Market Structure Insights
June 19, 2024
One of our customers at EDGE calculated that 82% of Demand in the S&P 500 is from three stocks (NVDA – now the largest – AAPL, MSFT). Ramifications? Reminds me of what the former head of investor relations at United Health Group, John Penshorn, said...
June 12, 2024
High-frequency traders are data-dependent. The Federal Reserve ought not be. I’ll explain. The U.S. central bank today concludes its open-market (FOMC) meeting. Jay Powell speaks. Before I go further: join the ModernIR webinar today on Leveraging your Treasury for Sellside Coverage. It’s genius. Not because...
June 5, 2024
Somebody pulled a pin and dropped a grenade in the stock market and nobody noticed. Let me explain: Now, there were explanations. Index options on the SPX expired at month-end as they do every last trading day of the month, and MSCI indices rebalanced. But...
May 29, 2024
Size matters. Does trade-size matter? The average trade in S&P 500 stocks is 87 shares this week (five-day average). Think about that. Quotes are in 100-share increments but the trades average less than the quote. It can fluctuate around month-ends, index-rebalances, options-expirations. NVDA’s average is...
May 22, 2024
It’s tough being a market strategist. Mike Wilson, chief equity strategist for Morgan Stanley, has thrown his bear towel on the laundry pile and lifted his year-end target for the S&P 500 to 5,400 from 4,500. He’ll be braining himself with a brick if the...
May 8, 2024
Should a stock like COKE rise 20% in a day? Executives love it, sure. But it’s aberrant behavior at loggerheads with what the dominant money buys today. Here’s what I mean. COKE is a member of MDY, the Blackrock (iShares) S&P midcap 400 ETF, with...