Over-performers and Under-performers on Nasdaq

(UPDATE) AMZN, NFLX continue to weaken in the final hour, despite Nasdaq remaining strong. NFLX is back to flat. We'll see if dip buyers come in, oh let's say in the last 30 seconds?

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So the market gapped up on less than expected unemployment number and Venezuela's offer for mediation in Libya. Great. It doesn't matter that there aren't many job openings, and Libyan opposition has said no to the mediation. Oil and gold/silver selling off.

Nasdaq is the best performer today of the three major indices, up 50 points or 1.83%. I'm curious which stock is over-performing (going up more than 1.83%), and which one is under-performing. So, from my stock screen, here's the list:

Over-performers:

QCOM (2.87%)
ORCL (3.05%)
EMC (2.17%)
BIDU (1.97%)
RIMM (4.22%)
AAPL (1.90%)

Under-performers:

AMZN (1.01%)
EBAY (1.16%)
GOOG (1.48%)
NFLX (0.54%)
INTC (1.23%)
MSFT (0.70%)

AMZN and NFLX continue to be rather weak, even in rebound.

Overall market under-performers:

FCX (0.63% Dr. Copper is not doing too well.)
POT (0.21%

AMZN: What Now?

AMZN stopped today at a very inconvenient place for me. I've been short AMZN since Friday, when it couldn't retake 50-DMA, which also happened to be about the mid bollinger band. And after the negative divergence on Nasdaq played out on Tuesday, I remain short AMZN.

But today the stock managed (barely) to retake the bottom trendline of the expanding, rising wedge that's been forming since September 2010. The volume was lower than the previous two days. (I just noticed that it is right at the trendline in log scale.)

My target remains 200-DMA, about $152 ($20 from here), but slow stochastics (at 60) is also approaching the oversold territory (not there yet). I think I will have to watch how the stock handles the bottom trendline of the wedge to decide whether to bail here or hold.

A quick upsurge on a high volume, I'll bail. A struggle on a low volume, I'll hold. (I'm a chicken little.)

If I had paid attention to the slow stoch cross over, I could have shorted it at $187 or so, and covered right about now and moved on, even if there's money still on the table. Oh well.

By the way, my private unscientific indicator is getting worse - more spammers, more bickering, less posters. A big move is yet to come, it seems.

(Sure enough, the US stock futures are up big. Emini Dow up 71, Emini S&P up 9, Emini Nasdaq up 12. For what? No one knows..)

AMZN Had a Mini-Flash Crash Intraday

AMZN, which I'm still short, had a flash crash intraday... Also look at the huge buy earlier. Hmmm. Now come dip buyers.

Weak Rebound, Putting AMZN

My unscientific indicator (Yahoo SKF MB) is showing more signs of a major move still coming.

In addition to the know-it-all jerk, now there are stock peddlers (spammers) coming in. More ominously, there is some bickering among long-time posters. All of these all at the same time.

As I've said, this is just my personal, totally unscientific indicator. Don't quote me on it or count on it.

The US stock market is trying its best to put in a rebound, but S&P500 smacked right against the trendline (slightly above 1320) of the rising wedge that was broken two days ago.

I putted AMZN that was forming, I thought, a bearish rising flag on a very small volume, when AMZN was up 45 cents for the day. We'll see. One logical stop would be 50-DMA, currently at $181.83.

I'll put the charts later.

Amazon Runs Out of Kindles

(Update 7/28/2010) So RIMM has popped on the news of iPhone killer. I'm not impressed with the move, at least not yet. The stock is yet to take out yesterday's high, which is $55.65. AMZN continues to languish, going nowhere.

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so reports Barron's Tech Trader Daily by Eric Savitz on July 27, 2010. Maybe that's why the stock had a miraculous reversal the day after the earning announcement:

(Quote)
Amazon.com (AMZN) has temporarily run out of Kindles.

Here’s what it says if you attempt to buy the e-Book reader on the company’s Web site:

“Temporarily out of stock. Order now and we’ll deliver when available. We’ll e-mail you with an estimated delivery date as soon as we have more information. Your account will only be charged when we ship the item.”

And what do you see when you go to the Amazon home page? Why, a promo for the extra-big Kindle DX!

As SlashGear notes, the sudden Kindle shortage could mean there has been a surge in demand - or it could mean a next-gen Kindle is on the way.
(Unquote)


That sudden reversal after the earning report has kept my AMZN puts worthless, but I still don't think much of the AMZN chart. Ever since the July top of $124.88 it's on the decline, underperforming the index (Nasdaq). You could say it is resilient, refusing to sell off. But it looks to me like it wants to sell off at any time now. (Of course I'm biased, I have AMZN puts.)

This stock and another Nasdaq beta Research in Motion (RIMM) look to me to be ready to dump. But then the Kindle rumor may be true, and RIMM just announced the iPhone "killer". They may turn on the dime.

AMZN: Make or Break (with Updates)

(2ND UPDATE 6/29/2010) The stock ended at $108.61, and it was as low as $106.01. Let's see if It tries to regain $110 tomorrow. If it tries and fails... look out below... to 200-MA on weekly at $78, which happens to be just about the target for the head and shoulders pattern...

(UPDATE 6/29/2010) And it broke! Watch if it stops around $110 and bounces. Slight positive divergence on RSI is gone now. If it does bounce but if it's a weak bounce (price, volume), filling the gap down to $80 may be coming soon....

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Amazon (AMZN) may be getting ready for a plunge, unless it manages to rebound right here right now.

