TSX TrendWatch Weekly

The S&P/TSX Composite Index is behaving a lot like a hot air balloon… inflated, but still tethered to the ground.  Some days it looks like it’s poised for take-off, then someone comes along and throws more weight in the basket.  Then we have to wait for more hot air!
You’re welcome to offer your own interpretation of what got thrown into the basket this past week, but the S&P/TSX Composite Index declined just shy of -6%, keeping the year-to-date loss at over -30%.

The Venture Exchange took twice the hit last week… -13% for a year-to-date loss of -71%.  Ouch!

The US numbers were comparable… -6% for the S&P500 and -8% for Nasdaq. The US year-to-date figures have fallen to lower than -40% as of Friday.

It’s not surprising, then, that our %-up statistic above is still hovering around 20%… 18% actually.

It’s really getting redundant to say “keep your powder dry for now”, and “sell short with extreme caution”, but that’s still where we stand.

As usual all of the sector and individual stock numbers are in the DATA & CHARTS workbook and many more are available through PREMIUM SERVICE subscriptions.

There were two sectors that had positive trend values as of the end of the week…  CONSUMER STAPLES and TELECOMMUNICATION SERVICES. CONSUMER STAPLES is perhaps not surprising because we’ve all got to eat, and Loblaw surprised analysts with better than expected financials last week.  I didn’t catch any major revelations in TELECOMMUNICATION SERVICES, but there may be some expectations that smart cell phones for Christmas may be good for the service providers.

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BOOKS…  I’ve added a few more recommendations to the BOOK STORE page of the site…  some old, some new.

• Stock Traders Almanac 2009 - This is a great collection of season statistics wrapped up as a desk calendar. A perfect gift for any of your friends who take investing seriously.
• Fooled by Randomness - This one is written by a trader who is also very knowledgeable about his probability theory. He has some excellent examples of how what appears to be investing genius is merely within the scope of a chance happening.
• How I Made $2,000,000 in the Stock Market -  An older item, but loaded with real-world day-by-day investing experiences. He shares his mistakes as well as his successes. In this case the author is a professional dancer, who stumbled into investing when the operator of one of the venues offered to pay him in stock instead of cash. (I’ve also included the author’s follow-on book, Wall Street: The Other Las Vegas, but haven’t read that one yet.
• Reminiscences of a Stock Operator - This is probably the oldest investment book I’ve read by a stock trading legend. It’s great to hear stories in the 80s and 90s…  1880s and 1890s, that is!  The Big Board back then was a chalk board, updated by clerks.

I think investment books are great gifts. They not only entertain, but have the promise of returning their physical value thousands of times over in investment profits.

With a few exceptions (notably the reference manuals like Morningstar’s ETF Guide), I’ve read all these books cover-to-cover or listened to them in audio format on my iPod, so I stand behind my recommendations.

So, spend some time learning while we sit through this market recovery, or introduce family and friends to the wonderful world of investing in equities and more exotic instruments through a book or two during the holiday season.

Visit our BOOK STORE recommendations now!