Weekly SP-500 Trend Commentary – 20110806

*** Status: Market Bearish – Bond Funds ***

For the last several months the SP-500 has been confined to a sideways channel. This week we had a convincing move to the downside. We were positioned for such a move given our bearish signals seen last week.The general market trading filter I use (SP-500 53 day CCI) is at -283 indicating Market Down which is down from -56 last week. My multiple composite SP-500 indicators on the daily chart are Bearish with the Blau Ergodic Composite Indicator and the MACD composite indicating a down trend. The SP-500 index is down ~14.2% from the recent May high of 1370. The CCI(53) indicator for all the indices on the right of this page are strongly bearish with only the IEF bond fund as bullish.

The Guppy Plot for the SP-500 is  Bearish, with the Fast moving averages now under the Slow moving averages. The average slopes of the Slow Moving Averages and Fast Moving Averages are both strongly negative. The ADX components are bearish and the Stoch is down.

We’ll see what the next week brings. We don't try to forecast the market here, rather we just monitor the current conditions and react accordingly. I hope you find this blog helpful. If you do, why not leave a comment.

Rankings:

This week's Rankings continue to have Bond Funds and Short Funds at the top.  Ranking scores are color coded to indicate positive ranking scores (rate of change / volatility) in green, and negative ranking scores in red. Overall the list is sorted by overall rank but the score that makes up the rank can be positive or negative depending on the recent rate of change. The full list of the funds that are ranked can be found under the Funds tab. Current Rankings of the Funds can be found under the Rankings tab.

What Others are Saying (all free sites): Overall Bearish

AAII Sentiment:  27% Bullish / 23% Neutral / 50% Bearish

Barchart: 100% Sell (last week 48% Sell)

Bulkowski: Bearish (CPI= 0% - last week 12%)

Buy-Don't Hold: Sell (1)

Consensus Traders: 23% Bullish / 17% Neutral / 61% Bearish (SPY)

Derek Hernquist: Negative

MTR Investors Market Timing Model: Market Down

MyPlanIQ Trend Score: -5.33% (SPY 1.95% last week) 

10 DMA New High - New Low Ratio: Bearish (see Chris Perruna for explanation)

Pattern Trapper: Bearish (SPY)

Stock TA (SPY): Neutral

Stock Trends: Mildly Bullish

Wishing Wealth: Down Trend

dshort.com: Invested (Note - monthly 10-EMA signal)

Click on Charts to Enlarge

SP-500 Daily Chart for August 6, 2011

SP-500 Daily Guppy Chart for July 30, 2011

Fidelity, Vanguard, Schwab, and Profunds Fund Rankings - 20110806

This week we had a major down move that kept Bond Funds at the top of the Rankings. We now have a variety of Bond Funds and Bear Funds back at the top. Remember that even though a Fund is ranked in the Top 15, if it is colored red it is in a downtrend. Green coloring indicates positive rate of change over the past period, and red indicates negative rate of change. For the full list of funds that are ranked see our Funds listing.

Selected Fidelity Funds Rankings

Selected Fidelity Funds Rankings for August 6, 2011

Selected Vanguard ETF Rankings

Selected Vanguard ETF Rankings for August 6, 2011

Selected Schwab & Profunds Funds Rankings

Selected Schwab & Profunds Funds Rankings for August 6, 2011

Retirement Strategy Update 20110806

One thing I've focused on is developing a strategy for my retirement funds. Ever since pulling my funds out of the market in late 2008, like many others I hesitatedt to reinvest - at least not without a plan. Two books that influenced my plans are The Ivy Portfolio and How a Second Grader Beats Wall Street. In general both of these books profess the use of broad index funds versus individual stock picking. The Ivy Portfolio adds a mechanism for market timing, such as the 10 month moving average and adjusting monthly. Dshort provides updates on The Ivy Portfolio strategy each month.

Below is a summary of retirement funds considered by mybestfunds.com with three different market timing strategies indicated: the average slope of the Guppy Slow moving averages, the CCI(53), and the 200 day simple moving average. In a future post, I'll provide backtesting results for each of these strategies. I plan on providing a weekly update on these funds.

Retirement Strategy Update for August 6, 2011