Stocks, Safe-Havens Under Pressure

Today’s tote board is blood-red on Wall Street, with the majority of asset classes sliding into negative territory. Decliners are leading gainers, with the DJIA DOW (-20), S&P 500 SPX (-4), and NASDAQ (-22) all trading to the red. Typically, lagging stocks equate to strength in safe-havens. However, this has not been the case today as gold, the Swiss franc, and Japanese yen are all losing ground vs the USD.

This morning’s U.S. session economic calendar has been largely muted. Aside from a few peripheral metrics, the slate was relatively bare. Here is a quick look at the highlights:

Event                                                                    Actual     Projected   Previous

Continuing Jobless Claims (Nov. 8)                 1.695M        1.685M        1.692M

Philadelphia FED Survey (Nov.)                        10.4                 7.0                5.6

Existing Home Sales Change (Oct., MoM)      1.9%               1.4%            -2.5%

The key event in this group is the dramatic increase in the Philadelphia FED Survey (Nov.). Figures smashed expectations and nearly doubled the previous release. Although stocks are not reacting positively to the news, you can bet that long-term equities bulls are reassured by the surge in manufacturing.

Stocks, Safe-Havens On The Back Foot

The Greenback is on the march versus the Swiss franc. Rates of the USD/CHF have broken above daily resistance and are challenging the 0.9925 quarter-handle. Are we finally going to witness a November hard test of par?

Here are the levels to watch for the remainder of the session:

• Support(1): Daily SMA, 0.9917
• Support(2): Bollinger MP, 0.9910

Bottom Line: At press time (1:00 PM EST), the USD/CHF is trading in the vicinity of 0.9925. If we see a pullback from the intraday bullish strength, a short-term buying opportunity will come into play.

For the remainder of the session, I will have buy orders queued up from 0.9918. With an initial stop at 0.9889, this trade produces 25 pips on a slightly sub-1:1 risk vs reward ratio.