Monday, September 21, 2015

Stocks To Watch: VRNG, PLUG, TTPH, VTL, JUNO




I've been stating for days that the Vringo, Inc. (NASDAQ:VRNG) stock was trying to bottom as it had nice positive divergence developing, now stock is near to cross the $.675 level, which could give a strong boost for run to $.82 (200EMA) Keep an eye on stock. I'm Bullish on VRNG.


Plug Power Inc (NASDAQ:PLUG) had a strong breakout Friday with a pop of 11 cents to 1.89 or 6% on 5.5 million shares, the biggest volume in a couple of weeks. Friday's strength could lead to more upside.


Tetraphase Pharmaceuticals Inc (NASDAQ:TTPH) was a nice winner for my readers and twitter followers. I brought this stock to your attention last week sub-10 and on Friday it closed at $12.54 on high volume. As i mentioned on twitter I took some profits at $12 but i will try to re-enter again.

Vital Therapies Inc (NASDAQ:VTL) shares successfully broke the $4 resistance level Friday on high volumes. This is a very bullish development. Short-term technical indicators are looking bullish and the MACD on the daily chart recently produced a new buy signal. If the stock can break the 13-day EMA at 4.17 next week, we should see a strong follow through move.


Juno Therapeutics Inc (NASDAQ:JUNO) has been on a nice uptrend and could be ready to breakout after strong volume in the last trading session. I wouldn't be surprised to see this stock trade back to $45 or better in the short term.

S&P500 Index Update – End Run Smash Looks Imminent

by Clive Maund
Gold Seek

The market didn’t waste any time “getting on with it” yesterday after the bearish action on the day of the Fed announcement. It fell, and hard. We are going to look at this carefully because what appears to be starting is a devastating “end run around the line” smash – if so a brutal plunge is just around the corner.
A few days back we were a little too accommodating in adjusting the upper boundary of the Pennant shown on the 3-month chart below when the index pushed out of the top of it. We shouldn’t have and on this chart we are going back to our original Pennant boundaries, which is important as it enables us to define where the support is at the apex of the Pennant. As you will recall the upside breakout from the Pennant, on the basis of its original boundaries, was regarded with deep suspicion, and it appears to have been the product of manipulation – Fed buying to “paint the tape”, especially as there was no such breakout in other markets like the London FTSE and Tokyo Nikkei, where a parallel Pennant had formed. If so then they may soon end up with egg on their faces.
Continue Reading at GoldSeek.com…

US Dollar ETFs $UUP Really Need Interest Rates To Rise This Year

The PowerShares DB US Dollar Index Bullish UUP , the U.S. Dollar Index tracking exchange traded funds, and the actively managed WisdomTree Bloomberg U.S. Dollar Bullish Fund USDU  are up 3.2 percent and 4.7 percent, respectively, year-to-date.
Those gains have been fueled in large part by market participants baking into the dollar an interest rate hike by the Federal Reserve, something the central bank eschewed at the conclusion of its September meeting Thursday.

Post-Meeting Reactions

The immediate reaction was forgettable for the greenback and ETFs such as UUP and USDU. However, on Friday the dollar ETFs are trading higher, led by a gain of half a percent at this writing for UUP.
What that says is that the door is still open to a rate hike sometime this year, either at the Fed's October or December meetings. More good news for UUP and USDU: Expectations for a 2015 rate hike were not significantly damaged by the Fed's decision Thursday to pass on such action this month.

“The fact is that the interest rate market’s implied probability for a rate hike in 2015 did not shift greatly. What has occurred was the removal of the embedded risk premium for a hike at yesterday’s Fed meeting, and a small reduction from the October meeting due to a number of professionals expecting the Fed to make some sort of pre-commitment to a hike at that meeting,” said Rareview Macro founder Neil Azous in a note out Friday.

What Expectations Remain?

With 2015 rate hike expectations barely lower Friday than they were Thursday, perhaps that is a sign investors were too hasty in departing the greenback. For example, UUP has bled almost $362 million in assets over the past 90 days, according to issuer data. Only one PowerShares ETF has lost more money over that period.
Since the start of the current quarter, USDU has lost a more modest $16.2 million. Still, that number is confounding when considering all the negative headlines regarding emerging markets currencies investors have been treated. USDU, by way of being actively managed, can short emerging currencies. For example, over 11 percent of the ETF's weight is short the sagging Mexican peso and Brazilian real.

Near-Term Catalysts

In the simplest of terms, the most important near-term upside catalyst for UUP and USDU is market participants reconfiguring expectations that a rate hike is going to happen this year.
“As a result, the decline in the US dollar is mostly a function of the decision not to hike at the September meeting, and a marginal decline in the probability of a move at the October meeting. The key risk in the near-term remaining for US dollar longs is that the market removes the implied probability – or risk premium –of an interest rate hike in 2015.
"At this point there has not been a major shift to that view as the unconditional probability of a move in December was effectively unchanged after yesterday’s meeting,” added Azous.

US Weekly Economic Calendar

time (et) report period ACTUAL forecast previous
MONDAY, SEPT. 21
10 am Existing home sales Aug.   5.52 mln  5.59 mln
TUESDAY,  SEPT. 22
9 am FHFA home price index July   -- 0.2%
WEDNESDAY, SEPT. 23
9:45 am Markit PMI flash reading Sept.   -- 53.0
THURSDAY, SEPT. 24
8:30 am Weekly jobless claims Sept. 19   275,000 264,00
8:30 am Durable goods orders Aug.   -1.3% 2.2%
10 am New home sales Aug.   515,000 507,000
FRIDAY, SEPT. 25
8:30 am GDP revision 2Q
3.7% 3.7%
10 am Consumer sentiment Sept.   87.0 85.7