Bear Mountain Bull

It’s time again for a little BMB R&R, especially with the market behaving as bizarrely as it’s been. Maybe if we stop watching it start to behave a little better…

Posting will be very light and variable over the course of this week, but we’ll put up an open thread each market day for our readers to comment on the day’s market activity or to post any interesting links they might run across.

Check the space below for whatever the latest might be during this ‘off’ time, and please visit the various sites in the ‘Links’ and ‘Regular Stops’ for up-to-date market news and analysis.

BMB will be back in full swing by next weekend.

Well, that Kansas City - Indianapolis game was one of the uglier playoff games I think I’ve seen. When KC was sitting at halftime with no first downs, I was wondering if somehow the Oakland Raiders had made the playoffs…

What’s this? The perennial laggard of ‘06, Health Care opens the new year at the top of the 8-week performance list. The XLV has made a nice move up off the lows in November, riding atop the 20-day moving average, but the 50-day has yet to turn upward. Can the move continue? It probably can, if the market were to take on a more defensive posture here.

The strong financials pulled back on weakness in the banks. The consumer stocks still aren’t doing a lot better than sideways. Tech had one big day this week, but the XLK has been pretty unspectacular for a couple of months now.

Industrials are leaking lower, Utilities got smacked on Friday, and the Materials and Energies have been sinking fast.

Here are the numbers to start off 2007:

Charts courtesy of StockCharts.com