Overheard On The Street
Here’s what they’re saying at mid-day:
Brian Conroy, Head of Listed Trading,
J.P. Morgan: “It’s a relatively quiet day today. We’ve had some earnings
surprises today and last night, but I think the market is getting somewhat used
to that, quite frankly, and the action today is mostly to the buy side. We’re
seeing more institutions putting money into this market than we are seeing
institutions selling. With the news of National Semiconductor last night, the
semiconductor stocks are a little weaker than the overall market, but for the
most part, the overall market’s financials and basic industry stocks are doing
better.”Â
Robin Griffiths, Chief Technical Analyst,
HSBC: “The low is in, basically. The seasonality of the market is sell in
May and go away, and then you get a mid-summer rally before you drop to a
panicky low in October. It’s always in October, and basically the low is in
place right now. There’s also a four-year cycle in economics which happens to be
linked to the Presidential election cycle, so in an election year, you normally
run through the election upwards and up through inauguration day as a honeymoon
period. Some Presidents get a really long honeymoon period. However you stack it
up, from the 19th of October, which was the low, through to the year-end and
into January will be the strongest quarter of the year.”
Paul Desmond, President, Lowry’s Research
Reports: “It’s interesting to note that several articles have appeared in
the financial press in recent days suggesting that market declines never extend
beyond October. We refer those authors to a long term chart of the DJIA for the
years ’37, ’41, ’43, ’48, ’51, ’56, ’67, ’69, ’71, ’73, ’78, ’79, ’80, ’84, ’91,
and ’94 in which market declines extended beyond the end on October.”