Report
Dave Nicoski ...
  • Ross LaDuke
EUR 46.20 For Business Accounts Only

Vermilion Compass: Weekly Equity Strategy

SPX 4400 Target In Sight; Constructive Outlook Intact

Our weight of the evidence approach continues to lead us to our view that the market remains mixed-yet-constructive overall. We explain our outlook below.

S&P 500. The S&P 500 remains bullish, progressing past our first target of 4350 and now on its way to our next target of 4400-4406. As long as 4257-4275 support holds, we expect to see 4400 followed by 4460. Should 4257 fail to hold, our next support levels to watch would be 4164 followed by 4120; we are constructive as long as 4120 holds.
What Supports Our Constructive Outlook? (1) There is an absence of major breakdowns on the S&P 500, Nasdaq 100, Russell 2000, or Dow Jones Industrial Average; all but the Russell 2000 are breaking out to new all-time highs. (2) Not one S&P 500 Sector is breaking down. (3) Cyclicals are outperforming relative to defensives; the cap-weighted Discretionary vs. Staples ratio (XLY/XLP) is bullishly inflecting, and RS for Utilities, Staples, and Gold is hitting multi-year lows. (4) High yield spreads are near multi-decade narrows and remain devoid of bullish inflections. (5) Broad commodities (Bloomberg Commodity Index), WTI crude oil, and copper remain in uptrends. (6) Breadth remains constructive. (7) Broadly speaking, there is an absence of breakdowns on the major global indexes (MSCI ACWI, EM, EAFE, etc.). These are all signs of a risk-on environment, and one where a constructive outlook is appropriate.
What Prevents An Outright Bullish Outlook? (1) Despite a bullish price pattern, small-caps are underperforming relative to large-caps, and the IWM has been unable to break above $234.50 resistance. (2) The US dollar (DXY) is going through a consolidation period, though remains below 92.80 resistance. (3) The 10-year Treasury yield has violated the key 1.40-1.45% support level; we need to see some stabilization. These are the main things that prevent an outright bullish outlook... we discuss further on pages 3-4.
Underlyings
Accenture Plc Class A

Alliance Resource Partners L.P.

Alliance Resource Partners is a natural resource company. The company is a coal producer in the eastern United States. The company markets its coal production to main domestic and international utilities and industrial users. The company has two reportable segments: Illinois Basin, which comprises of multiple operating segments, including operating mining complexes Webster County Coal's Dotiki mining complex, Gibson County Coal's mining complex, River View's mining complex and the Hamilton mining complex; and Appalachia, which comprises of multiple operating segments, including the Mettiki mining complex, the Tunnel Ridge mining complex, the MC Mining mining complex and the Penn Ridge property.

American Tower Corporation

American Tower is a holding company. Through its subsidiaries, the company is a real estate investment trusts and an independent owner, operator and developer of multitenant communications real estate. The company's primary business is the leasing of space on communications sites to wireless service providers, radio and television broadcast companies, wireless data providers, government agencies and municipalities and tenants in a number of other industries. The company also provides tower-related services, including site acquisition, zoning and permitting and structural analysis, which primarily support the company's site leasing business, including the addition of new tenants and equipment on its sites.

Centennial Resource Development Inc. Class A

Centennial Resource Development is an independent oil and natural gas company focused on the development of unconventional oil and associated natural gas reserves in the Permian Basin.

Crown Castle International Corp

Crown Castle International is a holding company. Through its subsidiaries, the company owns, operates and leases shared communications infrastructure that is geographically dispersed throughout the U.S., including towers and other structures, such as rooftops (collectively, towers), and fiber primarily supporting small cell networks (small cells) and fiber solutions. The company's towers, fiber and small cells assets are collectively referred to herein as communications infrastructure. The company's core business is providing access, including space or capacity, to its shared communications infrastructure via long-term contracts in various forms, including lease, license, sublease and service agreements.

Facebook Inc. Class A

Facebook is building and engaging products that enable people to connect and share with friends and family through mobile devices, personal computers, virtual reality headsets, and in-home devices. The company's products include: Facebook, which enables people to connect, share, discover, and communicate with each other on mobile devices and personal computers; Instagram, which is a place where people can express themselves through photos, videos, and private messaging, and explore their interests in businesses, creators and communities; Messenger and WhatsApp, which are messaging applications; and Oculus, which connects people through its Oculus virtual reality products.

