Trader Talk

In this article VIAC GS MS The Viacom office in Hollywood, California. Lucy Nicholson | Reuters Chinese stocks listed in the U.S. fell sharply last week, after several weeks in correction mode. A trader who participated in some of the wild trading in Chinese internet stocks on Friday confirmed that the primary cause of the

Gary Gensler, then-chairman of the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC). Simon Dawson | Bloomberg | Getty Images The Senate is expected to confirm Gary Gensler as chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission on Wednesday, and crypto assets — including bitcoin — are likely high on his agenda. With Democrats in control of all

In this article COIN Coinbase co-founder and CEO Brian Armstrong speaking at TechCrunch Disrupt SF 2018. Steve Jennings | Getty Images for TechCrunch The pending Coinbase direct listing, scheduled for April 14th on the Nasdaq under the symbol COIN, is exciting a broad base of the investment community outside the usual cryptocurrency crowd. “Coinbase is

Traders on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange. Source: NYSE The market is showing some signs of exhaustion, and with good reason.  Most major parts of the market have run up significantly in the past month.  But there is a growing chorus warning that we are at “peak everything.” That is, peak earnings

Traders on the New York Stock Exchange. Source: NYSE This is a very powerful rally. The combination of surprisingly strong economic reports and even more surprisingly strong earnings reports is pushing broad swaths of the U.S. stock market to new highs. Even the technicians are impressed. “The vast majority of NYSE stocks are in intermediate-term

In this article PEP A trader works on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange. NYSE Everyone knew earnings were going to be good, but this is really good. “There’s evidence every day that growth is clearly improving around the world, today from the US to Australia,” Ed Hyman, chairman and head of the

President Joe Biden addresses a joint session of Congress at the U.S. Capitol in Washington, U.S., April 28, 2021. Doug Mills | Reuters If the stock market is considered a barometer of success, President Joe Biden’s first 100 days in office is starting off with a bang — a big bang. Since the election, the

Traders on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange. Source: NYSE The reopening story is now getting very real, at least for Wall Street. The latest earnings reports are chock-full of companies reporting earnings above expectations, and most importantly, raising guidance. Take steel maker Nucor, which reported what CEO Leon Topalian called the “most

Traders on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange. Source: The New York Stock Exchange The short-squeeze craziness has implications for trading, regulations and investor psychology: Is there a power shift on Wall Street? What action, if any, will the SEC take? Should there be position limits on options?  To get a better appreciation

Traders work on the floor of the NYSE. NYSE Short sellers on the ropes — or are they?  Short sellers clearly have picked the wrong names in January. The GameStop phenomenon — where buyers deliberately target heavily shorted stocks — is only the most recent development in a long series of failures from short sellers. But

The Reddit forum WallStreetBets on a smartphone arranged in Sydney, Australia, on Thursday, Jan. 28, 2021. Brent Lewin | Bloomberg | Getty Images What’s next for the Reddit crowd? Wall Street seems unsure.  The “blow-out-the-short-sellers game” is showing signs of exhaustion, but the ramifications are only just being felt. What traders can’t agree on is what

Wall Street is concerned about the Yellen regulator super-summit, and with good reason, market watchers say. “The Street should be worried,” Jamie Selway, former head of electronic brokerage at ITG and now an investment advisor, told me. “There’s clearly questions about gamification, and whether a lot of these approaches are suitable and inducing unnecessary trading

Peak GameStop?  GameStop’s volume and volatility has been much lower this week than in the prior six days. This is also true of other heavily shorted names like Bed Bath and Beyond, Express and AMC.    What’s going on?  Chris Murphy, co-head of derivative strategy at Susquehanna Financial Group, ticked off the signs that the endgame

With attention focused on Robinhood, GameStop and retail traders at Thursday’s congressional hearings, trading volumes are very much in focus, as is the practice of “payment for order flow.” Talk about a comeback story. A year ago, retail traders were a declining part of the trading world. Then Covid hit. Millions stayed home and got stimulus

Traders on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange. Source: The New York Stock Exchange Stocks are hitting new highs on the back of a magical phrase being sprinkled like pixie dust among the conference calls this earnings season: “operating leverage.” “The market is set to see a substantial acceleration in earnings growth on

Traders work on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange. NYSE Blowout earnings are forcing analysts to up estimates for 2021. With a little more than half of companies reporting, earnings are proving to be a pleasant surprise for the trading community. The GameStop/Robinhood fiasco is turning out to be a minor blip in

Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell testifies before the Senate Banking Committee hearing on “The Quarterly CARES Act Report to Congress” on Capitol Hill in Washington, December 1, 2020. Susan Walsh | Pool | Reuters Stock investors are trying desperately to interpret what a rise in bond yields means for the stock market. Since February 10th,

Cathy Wood Crystal Mercedes | CNBC Some called it the “Cathie Wood sell-off.”   At the open Tuesday, the top names owned by Ark Investment Management were the biggest decliners in the market.  Shares of Palantir, Tesla, Roku, Square, Paypal, Teladoc, Baidu, Zillow, Shopify and Spotify were all down big, in many cases by double-digits.  All

CEO of Tesla Motors Elon Musk reacts following the company’s initial public offering at the NASDAQ market in New York June 29, 2010 Brendan McDermid | Reuters S&P’s action on Tesla showed the growing power of indexers and passive investing. S&P Dow Jones Indices has announced that Tesla will be added to the S&P 500

Santa Claus pays a visit on the floor at the New York Stock Exchange. Brendan Mcdermid | Reuters A big year-end rally? Don’t get too excited yet. December is traditionally an up month: Since 1945, the S&P 500 rose nearly 1.5% in all Decembers and advanced in price 73% of the time, according to Sam Stovall