Morning Market Thoughts

by DAN Good morning. Another strong open this morning on some strong earnings reports by Morgan Stanley (MS), Intuitive Surgical (ISRG), Lam Research (LRCX) an d Abbott Labs (ABT). The indexes are still in jail and I would be suspicious of any breakout. While nothing is guaranteed, I think there is a very strong likelihood that any upward gaps will be sold into. That should be your default position.

There will always be the exception, so don’t just shy away from a stock because it gapped. Instead, watch it closely and keep your mind on risk management rather than all the sugar plums dancing in your head.

The next few weeks promise to be quite volatile as several important companies report earnings. In particular, April 27th (next Thursday) will be nuts (actually, Friday will be nuts). On Thursday, Alphabet (GOOGL), Amazon (AMZN), Celgene (CELG) Dominos Pizza (DPX), Alexion (ALXN), Raytheon (RTN), Union Pacific (UNP), Boston Scientific (BSX)….and a slew of regional banks! So be aware that the volatility in the market will rise dramatically next week as traders struggle to digest the information.

And because we are in consolidation, the market could break in a meaningful way either upward…or downward.

Sadly, nothing is guaranteed….other than your ability to trade prudently and avoid impulsiveness. Come into each day with a plan. And that plan can always include not doing anything except watching and learning…or buying/selling specific stocks according to your plan.

It’s important to have a plan. Your plan might not even be a good one, but it’s better than having no plan at all. If you have a plan that doesn’t pan out, at least you can learn from it. But if you have no plan, then the only thing you’ll have learned is that you shouldn’t had a plan. And you know that alrleady. 😎

See you in the forum.

Dan

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