on the heels of the latest tropical storm going through the Caribbean that may have an impact on supply.
I think one of the conundrums the market faces is that we continue to see energy prices go higher. It's going to be hard to get the market to rally much this week with oil starting at $68.
That's the one thing that can upset this apple cart. We would focus more on energy prices if we got something that was out of line with consensus.
We've had colder weather across the country, so we're back on the energy watch, and that's certainly going to have an effect on stocks.
You look at the past three days, we're down, up and down again. Without any real catalyst, and really, without knowing what the Fed will do, we're going to bounce around here for a while.
The fact that the Fed is remaining vigilant is positive for earnings growth. They see a robust economy and they see that continuing.
We had a terribly horrible day going on until the later afternoon when we had a nice turnaround, ... There's clearly some bargain hunting going on.
We've had a very good week and there's been some profit-taking. It's nothing to be concerned about.
We've had a relatively positive earnings reporting season, with most of it behind us, and the market has tried to price that in, so today may be a day where we try to sit back and digest some of our gains,
We're very oversold, corporate news is relatively good, consolidation in tech and telecom continues to go on, and bargain hunters are out there,
The three things we'll digest this week are earnings and guidance for the fourth quarter, and the long-term forecast for energy prices.
Depending on how you look at it, (Citigroup's earnings) only beat by 2 cents, ... It's got to be better than two pennies to get people that excited.
A lot of investors are in a wait-and-see mode until we get the Fed behind us next Tuesday,
There?s an overall feeling that U.S. stocks may be able to extend their rally.
If you look at Fed funds futures for December, they are indicating that the Fed will take a breather at one of the remaining meetings this year. It's been one of the positives in the last week as it runs through investors' psyches.
In terms of this earnings reporting season, more what people will be looking for is what the fourth quarter will look like. Nine out of the last 10 times, the fourth quarter has been higher, so we'll be playing close attention to any kind of guidance we get.
The market continues to raise the level of tolerance it has for high energy prices.
The focus is on Vista and when they get that rolled out. Obviously, they need to keep to their schedule and get that out in the first quarter, but that means any ramp in revenue growth for this company is not going to come until the first quarter of next year.
The market has been responding well in terms of energy prices coming down, but those are very volatile numbers week over week. Any major swing from the consensus figure can add a lot of volatility.
The market is reacting more to good news than to bad news at this point. Energy prices are certainly stabilizing off their peak, but it's pretty remarkable considering the headwinds we should be facing.
The market is reacting more to good news than to bad news at this point, ... Energy prices are certainly stabilizing off their peak, but it's pretty remarkable considering the headwinds we should be facing.