Here's is AMZN's daily 1 year chart. After gapping up in late October above $110, it has managed to stay above that. But in the process, the volume has dwindled, and the pattern looks like a big head and shoulders (bearish), with the tiny right shoulder shaping like a descending triangle (bearish).


If the plunge happens, it is likely to fill the gap and settle between $80 and $90. Height of the head from the neckline (say $115) is 36. Neckline minus 36 will give you the target of $79, but I do see some support above $90. Also, technical indicators are not totally bearish, except for slow stochastics set at 89. It's already in a bearish territory of below 20. There's a positive divergence between the stochastics and MACD, but that divergence could be blown away if the tentative general market decides to go down.

AMZN will report its earnings on July 23. The stock tends to move significantly on earnings. August put option at $100, traded today for $2.69, could be worth $20 if AMZN plunges to my target... [Please do your own DD. This is not advice in any way...]

Silicon Valley vs the Rest of the US

Or tech vs traditional. Or companies that continue to innovate vs companies that don't. I don't know how exactly to define it, but take a look at the comparison charts below. (They are 5-year charts.)


The first four are the tech companies, three in the Valley, one up in Washington. Netflix (NFLX) broke to all-time high today. Intuitive Surgical (ISRG), Apple (AAPL), and Amazon (AMZN) continue to break out from the high. Their charts say it all: Recession? What recession? Also notice that, except for ISRG, their recent bottom was NOT March 2009. They bottomed sooner than the rest of the market, and off to the races ever since...

Compare them to the rest. First two of "the rest" are tech companies, Google (GOOG) and Microsoft (MSFT). Even though they have recovered from their lows, they don't compare at all with the first four. (That tells me, unfortunately, GOOG has already become MSFT...) Rather, they resemble big, traditional businesses that are listed in New York Stock Exchange, rather than on Nasdaq. Their charts look more like J.P. Morgan Chase (JPM) or Coca Cola (KO). The last one is Freeport McMoran (FCX), a copper and gold company. Although it has recovered a lot, it is still far from recapturing the all-time high.

They (NFLX, ISRG, AAPL, AMZN, etc) are clearly in a bull market, disregarding the rest. In a bull market, you buy a breakout from the high. That's what I learned in the book by William O'Neil (How To Make Money In Stocks: A Winning System in Good Times or Bad, 3rd Edition).

I am not advocating anything, going long or short, here. Do your own DD, but I sure wish I bought every single breakout from the high for these stocks.

Nasdaq Betas That Don't Come Back Down

With just about every analysts eager to call the top, the market marches on, bid or no bid. My portfolio has been rather stagnant for 2 months, with gains in precious metal stocks offsetting the weakness in financials. Probably a top is near, therefore, but I don't think the market will crash back to, say Dow 6,000, right away as some of them proclaim.

Why? Nasdaq "beta" stocks: AAPL, AMZN, GOOG, ISRG, PCLN.

They refuse so far to correct much. AAPL corrected the most after earning and filled the gap. But others, particularly AMZN and ISRG, hardly looked back, and has since resumed the upward march.


How much upside could there be for the major indices? Another 10%? 5%? I am debating whether it is worth to stay in the market, but when I look at these Nasdaq tech stocks it is tempting to believe this is a new bull market, in which you would buy stocks on the breakout from the high.

Now It's AMZN's Turn!

Nasdaq beta stocks are back with vengeance. First was Google (GOOG), then Apple (AAPL), and today was Amazon (AMZN). It announced a steller quarter result after hours and the stock jumped to $106. In this deep recession, the company's profit jumped 62%. If the AH price holds at Friday's closing, it will be ALL TIME HIGH for the stock.

This is the monthly chart of AMZN since its IPO. I don't care to do the TA analysis on a wild-looking thing like this. I'm just impressed. Usually when a stock falls from the crest (like Nasdaq dot-com bubble high), it doesn't recover. But this one did, and is about to take out the previous high.

I've been the customer ever since AMZN opened its virtual door. Its CEO, much like AAPL's CEO, has just kept at it, instead of selling out, retiring, or going into philanthropy.



About the only thing I can say about the chart is that the trendline held at the bottom, and it was a buy when it bounced off that line in November last year, at $34. It is quite possible that a few years from now I may be asking myself, "So AMZN was only $100. What was I thinking?"
Maybe I should think the unthinkable and buy the breakout.

Is Amazon (AMZN) Breaking Down?

Technically, needless to say. I like what they offer and I buy from them often, but that has nothing to do with what I'm seeing in the chart.

The stock market seems to be going back to the "bad news is bad, less bad news is bad, good news is bad" mode, and that's not a good time to be long.

Online retailer Amazon (AMZN) seems to be breaking down. The stock broke through its 50-DMA yesterday, and it continues to go down today. It may have something to do with the FTC announcement of its intentions to regulate blogs (see my post on the other blog), it may not. (Pure technical analysts will tell you that it doesn't matter at all, as all's in the chart. I don't quite buy that argument yet, but what do I know?)

Here's AMZN's 3-year weekly chart. It looks bearish to me. Negative divergence between RSI and stock price, between stock price and volume. It is about to touch the mid bollinger band, which coincides with the trend line from the November 08 low.

It's possible that it holds at that line, but also note that since 2007 high the stock has been making lower highs. AMZN's beta is 1.4, so when the general market starts to head south it tends to go down more than the market. (Of course the high beta means when the market goes up the stock goes up more than the market.)

The break below 50-DMA on a daily chart is a sell/short signal, but that signal is followed by any and every technical traders. Probably the first break (right now) is too obvious, and this could be just a fake. I'm just watching, trying to learn.