The Canadian Vanguard Stock Market Report At Close – Friday, January 12, 2024
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Your Weekend Market Report And Analysis For Monday’s Market Winning Trades
. The market is closed on Monday January 15 for Martin Luther King holiday.
The Toronto Market
The TSX composite index gained 71.82 points or 0.34% to close at 20,990.22. The index seems hesitant to cross the 21,000 points level. Friday’s market literally reversed Thursday’s market performance.
There is currently, quite a number of major problems out there worldwide – war or possibility of war at different parts of the globe, possible expansion of the Middle East war and competing internal political forces within the US among others causing some uncertainties in the market. The market is looking for direction. For reference – on Thursday the TSX composite index declined 71.02 points.
Basic Materials, up 2%, was clearly the top performing sector on Friday. Healthcare was next but with 1.03% gain. Technology gained 0.69%; Industrials gained 0.51%; Telecommunications Services gained 0.48% and Energy gained 0.12%. Durable Consumer Goods & Services declined -0.11%; Utilities declined -0.24% and Financials declined -0.24%.
Retail – Apparel & Accessories, up 8.47%, was the top performing industry on Friday; Precious Metals & Minerals was up 3.61%; Air Freight & Courier Services was up 3.59%; Pharmaceuticals – Generic & Specialty was up 3.08% while Construction – supplies & Fixtures was up 2.80%. Members of the Retail – Apparel & Accessories industry include: Roots Corp (TSX:ROOT); Reitmans Canada Ltd (TSX:RET.A); Peekaboo Beans Inc. (TSX:BEAN) and Aritzia Inc. (TSX:ATZ)
For the week, Technology was the top performing sector, up 7.35%; Discretionary Consumer Goods & Services was up 2.13%; Durable Consumer goods & Services was up 1.88%; Healthcare was up 1.48% and Basic Materials was up 1.4%. Financials declined -1.34%; Energy declined -0.97% and Utilities was down -0.84%.
Today’s Statistics: The gaining issues (advancers) outnumbered the declined issues (decliners) today. The ratio was 2.07-to-1.00 or roughly for every two advancers there was one decliner. In real numbers, 968 advancers to 466 decliners with 103 Unchanged – really bullish market, a good day to trade. The total volume of shares traded for gaining stocks was 199,847,217 or 60.2%; the total volume for declined stocks was 120,266,925 or 36.2% and 12,076,066 or 3.6% for “Unchanged”.
There were 146 new 52-Week Highs and 9 new 52-Week Lows. The market rally continues. Friday the TSX did a complete reversal of Thursday’s session, in terms of trend. The TSX appears quite hesitant to cross the 21,000 points level. We shall see if that happens this coming week. It looks likely, but the market will do whatever it wishes to do regardless of our thinking or wishes. Smart traders know to study and follow the market, i.e. investing, and not try to guess the market which really is gambling.
The total volume of stocks traded at the TSX today was 332,190,208 compared with 320,320,972 yesterday, a 3% increase. Today’s volume of 332,190,208 is higher than the average of the ten most recent market sessions.
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The US Market
The Dow Jones Industrial Average declined -118.04 points, or -0.31%, to close at 37,592.98. The S&P 500 was up 3.59 points, or 0.087%, to close at 4,783.83. The Nasdaq Composite advanced, without really advancing for the second session in a row, a mere 2.57 points or 0.02%, to close at 14,972.76. Nasdaq has spent the last few sessions essentially closing just at about the previous session’s level. Clearly the markets are looking for direction.
Energy, up 1.10%, was the top performing sector at the US markets on Friday. Telecommunications Services was next , up 0.88%; Utilities gained 0.53%; Technology was up 0.30%; Basic Materials was up 0.23% and Durable Consumer Goods & Services gained 0.19%. Industrials declined -0.03%; Healthcare declined -0.17%; Financials declined -0.21% and Discretionary Consumer Goods & Services declined -0.77%.
Precious Metals & Minerals was the top performing industry, up 2.69%; Consumer Electronics was up 2.40%; Paper Products gained 1.68%; Oil & Gas Refining & Marketing was up 1.28% and Oil & Gas Exploration & Production was up1.13%. The Precious Metals & Minerals industry group comprises a large number of mining companies. Some of those are Agnico Eagle Mines Ltd (AEM), Barrick Gold Corp (GOLD), Centrus Energy Corp (BRGC) and Denison Mines Corp (DNN).