Gartner Inc.

Gartner is a research and advisory company. The company's principal products and services are delivered through its three business segments: Research, which provides insights and advice across various functional areas of the enterprise through research, briefings, proprietary tools, access to the company's research personnel, peer networking services and membership programs; Conferences, which provides business personnel across an organization the opportunity to learn, share and network; and Consulting, which helps chief information officers and other senior executives driving technology-related strategic initiatives move from insight to action.

Infosys Limited ADS

Peabody Energy Corporation

Peabody Energy is a coal company, engaged in the mining of thermal coal for sale primarily to electric utilities and metallurgical coal for sale to industrial customers. The company owns interests in several coal mining operations located in the U.S. and Australia. The company has a majority interest in several of those mining operations and an equity interest in Middlemount Coal Pty Ltd. (Middlemount), which owns the Middlemount Mine in Queensland, Australia. In addition to its mining operations, the company markets and brokers coal from other coal producers, both as principal and agent, and trade coal and freight-related contracts through trading and business offices in the U.S., Australia, China, and the U.K.

Penn Virginia Corporation

Penn Virginia is an independent oil and gas company engaged in the onshore exploration, development and production of crude oil, natural gas liquids (NGLs) and natural gas. The company's operations consist primarily of drilling unconventional horizontal development wells and operating its producing wells in the Eagle Ford Shale, in Gonzales, Lavaca, Fayette and DeWitt Counties in South Texas. The company operates in one segment, which is the exploration, development and production of crude oil, NGLs and natural gas. The company sells its oil, NGL and natural gas products using short-term floating price physical and spot market contracts.

Renren ADS (N Shares)

SBA Communications Corp. Class A

SBA Communications is a holding company. Through its subsidiaries, the company is an owner and operator of wireless communications infrastructure, including tower structures, rooftops, and other structures that support antennas used for wireless communications. The company's operations are in the U.S. and its territories. In its site leasing business, the company leases antenna space to wireless service providers on towers that the company owns or operates and manages rooftop and tower sites for property owners under various contractual arrangements. In its site development business, the company assists wireless service providers in developing and maintaining their own wireless service networks.

Snap Inc. Class A

Snap is a camera company. The company's primary product, Snapchat, is a camera application that helps people to communicate visually through short videos and images called Snaps. The company's products are: Camera, which includes tools for people to personalize their Snaps; Chat, which includes interacting with friends on Snapchat; Discover, which includes providing Stories and Shows from publishers, creators, and the community; Snap Map, which shows a live map of the user's location; Memories, which enables users to save the Snaps they create in a personal collection called Memories; and Spectacles, which includes creating Memories by using Spectacles, which are the company's sunglasses that make Snaps.

Twitter Inc.

Twitter provides products and services for people, organizations, advertisers, developers and platform and data partners. The company's product, Twitter, is a global platform for public self-expression and conversation in real time. The company's mobile application, Periscope, lets anyone broadcast and watch video live with others. The company's products and services for advertisers include Promoted Products such as Promoted Tweets, Promoted Accounts, and Promoted Trends. The company's products for developers and data partners provide tools and public application programming interfaces to build applications and other products that utilize Twitter data and syndicate and distribute Twitter content across their properties.

Weibo Corp Sponsored ADR Class A

WIPRO LTD

Provider
Vermilion Research
Vermilion Research

Vermilion Research delivers timely, actionable, and unique research inputs to professional investors. Our research strategists highlight securities which we believe are at major inflection points, based on our various proprietary technical indicators, and offer asymmetric risk/return profiles. We believe our research methodology, which is not limited by industry sector or market capitalization, enables us to deliver superior investment recommendations.

Our process begins by organizing all actively traded stocks into coherent sectors, then into logical industry groups. We then apply our proprietary relative strength tools to identify developing price trends. Once attractive trends are identified within a selected sectors or groups, we screen for individual stocks which we believe offer the best risk/reward profile. Vermilion offers U.S. and global equity market research products. Vermilion’s research team, which has received numerous awards and accolades, has a combined 70 year of experience in the analysis of investment securities.

Analysts
Dave Nicoski

Ross LaDuke

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