Market Insights
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Big Caps on the Move: Scanning for Breakouts in the Dow
It's pretty quiet today as stocks drift aimlessly before Labor Day. Dog days of summer? More like the sloth days ... Still, some members of the Dow Jones Industrial Average are melting to new highs even as the broader market snoozes in the shade. Here's a quick tool...
Greek of the Week: Theta
This is the third installment of a four-part series about options Greeks on Market Insights concluding Labor Day week. So far, we've looked at delta and gamma. This week, we'll turn to theta. Theta: T is for "time decay." Theta measures how much time value an option...
Starting with Futures: S&P 500 E-minis
Do you love to trade stocks, but are confused by futures? Keep reading. Many clients are initially puzzled, or even scared, by these derivative instruments. The lingo is different. Their hours are weird. The rules seem bizarre, along with their settlements and...
Is the Global Picture Brightening?
Global stocks have been a hot mess all summer, but some recent events may suggest the tide is turning. Over the weekend, for instance, China allowed its currency to appreciate against the U.S. dollar. That's being viewed as a sign Beijing won't deploy yuan devaluation...
Last Week Shows Records Were Made to Be Broken
As the saying goes: Records were made to be broken. Just take the market last week. The S&P 500's decade-long bull run surpassed the lifespan of its previous upward journey in the 1990s. Another record fell on Tuesday, when the Russell 2000 Index hit a new...
New Companies Back on the Rise
Back in the spring, there was a wave of bullishness in initial public offerings. After a few pullbacks, some of those companies are pushing higher again. Take a name like ZScaler (ZS), which provides cloud-computing security services. It chopped around after crushing...
Goldilocks Drives S&P 500 to New Highs
If the longest bull market in history had a patron saint, it would be Goldilocks. This Wednesday marked the 3,453rd session in the uptrend that began on March 9, 2009. That outlasted the earlier run between late 1990 and early 2000. While improving economics and...
Calls Spike as Small Cap Goes Mobile: Options Recap
Last month, Market Insights highlighted a surging maker of smart-phone games. Yesterday, options traders lit up the name. Here's a breakdown of the large transactions detected in Glu Mobile (GLUU): A block of 5,500 September 5.50 calls was bought for $2.04. A block of...
Retail Revival Underway: Earnings This Week
Remember when everyone thought traditional retailers were going extinct? This week's earnings reports may have destroyed that narrative. "This is the healthiest environment I have ever seen," Target (TGT) CEO Brian Cornell told CNBC as his stock shot into record...
Big Caps on the Move: Scanning for Breakouts in the Dow
It's pretty quiet today as stocks drift aimlessly before Labor Day. Dog days of summer? More like the sloth days ... Still, some members of the Dow Jones Industrial Average are melting to new highs even as the broader market snoozes in the shade. Here's a quick tool...
Greek of the Week: Theta
This is the third installment of a four-part series about options Greeks on Market Insights concluding Labor Day week. So far, we've looked at delta and gamma. This week, we'll turn to theta. Theta: T is for "time decay." Theta measures how much time value an option...
Starting with Futures: S&P 500 E-minis
Do you love to trade stocks, but are confused by futures? Keep reading. Many clients are initially puzzled, or even scared, by these derivative instruments. The lingo is different. Their hours are weird. The rules seem bizarre, along with their settlements and...
Is the Global Picture Brightening?
Global stocks have been a hot mess all summer, but some recent events may suggest the tide is turning. Over the weekend, for instance, China allowed its currency to appreciate against the U.S. dollar. That's being viewed as a sign Beijing won't deploy yuan devaluation...
Last Week Shows Records Were Made to Be Broken
As the saying goes: Records were made to be broken. Just take the market last week. The S&P 500's decade-long bull run surpassed the lifespan of its previous upward journey in the 1990s. Another record fell on Tuesday, when the Russell 2000 Index hit a new...
New Companies Back on the Rise
Back in the spring, there was a wave of bullishness in initial public offerings. After a few pullbacks, some of those companies are pushing higher again. Take a name like ZScaler (ZS), which provides cloud-computing security services. It chopped around after crushing...
Goldilocks Drives S&P 500 to New Highs
If the longest bull market in history had a patron saint, it would be Goldilocks. This Wednesday marked the 3,453rd session in the uptrend that began on March 9, 2009. That outlasted the earlier run between late 1990 and early 2000. While improving economics and...
Calls Spike as Small Cap Goes Mobile: Options Recap
Last month, Market Insights highlighted a surging maker of smart-phone games. Yesterday, options traders lit up the name. Here's a breakdown of the large transactions detected in Glu Mobile (GLUU): A block of 5,500 September 5.50 calls was bought for $2.04. A block of...
Retail Revival Underway: Earnings This Week
Remember when everyone thought traditional retailers were going extinct? This week's earnings reports may have destroyed that narrative. "This is the healthiest environment I have ever seen," Target (TGT) CEO Brian Cornell told CNBC as his stock shot into record...