Market Direction Week of July 7, 2014

Market Direction: BULLISH alert issued 06/19/2014

Last Week Review: U.S. stocks ended a holiday-shortened week at record levels, with the blue chip Dow surpassing 17,000 for the first time, after a surprisingly strong June jobs report added to growing evidence that the U.S. economy is strongly rebounding. U.S. employers added 288,000 jobs in June and the unemployment rate sank to 6.1%, its lowest level in nearly six years, the Labor Department said. June's advance far outstripped forecasts and marked the fifth straight month that the economy added more than 200,000 jobs—the best five-month stretch of job creation since 2006, according to Dow Jones.

But the participation rate, for the third month in a row, remained at 62.8% — the worst since 1978.

How the market finished last week, the Nasdaq popped 2%, the S&P 500 1.2%, and the Dow 1.3%.

This Week: The traditional start to the Q2 earnings season gets underway in the coming week and next week will be relatively slow with few economic releases.

Geopolitical tension will remain a factor for markets as the crisis in Iraq looks no closer to being solved and Ukraine and Russia continue to work towards a permanent ceasefire agreement. World powers will continue negotiations with Iran over the nation’s disputed nuclear program with the July 20 deadline quickly approaching.

Economic Calendar: FOMC Minutes (7/9), Jobless Claims (7/10), and Treasury Budget (7/11)

Some of the major earnings announcements on deck: AA, WFC, FDO, INFY.

$tockMarketDirection is in a BULLISH posture. We strongly encourage our many bloggers/followers to monitor positions closely, exercise proper money management strategies and to monitor $tockMarketDirection for ALERTS that we may issue advising of a change in our current posture. Cha-ching.