Market Analysis for Apr 19th, 2004

If ever there was a sluggish Monday, this would be it. The markets are pretty non-descript. Looking at the volume figures, with three hours to go, you have 600 million shares traded on the NYSE, on course for a billion shares or so, which is probably lower than average. The a/d line reads 1350 up and 1750 down, so a slight negative there. As we look at the chart action, it's basically a tale of two different markets. You have the sluggish S&P and, on the other hand, you have the Nasdaq futures up 8-9 points off of Friday's spike low in what I consider to be a recover rally off of the lows in the June Nasdaq E-mini from Friday's low of 1442. Somewhere in the vicinity of 1466-72, I think that the June Nasdaq will peak and roll over and have another downleg. But for now that index is 1462 and up about 9 points on the day.

On the other hand, the E-mini June S&P is down 1.75 on the day at 1132