Investors blew off the uncertainty of 2011 and plowed into the new year of 2012 with gusto, sending stock prices up almost 2% in the first week of trading. Volumes, though, remained light in a holiday shortened week.
Although stocks dropped Friday, traders said they were heartened by the market’s ability to hold on to the big gains made early in the week, particularly after a volatile 2011, in which such early-week gains often disappeared by Friday.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 142.6, or 1.2%, on the week, to close at 12359.92. The Nasdaq Composite gained 2.7%, to end at 2674.22. The biggest rises were seen Tuesday, the first day of trading in 2012.
“The fact that, coming out of the gate, we have been able to hold on to Tuesday’s big gain is constructive,” notes Michael Marrale, head of U.S. sales trading for RBC Capital Markets. Now that the calendar page has turned, hedge funds, many of which sat out much of 2011, might be induced to return to buying stocks, particularly if there is another 1% to 2% gain relatively soon, he says. Fears of missing out on a rally will increase, and they won’t want to start the year already 2% to 4% in the hole, he adds.
There was some evidence of rally-chasing already, he says, since some of the stocks that did the best last week were “2011 losers,” or among the poorest performers of 2011: Bank of America (ticker: BAC); Alcoa (AA); JPMorgan Chase (JPM) and Netflix (NFLX). Meanwhile, some of the worst stock performers last week, mainly defensive stocks, were among the best of 2011.
In particular, Bank of America stock rose strongly, as rumors circulated that the White House was contemplating some kind of large mortgage-refinancing program, which the government denied. Its stock rose 11% on the week.
Meanwhile, U.S. economic data were “consistently better than expected,” says Peter Kenny, an institutional-sales trader at Knight Capital Americas. That helped fuel the week’s gains. And Friday, the Labor Department said the unemployment rate fell to nearly a three-year low of 8.5%, from 8.7% in November—the fourth consecutive monthly decline.
Despite the pretty good week, one trader says investors should be concerned with some overly bullish sentiment, at least for the short term. A surfeit of such emotion seems to have gotten the upper hand of late, particularly among individuals, and this trader suggests a reversal—albeit perhaps a mild one—could be expected next week.
Bullish sentiment among individual investors rose to 49%, from 40.6% for the week ended Wednesday, according to the most recent weekly online survey of members of the American Association of Individual Investors. Bearish sentiment fell to 17%, from 31%. Both cases, the trader adds, represent extremes of sentiment not seen in a while.
Press reports circulated last week that Eastman Kodak (EK) is teetering on bankruptcy, while Sears Holdings (SHLD) appointed a chief merchandising manager to combat six straight years of declining same-store sales. Both firms—former Dow Industrial Average components—are more than 100 years old, and were once the big kahuna in their respective industries.
Such news is a sobering reminder that capitalism’s creative destruction can bring even great companies—and their shareholders—to their knees. That’s just as relevant to America’s current crop of world beaters, like Apple (AAPL), Google (GOOG) and the closely held Facebook, among others.
Capitalism has a way of humbling even the most high. As technology progresses at ever-dizzier rates, the possibility that a dominant company can stumble appears to be quickening. Nokia (NOK) went from the uncontested king of mobile phones to flat on its back in less than a decade, even as mobile-phone use has exploded.
There is always somebody in a garage somewhere working on a better mousetrap. And the bigger and fatter the company and its margins, the more likely that’s true (Source: Barrons Online).