In last week’s Weekly Wrap Up
we finished up by saying, “We'll need a monster month to see the stock
funds turn positive again for the year.” Well, we actually had modest
losses on Thursday and Friday, the first two days of the new month, but
thanks to a strong end to November, the worst Thanksgiving week since
1932 gave way to the best week in 3 years for the market, and now the
S&P 500 and Dow are back in positive territory for 2011.
For the TSP, the
C-fund jumped 7.47% on the week, the S-fund gained 8.89%,the I-fund
moved up 9.31%, while the F-fund (bonds) added 0.08%, and the G-fund was
up 0.03%.
We
got a decent November jobs report on Friday as the unemployment rate
dropped sharply to 8.6%, but investors either focused on the contraction
in the labor force, or they simply wanted to take profits after the 7%
rally earlier in the week because the market could not hold early gains
into the close on Friday despite the positive report.
The S&P 500 is in a sticky situation. It seems to have broken out of
a bullish bull flag pattern, and that means the flag itself, which was
resistance on the way up, should act as support now. The 200-day EMA is
also there to help with support. But the reversal day on Friday looks a
little negative as we’ve seen similar reversals become short-term tops
recently.
Chart provided courtesy of www.decisionpoint.com, analysis by TSP Talk
This
week could be another wild one as the chaos in Europe continues and
there are scheduled meetings that could shake things up. Much of last
week’s gains had to do with optimism in Europe, but we know how fickle
that can be.
After some early strength in December, there is a seasonal lull before
the strongest historical seasonal period of the year beings. That lull
would start sometime this week as Monday is the 3rd trading day of the month.
Chart provided courtesy of www.sentimentrader.com
Good luck, and thanks for reading. We will be back here next week with another TSP Wrap Up.
Tom Crowley
www.tsptalk.com
The legal stuff:
This information is for educational purposes only! This is not advice or
are commendation. We do not give investment advice. Do not act on this
data. Do not buy, sell or trade the funds mentioned herein based on
this information. We may trade these funds differently than discussed
above. We use additional methods and strategies to determine fund
positions.
