Market Alert - Pre-Market

SP500 +1.46; DJ30 +18.00; NASDAQ +5.37

Happy Friday 13! Futures holding very modest gains, moving higher toward the open, building on the recovery Thursday afternoon. Bank earnings were palatable though the only one that beat top and bottom line was JPM as it prints money in the back.

Earnings beats: JPM; INFY (TL in line)

Misses: BAC (TL); BLK (TL); WFC (TL, BL)


Retail Sales, Dec: 0.6 vs 0.7 exp vs 0.2 NOV (from 0.1)

Control GROUP: 0.2% vs 0.4% exp

Ex-auto, Ex-gas: 0.0 vs 0.4 expected. This is the key. Outside auto sales to end 2016 as dealerships dumped inventory and rising gasoline prices, consumer spending showed no increase. Autos expect weaker sales in 2017. Where is that optimism? Did it not translate into retail sales? Apparently not. The next key is whether it failed to translate into business spending.


PPI: 0.3% vs 0.3% exp vs 0.4% prior. Gasoline and heating, brokerage services rose. Everything else flat or lower (fruit lower).

Core: 0.2% vs 0.1% exp vs 0.4% Nov


Jobs: LOW cutting "less than 1%" of workforce to increase efficiency. Does it really mean productivity? That workweek seen in the Jobs Report continues to drop. Time to get more out of the workers I guess.


China: December exports -6.1% vs -3.3% exp vs +0.1% prior. Year/year numbers. This is a back page story when it used to be page 1.


Analysts: FB upgraded, NFLX upgrade.


OTHER MARKETS
Bonds: 2.373% vs 2.358%

EUR/USD: 1.0647 vs 1.0624

USD/JPY: 114.776 vs 114.57

Oil: 52.64, -0.37

Gold; 1193.90, -5.90

Futures are holding pretty decent gains to the open. It would appear the Thursday morning session sellers have left for the long weekend. Yes, Monday is a holiday. We will see what shows a good move but with the indices still in the range the session likely won't resolve anything. Heck, even if it shows breakouts I am not sure they hold.

BAC is interesting. It was down but is not up a bit. It is possible it could hold a good move. If so we might pick up some more positions on the stock and see if we want some options next week.



Jon Johnson, Chief Market Strategist
InvestmentHouse.com
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