Day Traders Diary

11/27/15

The stock market meandered in a narrow range through the abbreviated Friday session, ending the day and the week on a flat note. The S&P 500 added 0.1% today, ending the week higher by two points (+0.1%).

Unsurprisingly, the Friday session was very quiet with trading volume running well below average. To that point, only 378 million shares changed hands at the NYSE floor. The lack of activity in the U.S. masked a relatively busy overnight session that featured a 5.5% dive in China's Shanghai Composite after regulators expanded their investigation into major securities brokers, including Citic Securities.

Once the focus shifted to the Wall Street session, equities ticked lower due to relative weakness in consumer discretionary (-0.4%) and energy (-0.7%), but gains in the remaining sectors offset the softness in the two cyclical groups.

Media names kept the discretionary sector under pressure with Dow component Disney (DIS 115.13, -3.54) falling 3.0% to mid-November levels. Meanwhile, the energy sector retreated as crude oil fell 2.5% to $41.97/bbl.

On the upside, the consumer staples sector (+0.4%) held the lead throughout the session while top-weighted technology (+0.2%) and financials (+0.2%) also finished ahead of the broader market. Chipmakers underpinned the tech sector after NXP Semiconductor (NXPI 88.36, +3.82) received clearance from the Federal Trade Commission to continue its acquisition of Freescale Semiconductor (FSL 37.35, +1.45). The two names surged 4.6% and 4.0%, respectively, while the PHLX Semiconductor Index spiked 0.7%.

Treasuries held gains during overnight action, but they returned to little changed intraday with the 10-yr yield at 2.23%.

Investors did not receive any economic data today; however, Monday will include a couple releases with November Chicago PMI (Briefing.com consensus 55.0) and October Pending Home Sales (consensus 0.7%) set to be reported at 9:45 ET and 10:00 ET, respectively.

Nasdaq Composite +8.3% YTD

S&P 500 +1.5% YTD

Dow Jones Industrial Average -0.1% YTD

Russell 2000 UNCH YTD