Rally Hits a Wall at S&P Q4 High of 1265, Down 2%  to 1237

You have heard all the compelling reasons to jump into this market:

  • Seasonality is strong from November through May
  • Charts look good
  • Lots of cash on the sidelines, everyone is underinvested
  • Interest rates are too low for alternative investments- 10 yr. bond yield at 1.97%
  • Economy is improving, recession fears are ebbing
  • Don’t fight the FED
  • Earnings are strong

But all it takes is sobering news from Europe that they will not do “QE” and any bond buys are not coming soon. Layer on top of that, the Corzine hearings ( Will Corzine put up his own money to pay back investors?)and the realization that despite all the new laws passed by Congress , excess leverage is alive and well and your money is not safe unless it is protected by the  FDIC. So confidence is trashed by fears that money is still not safe and massive debt will not be de-leveraged easily. Even gold ($1708) is selling off because whoever owns it needs the cash now. And don’t expect any help from Congress as polarization stops even minor actions from getting passed so forget about a payroll tax cut or budget resolution. This chart below from a Kelly Evans article in the WSJ today says it all: we are addicted to credit and if we try to shrink the financial system we may limit growth.

[AOT]

The Rayno Life Science Portfolio is faring a little better down 1.3% with the Biopharma picks down only 1.17%. In the green on a bad day  are ALXN, EXEL,HGSI, and SGEN. Diagnostics and Tools stocks, more dependent on fundamentals rather than news, were hit harder with some  stocks down 3% or more:ABAX, ALR, QGEN, and  SQNM. High flier Cepheid (CPHD $32.47) took a 4.8% hit  on low volume with no news. Agilent (A $34.52) was down 5.84% on moderate volume and no apparent news.The QQQ ($56.34) is down 1.3% with AAPL($392.47) up 0.8% holding the fort.

RE :  Europe as of 345p this leak of draft. Market sells off from recovery at 330p, now down 2%.

 

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