Ouch!
Greg Che is on vacation. In his
absence, this column is being written by Brice Wightman.
Practically the only good thing about Tuesday’s
trading was the closing bell at 4:00. The Dow and Naz both slipped in worried
trading. Job cuts announced by both Corning and Compaq fueled the slide. For the
intermediate term trader, good setups are few and far between–the safest place
to be right now is in cash. The fear and doubt being generated about upcoming
earnings reports has shaken the market pretty badly.
That being said, let’s take a look at couple of
charts–first, to the upside:
Advanta looks strong, rallying out of a base from
which weak hands were shaken out.
Hawaiian Electric is breaking out from an
ascending triangle on the weekly chart.
Again on the weekly chart, Tenet Healthcare is
trading at the top of a flag.
And now, the downside:
More typical of today’s action is Veritas, which
broke down with a wide-range bar.
Again, typical of the action today is Protein
Design Labs, breaking down in a big way.
The Biotech HOLDRs
(
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PowerRating), mentioned Monday,
got slammed for a seven point loss Tuesday. And Americredit
(
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PowerRating), also
mentioned yesterday, rallied for a 2-point gain.
Undoubtedly, this market will need some guidance
(and some earnings) to pull out it out of its current state. The action for the
next couple of weeks will be shaped largely by earnings.
I doubt if we’ve seen the end of this downdraft,
so keep your powder dry.