For the week, Technology, up 4.48%, was the top performing sector; Healthcare, up 1.31%, was next; Durable Consumer Goods & Services gained 1.26% and Industrials gained 0.80%. Energy declined -2.16%; Utilities declined -1.54%; Basic Materials declined -1.28 and Financials was down -0.84%.
Today’s Market Statistics: Today, the gaining issues (advancers) outnumbered the declined issues (decliners) on the NYSE by a ratio of roughly six advancers for every five decliners or 1.44-to-1 numerically. In real numbers, 2,353 advancers to 1,631 decliners with 268 “Unchanged”. The total volume of volume-gaining stocks was 411,598,723 or 48.2%; the total volume of declined-volume stocks was 433,739,534 or 50.8%; and 8,676,172 or 1% “Unchanged”.
There were 278 new 52-Week Highs and 64 new 52-Week Lows.
The total volume of stocks traded on the NYSE today was 854,014,429 compared to a total volume of 936,032,709 yesterday, a 9% decrease in volume. The volume of stocks traded was about 5%; slightly higher than the average of the ten most recent market sessions.
The current market rally is aging but quite alive. Let us put it as “the vitamins” are still working. Why vitamins? The volume is down today and that diminishes the strength somewhat and raises some doubt about the reliability of any decision made based on the data.
On the NASDAQ, the decliners outnumbered the advancers by a ratio of roughly thirteen decliners to every ten advancers or a ratio of 1.09 -to-1 in numbers. There were 2,211 decliners to 2,029 advancers with 350 unchanged. The total volume of volume-gaining stocks was 2,260,199,816 or 44.6%; the total volume of declined-volume stocks was 2,773,925,268 or 54.7% and 34,037,124 or 0.7% for “Unchanged”.
There were 136 new 52-Week Highs and 89 new 52-Week Lows.
The total volume of stocks traded today was 5,381,917,286 which is just about normal volume for the NASDAQ indicating more investors returned to the market today.
The total volume of stocks traded on the NYSE today was 5,068,162,208 compared to a total volume of 5,381,917,286 yesterday, a 6% decrease in volume. The volume of stocks traded was about the average of the ten most recent market sessions.
The market outlook remains uptrend positive.
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Stocks In The News/Stocks To Watch
The US Markets
The EV Stocks – Tesla, interestingly, is known for Electric Vehicles (EV) but it is categorized as a technology company at the US markets. The technology companies made a comeback this week with Nvidia Corp leading the way. Tesla cut prices this week to stay competitive in China but that appears to have no effect so far. The issue is not just Tesla but the EV industry. The industry was doing well as long as the government subsidies were flowing.
The market is about making money so the traders will do their bit of Pump and Dump but EV stocks are at best, really a very long term investment. The infrastructure needed to support EV use on a very large scale are yet to be built. These are several years and billions, more likely trillions, of dollars away. More nuclear generating plants will need to be built in pretty well every country around the world for affordable but abundant electricity supply. The problem with that aspect is not just he cost. There are political considerations also as there are ethnic groups who think they have the birth right to rule the world and they consider controlling access to nuclear power essential to being able to maintain status quo. Intellectually, the case for large scale EV adoption is simple on paper only. In reality, EVs should be considered as long term investment.
For short term investing strategy with EV stocks, see the charts below.
The time for EV is coming but still some years away. In the meantime, EV stocks remain
(i) an interesting play for traders with time on their hands and
(ii) opportunity for young investors interested in long term investment – “buy it and forget it” type of investment.
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Regular Market Day Features
Beginner Investor’s (Canadian stocks) Watchlist
The banks got hit this week. However, if you bought any of the six Canadian big banks in early November 2023, you should now be sitting on good gains. A good reason for buying bank stocks is that the banks pay good dividends. Refer to our previous postings especially in early November 2023 about the Canadian banks for more on this topic.
The Canadian Vanguard Chinese Stocks Watchlist
EV, Energy and Resource Stocks Watchlist
It is not a good time to own EV company stocks.
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