ChartSmarter Friday Game Plan 9/30/16

Markets finished slightly off afternoon lows Thursday as the Nasdaq and S&P 500 gave up .9%. Looking at the S&P 500 chart, it lost its 50 day SMA the very next day after recapturing it twice in the last 6 sessions, hardly a bullish vote of confidence. The Russell 2000 recorded a bearish engulfing candle today and it lagged the other major averages falling 1.4%. Heading into Friday the Nasdaq is lower by .7% for the week and the S&P 500 by .6%. All of the major S&P sectors lost ground Thursday, with energy just fractionally lower, and it was healthcare that fell the most by 1.8%. Followed by that is was the utilities that just continue to bleed and now on a 5 day losing streak, off by more than 3% this week thus far. The financials surrendered 1.4% and much of the markets malaise was blamed upon DB problems. All was not negative today as there was some M&A activity with QCOM taking a liking to NXPI and on weak sessions like Thursday it can pay to see which names shrugged off the negativity. Below is the chart of PANW and how it was highlighted in our Thursday 9/15 Game Plan. The cyber security play is now higher 8 of the last 10 weeks and showing excellent relative strength up by 3.2% headed into Friday. Perhaps one can believe that the oil rally may have some legs now that OPEC leader Saudi Arabia is having some financial issues. Once agin it is purely price action that interests us and looking at the services ETF OIH the chart is shaping up nicely. Like its peer XLE which is dealing with the round 70 number, the OIH is dealing with the 30 figure. The fund was only able to record one weekly CLOSE above it since last November which was the week ending 4/29, that did so by just 4 pennies. The chart is now sporting a double bottom trigger of 29.98 and it will most certainly end a 5 week losing streak tomorrow up better than 8%. The ETF has not registered a two week winning streak since the end of May.