You May Not Know Them, But This Team Has Some Major Players
When You Least Expect It…
The mishap this week with the small aircraft violating the no-fly zone near the
White House and the corresponding market action prompted me to write this piece.
If you’ll recall, the Capitol Building was evacuated around Noon on Wednesday
after a small plane violated airspace and didn’t respond to calls. F-16s had to
be scrambled and there was general panic in the nation’s capitol. The market dropped
suddenly–with the Dow falling 40 points and the S&P dropping 6.5 points in one
5-minute bar. And just as quickly, the market rallied and went on to make new highs for the
day. The 12:05 PM bar actually turned out to be the low of the day.
So what was that all about? Well, Kevin Haggerty
mentioned the “plunge protection team” in his
05/12 column  NYSE specialists and other savvy traders have long
speculated about the existence of this mysterious entity, which periodically
rescues the market from falling too far and too fast. Thought to have been
created in 1988 by
Executive Order 12631 – Working Group on Financial Markets, the PPT shows up
occasionally when the market suffers a dramatic downdraft. To read more about
the PPT, try a Google search.
And remember, if you ever see
the market rally dramatically after a large drop and you can’t
quite explain it, maybe it’s the plunge protection team.
If You Day Trade…
If you do, the
Alvarez Factor could
potentially really improve your trading!
If You Swing Trade…
Attend the
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The New, Improved
TradersWire
If you haven’t been in TradersWire for a while,
swing by next week–you’ll be pleasantly surprised. We’ve made a lot of changes,
including precise buy and sell alerts on stocks and E-minis and Mini-sized Dow
contracts, expanded education and trading tips. And as always, there are some
good traders in the chat room. I’m not ashamed to say that I’ve learned a lot
from some of these traders through the years, and I’m willing to bet you could
learn something, too.
 So
come on by, we’ll
see you in
TradersWire on Monday!
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Big Cap
Earnings Announcements for the Week of
May 16th
Company |
Symbol |
Date |
| Bema Gold | BGO | Monday, May 16 |
| Limted Brands | LTD | Monday, May 16 |
| Lowe’s | LOW | Monday, May 16 |
| Valspar | VAL | Monday, May 16 |
| Abercrombie & Fitch |
ANF | Tuesday, May 17 |
| Applied Materials |
AMAT | Tuesday, May 17 |
| Barnes & Noble | BKS | Tuesday, May 17 |
| Big Lots | BLI | Tuesday, May 17 |
| Borders Group | SWFT | Tuesday, May 17 |
| Deere & Co. | DE | Tuesday, May 17 |
| Dick’s Sporting Goods |
DKS | Tuesday, May 17 |
| Hewlett Packard | HPQ | Tuesday, May 17 |
| Home Depot | HD | Tuesday, May 17 |
| JC Penny | JCP | Tuesday, May 17 |
| Nordstorm | JWN | Tuesday, May 17 |
| Saks | SKS | Tuesday, May 17 |
| Staples | SPLS | Tuesday, May 17 |
| Advance Auto Parts |
AAP | Wednesday, May 18 |
| Catalina Marketing |
POS | Wednesday, May 18 |
| Foot Locker | FL | Wednesday, May 18 |
| Jack In the Box | JBX | Wednesday, May 18 |
| Men’s Wearhouse | MW | Wednesday, May 18 |
| Pet’s Mart | PETM | Wednesday, May 18 |
| Ross Stores | ROST | Wednesday, May 18 |
| Talbots | TLB | Wednesday, May 18 |
| Aeropostale | AOS | Thursday, May 19 |
| Ann Taylor Stores |
ANN | Thursday, May 19 |
| Autodesk | ADSK | Thursday, May 19 |
| Claire’s Stores | CLE | Thursday, May 19 |
| Cost Plus | CPWM | Thursday, May 19 |
| Gap Inc. | GPS | Thursday, May 19 |
| Marvell Semiconductor |
MRVL | Thursday, May 19 |
| Serna Software | SRNA | Thursday, May 19 |
| Sharper Image | SHRP | Thursday, May 19 |
| Vivdendi Universal |
V | Thursday, May 19 |
Scheduled Stock Splits for the Week of
May 16th
Company |
Symbol |
Ratio |
Payable |
Ex-Date |
| Colony Bankcorp | CBAN | 5-4 | May 15 | May 16 |
| Frontier Financial | FTBK | 3-2 | May 16 | May 17 |
| Nexen | NXY | 2-1 | May 17 | May 18 |
| Washington Banking | WBCO | 4-3 | May 1 | May 18 |
| McGraw Hill | MHP | 2-1 | May 17 | May 18 |
| Moody’s | MCO | 2-1 | May 17 | May 18 |
| Barrett Business | BBSI | 3-2 | May 19 | May 20 |
| Frontier Oil | FTO | 2-1 | May 20 | May 23 |
Need more splits information? Click
here.
Upcoming Economic Events for the Week of
May 16th
| Date | ET | Release | For | Consensus | Prior |
| May 16 | 8:30 am |
NY Empire State Index | May | 11.0 | 3.1 |
| May 17 |
8:30 am |
PPI | Apr | 0.4% | 0.7% |
| May 17 | 8:30 am |
Core PPI | Apr | 0.2% | 0.1% |
| May 17 | 8:30 am |
Housing Starts | Apr | 1980K | 1837K |
| May 17 | 8:30 am |
Building Permits | Apr | 2043K | 2025K |
| May 17 | 9:15 am |
Industrial Production | Apr | 0.1% | 0.3% |
| May 17 | 9:15 am |
Capacity Utilization | Apr | 79.4% | 79.4% |
| May 18 |
8:30 am | CPI | Apr | 0.4% | 0.6% |
| May 18 | 8:30 am | CORE CPI | Apr | 0.2% | 0.4% |
| May 19 |
8:30 am | Initial Jobless Caims | 05/14 | NA | 340K |
| May 19 | 10:00 am | Leading Economic Indicators | Apr | -0.2% | -0.4% |
| May 19 | 12:00 pm | Philly Fed | May | 19.0 | 25.3 |
Have a great weekend!
Brice
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