ChartSmarter Monday Game Plan 3/13/17

Indexes finished off session highs but following a mild afternoon rally, all off the major averages ended green, even the Russell 2000 which rose .4% ending a 6 day losing streak. It was the Nasdaq which has recorded 10 straight winning Fridays now, and this indicates market participants are willing to hold through weekends which shows excellent conviction, but the bears may decipher this as complacency. But PRICE action is all we focus on as trend followers and that is speaking loud and clear. Instead of hearing to much euphoria, there is instead an overwhelming amount of discussion about many waiting for a “correction”. This will undoubtedly occur at some point, but they rarely do markets present themselves this favor when we all know the markets always attempt to confound the most. On a weekly basis the Nasdaq lost .15% but “performed” the best of the big three and did record a weekly hammer. The S&P 500 lost .44% and both put a halt to prior 6 week winning streaks. I still think attention should be paid to the Nasdaq and that benchmark has now registered three consecutive taut weekly CLOSES all finishing within just 25 handles of each other. This type of tight, coiling action often leads to powerful moves generally in the direction of the prevailing trend. Looking at individual sectors it was the tech and healthcare which were the only major S&P sectors to advance. The XLK and XLV both gained .47 and .26% respectively. Energy was the laggard this week as the XLE slumped 2.75%, ending above the round 70 number, but just underneath its 200 day SMA. The group has started to look relatively attractive as of Thursdays action as many names recorded bullish piercing line patterns giving a definitive stop, with decent risk/reward scenarios. On the monthly time frame it is healthcare, with XLV higher by 5.73%, which continues to flourish and below is the chart of CLVS and how it appeared in this weeks Thursday Game Plan. It did not advance much on a weekly basis, but it won a nice battle which its 50 day SMA which caught up to price this week offering a touch for the first time since last November.