Courtesy of Joe Weisenthal of Clusterstock America has likely already seen the peak number of retail bank branches there will ever be, as a shrinking industry, consolidation and electronic banking undermine the need for physical locations. With these trends in mind, growth-happy Bank of America (BAC) is set to close 10% of its 6100 retail branches,...

Courtesy of Phil’s Stock World Poor Bears! They just can’t seem to catch a break in this up and up market.  While yesterday’s housing data may have seemed good, it was up 11% from May – that didn’t make it actually good as it was down 22% from last June and that was despite the average home being sold for 12% less.  If I were to...

Courtesy of Zero Hedge From an interview earlier with NYSE’s Larry Leibowitz, who is surprisingly vocal against Flash trading. Larry – since the NYSE does not engage in Flash trading, can you please indicate whether or not the SLP program provides advance notice to Goldman Sachs ala Direct Edge’s ELP program. Regardless, the escalation...

Courtesy of MISH Be prepared for a barrage of commercials from pharmaceutical manufacturers telling you what a “tremendous deal” the health care reform package is. Clearly reform is a “tremendous deal” for them, otherwise they would not be pushing it so hard. Please consider Drugmakers Consider Ad Campaign on Health Overhaul. Drugmakers...

Crude oil closed higher on Monday extending the rally off this month’s low. Profit taking tempered early gains and the mid-range close sets the stage for a steady opening on Tuesday. Stochastics and the RSI are becoming overbought but remains bullish signaling that sideways to higher prices are possible near-term. If September extends today’s...

Courtesy of The Pragmatic Capitalist The financial news networks are just loving the “better than expected” news on new home sales.  It’s amazing the conclusions people will come up with by just reading headline news reports without delving into the details of an economic news release.  The real details of today’s new homes report shows substantial...

The September NASDAQ 100 closed higher on Monday as it extends this month’s rally. The high-range close sets the stage for a steady to higher opening on Tuesday. Stochastics and the RSI are overbought but remain neutral to bullish signaling that sideways to higher prices are possible near-term. If September extends this month’s rally,...

Courtesy of Adam Lass of WaveStrength Options weekly What I am worried about is what will happen when investors fall off the top of this wall. “Let me take my chances on the Wall of Death” – Richard Thompson The common adage has most every rally climbing a wall of worry. “If I buy now, I might get crushed for the fifth or sixth or seventh...

Courtesy of CalculatedRisk The Census Bureau reports New Home Sales in June were at a seasonally adjusted annual rate (SAAR) of 384 thousand. This is an increase from the revised rate of 345 thousand in May. Click on graph for larger image in new window. The first graph shows monthly new home sales (NSA – Not Seasonally Adjusted). Note the...

Zero Hedge, in collaboration with David Rosenberg, Chief Economist & Strategist, Gluskin Sheff + Associates, Inc., is pleased to release the attached analysis “The End Of The End Of The Recession.” It is our hope that this piece will provide some badly-needed perspective on “the recession is over” debate, a topic that has...

Courtesy of Jay Yarow of Green Sheets OPEC is preparing for oil prices to plummet, as demand shows no sign of improving, and space to store oil runs out, the Wall Street Journal reports. In the past few weeks the price of oil has quietly ticked higher. Today, it hit $68.99 on the Nymex, the highest price it has seen since July 2. As has been the case...

Earnings: Is That REALLY What’s Driving The DJIA Higher? It’s the season for corporations to report their earnings, and everywhere you turn, analysts talk about earnings’ influence on the broad stock market. Keep reading if you also think that earnings are what you should focus on in your investment strategy… Read More

Courtesy of AC Investor Chart courtesy of www.stockcharts.com ( click to enlarge ) The technical daily chart above of SIRI, shows very bullish signal as 50 day moving average has just crossed on top over 200 day moving average forming the Golden Cross. With the bullish sign formed and MACD also back above 0 we should see the stock take off from now...

Courtesy of The Pragmatic Capitalist This is the biggest week of the quarter in terms of earnings.  29% of the S&P 500 will be reporting and 750 companies in total report.  The docket is loaded with energy and materials firms.   Adding to this is a heavy slate of economic news: Monday: New home sales Tuesday: July Conference Board Consumer...