Per this morning’s video commentary, I was looking for a pop today. But I gotta tell ya, the fast-diminishing of today’s rally I was seeing about 10 minutes before the close made a lot of sense to me. I mean what short-term trader would want to go long into tomorrow’s before-the-open jobs report when the supporting data of late say it may not be good??

Here’s what I’m talking about (S&P 500 1-minute chart at 12:49 pm):





But then, wow!, out of the blue somebody(s) stepped in:





Here’s my after-market interoffice memo:

“I think traders see a can’t lose jobs # in the morning. If it’s good, they see the trade being “the economy’s ok after all”. If it’s bad, they see it being “here comes the fed.”

I can for sure tell you this, bond traders think it’s the latter.


Here’s TLT (treasury bond ETF) in purple, and the S&P 500 in white from September 1 through today. Note how they, as you’d expect in the present environment, have for the most part been negatively correlated; up until today (shaded rectangles), that is:





Gold (the quintessential safe haven), in orange, by the way, rallied today as well.





Now, having penned the above, make no mistake, I’m here to tell you that one day does in no way a trend make! But it is safe to say that — stock market rallies notwithstanding — general conditions are not all that inspiring. The latest read from the Conference Board’s CEO Survey says the folks who, ironically, run the companies those traders are buying agree (lowest expectations 6 months out since the last recession):