A Dovish Fed Feeds the Stock Market Rally

By: PhilStockWorld

The interim rally that began yesterday picked up steam today, assisted by 2 PM FOMC minutes, which the market saw as accommodative in removing “outdated” the 6.5 percent unemployment target for raising interest rates. The S&P 500 opened higher and traded up to a narrow mid-day range prior to release of the Fed minutes. Promptly at 2 PM the index roared higher and overcame a bit of 3 PM selling with a second advance. It closed with a 1.09% gain for the day, just fractionally off its 1.11% intraday high.

The yield on the 10-year note finished at 2.71%, up 2 bps from yesterday’s close. The interim high yield was 3.04% at the end of 2013.

Here is a snapshot of the past five sessions, which shows the downtrend from the record intraday high and subsequent two-day advance.

Here is a daily chart of the SPY ETF. if volume is a clue, then it appears that participation in today’s rally was limited.

The S&P 500 is now up 1.29% for 2014.

Here is a longer perspective, starting with the all-time high prior to the Great Recession.

For a better sense of how these declines figure into a larger historical context, here’s a long-term view of secular bull and bear markets in the S&P Composite since 1871.

- Phil

www.philstockworld.com

Philip R. Davis is a founder of Phil's Stock World (www.philstockworld.com), a stock and options trading site that teaches the art of options trading to newcomers and devises advanced strategies for expert traders. Mr. Davis is a serial entrepreneur, having founded software company Accu-Title, a real estate title insurance software solution, and is also the President of the Delphi Consulting Corp., an M&A consulting firm that helps large and small companies obtain funding and close deals. He was also the founder of Accu-Search, a property data corporation that was sold to DataTrace in 2004 and Personality Plus, a precursor to eHarmony.com. Phil was a former editor of a UMass/Amherst humor magazine and it shows in his writing -- which is filled with colorful commentary along with very specific ideas on stock option purchases (Phil rarely holds actual stocks). Visit: Phil's Stock World (www.philstockworld.com)

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