Friday, June 18, 2010

So far

What a sweet night of sleep. I haven't had a week's worth of slumber this good in ages. The constant flow of steel chariots whizzing by en route to sunny Waikiki can't deprive me of those zzz's. I'm up before 9 am Hawaii time and have I missed anything in the market?

No. Of course not. Quad witching and a paralyzed retail flock have left most trading to the desks and robots. Factor in the $27 billion that has pulled out of the market since Jan. 1 and the lingering effects of the Flash Crash and we have what is, essentially, a mostly empty beach. Nobody's wading in the water. They know sharks are nearby.

Market is flat (Dow Jones +27). There are a lot of stocks hovering just above break-even with a few that are up big. AAPL is up just 1%, but that's a righteous 1%. Shares hit 275, an all-time high, before pulling back to 273. With an hour left before the close, uber-bulls are going to stampede in as they did at the opening bell. I'd rather wait this out and see what the weekend brings.

No, what has really moved is Banco Santander (STD), up 2.8% to 11.59. The Spanish bank king has been aggressive near (pursuing Royal Bank of Scotland) and far. They want M&T, a large regional in the Northeast. For all that aggression, STD is being rewarded.

Another Eurozone bank, IRE, is up 5.1%.

SLV is up 2.45% and GLD is up almost 1%.

IMAX dipped below 16 before finally making that long-awaited bounce and is now up 3.6%.

Nat Gas sector is middling. BRNC is up 4.4% ad GDP is up 3.3%. PQ up 3% and PETD gaining 2.8%. Most stocks on my lists are generally up slightly and a good-sized minority are down a bit. Not a lot of buying, but even less selling. Same general pattern of the past few days.

The world, it appears, is tired.

Photo: Vator News

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