The Breather
For
three-and-a-half days of mostly straight-up trade, the market made a
few people forget that we’re still in a three-steps-forward,
two-and-a-half-steps-back trend.
The biggest plus on the day was Nasdaq
volume.
At 1.47 billion, it was 8% less than
that of Monday and 1% less than the recent average, indicative of minimal
profit-taking.
A benefit of the session: Some of the
individual leaders pulled back from steep ascents, potentially giving the
intermediate or swing player logical pivots from which to enter initial or
add-on positions in the days and weeks ahead.
On a morning such as Tuesday’s, it
helps to divert your attention away from your screen and onto charts of stocks
in your account.
If you’re invested in the leaders,
you’ll notice that, in the context of the intermediate picture, virtually none
did anything out of the ordinary Tuesday.
A few came under distribution, but
nothing extraordinary given the rich gains of the past several weeks.
The "accidents," such as
Redback
(
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(
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Among the names, Applied Micro
Circuits
(
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gap and Monday’s clearing of a four-month base.
Broadcom
(
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for only the first time in four weeks.
Ariba
(
ARBA |
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from Monday’s high-volume, wash-and-rinse shakeout.
Sapient
(
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final five minutes of trade to print a five-month high.
For the third day, BEA Systems
(
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pulled back on decreasing turnover.
GSI Lumonics blew out of a two-week
zone on brisk trade, then went out below the lip.
Recent new issue New Focus
(
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an optical play, jogged to a fresh high following Monday’s breakout from a 1-2-3
pullback.
Other recent IPOs, such as Marvell
(
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and Pixelworks
(
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mindset.
PMC-Sierra
(
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inside day on ebbing trade, its third session of handle construction.