Bear Radar

Style Outperformer: 

• Mid-Cap Growth +.3%

Sector Outperformers:

• 1) Retail +1.1% 2) Steel +1.1% 3) Homebuilders +1.1% 

Stocks Rising on Unusual Volume: 

• ALDR, ACAD, FINL, CALM and QLIK

Stocks With Unusual Call Option Activity: 

• 1) XLNX 2) AKRX 3) CHTR 4) ACAD 5) P

Stocks With Most Positive News Mentions: 

• 1) FINL 2) QLIK 3) EXP 4) FB 5) MAR

Charts:

• ETFs Rising on Unusual Volume
• Stocks Rising on Unusual Volume

Bull Radar

Style Outperformer: 

• Mid-Cap Growth +.3%

Sector Outperformers:

• 1) Retail +1.1% 2) Steel +1.1% 3) Homebuilders +1.1% 

Stocks Rising on Unusual Volume: 

• ALDR, ACAD, FINL, CALM and QLIK

Stocks With Unusual Call Option Activity: 

• 1) XLNX 2) AKRX 3) CHTR 4) ACAD 5) P

Stocks With Most Positive News Mentions: 

• 1) FINL 2) QLIK 3) EXP 4) FB 5) MAR

Charts:

• ETFs Rising on Unusual Volume
• Stocks Rising on Unusual Volume

Morning Market Internals

NYSE Composite Index:

• Volume Running -35.0% Below 100-Day Average
• 1 Sector Rising, 9 Sectors Declining
• 43.8% of Issues Advancing, 53.3% Declining
• 71 New 52-Week Highs, 6 New Lows
• 42.4% of Issues Above 200-day Moving Average
• Average 14-Day RSI 45.7%
• Vix 15.6 +5.6%
• Total Put/Call .56 -46.2%
• TRIN/Arms 1.48 +75.9%

Monday Watch

Today's Headlines
Bloomberg: 

• Saudi Stocks Lead Mideast Declines as Easter Weighs on Trading. Saudi stocks led Middle Eastern markets lower as oil languished near $40 a barrel and the Easter weekend holiday in Europe sapped volumes. Equities in Dubai extended the longest losing streak in more than two months. The Tadawul All Share Index sank for a fourth day, losing 1.5 percent to 6,256.68 at the close in Riyadh. About 4.8 billion riyals ($1.3 billion) of shares traded, or 17 percent less than the market’s daily average over the past year. Jabal Omar Development Co.’s 9.3 percent plunge was the biggest contributor to declines. The DFM General Index lost 1.2 percent on less than half the average daily turnover value over the past year. The Bloomberg GCC 200 Index, which tracks the biggest companies in the six-nation Gulf Cooperation Council, slid 1.2 percent.
• Japan Stocks Rise as Yen Weakens for Seventh Day After U.S. GDP. Japanese stocks rose as the yen fell for a seventh day after data showed the U.S. economy grew at a faster pace than previously estimated.The Topix index advanced 0.6 percent to 1,374.80 at 9:32 a.m. in Tokyo, extending last week’s 1.6 percent gain. All but four of the gauge’s 33 industry groups increased. The Nikkei 225 Stock Average added 0.7 percent to 17,120.37.
• Oil Enthusiasts Stay Out of Rally Led by Shrinking Bearish Bets. Oil enthusiasts haven’t been jumping on board the latest rally. As crude has soared 50 percent since Feb. 11, the number of bets on increased prices has barely budged. Instead, the upward pressure on prices appears to have come from traders cashing out of bearish wagers at an unprecedented pace. The liquidation of short positions during the last seven weeks covered by data from the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission was the largest on record. "The rally has come from shorts getting scared out of their positions, and you’re not seeing a lot of money coming in on the long side," said John Kilduff, partner at Again Capital LLC, a New York hedge fund focused on energy. "It really calls into question the fortitude and staying power of the rally." Short positions on West Texas Intermediate crude, or bets that prices will fall, have dropped by 131,617 contracts since Feb. 2, the biggest liquidation in CFTC data going back a decade. To close out a bearish position, traders buy back futures and options, putting upward pressure on prices. In the same period, bullish wagers fell by 971.
• It Only Took a Month for Funds to Grow Wary of a Copper Rally. It’s been barely a month since investors first started betting on a copper rally, and they’re already on the retreat. Money managers cut their wagers on price gains for a second straight week, pulling back just before futures capped the worst slump in a month. Tuesday’s attacks in Brussels sapped confidence in the global growth outlook, while a recovery for the dollar weighed on demand for commodities as alternative assets. Money managers reduced their net-long holdings in copper by 4.4 percent to 23,011 U.S. futures and options in the week ended March 22, according to Commodity Futures Trading Commission data released three days later.
• Sanders Says He's Seized Momentum After Crushing Caucus Wins. Bernie Sanders said he’s seized the momentum in the race for the 2016 Democratic presidential nomination after trouncing Hillary Clinton in three caucuses. The Vermont senator won Saturday in landslides. He received 73 percent of the vote in Washington state, the day’s biggest prize in terms of delegates; 70 percent in Hawaii, and 82 percent in Alaska, the Associated Press reported. Those wins followed similarly lopsided results in Utah and Idaho on March 22. “We’ve won the last five out of six contests, all of them with landslide victories,” Sanders said Sunday on CNN’s “State of the Union.” “We’re heading to the west coast, which is the most progressive part of America. We think we’re going to do very well there.”

Wall Street Journal:

• Terror Network’s Web Sprawls Beyond Brussels and Paris. Multiple recent arrests suggest a wider Islamic State presence in Europe than previously thought. A pan-European effort to crack the Islamic State network behind the Paris and Brussels attacks is yielding an unsettling discovery—a web of interlocking terror cells whose dimensions authorities say they are still trying to grasp.
• Donald Trump’s Weakness in Big Suburbs Could Hurt Him in November. Republican front-runner has lost the primary in key counties of general-election battlegrounds. Donald Trump has dominated the Republican primaries so far despite a weakness that could prove damaging in a general election: He is losing many of the populous suburbs where the battle for the White House is often won and lost.

Fox News: 

• Blast in crowded Pakistan park kills at least 65. (video) An explosion ripped through a crowded Pakistan park where Christians were celebrating Easter on Sunday, killing at least 65 people, officials told the Associated Press. A Taliban faction, Jamaat-ul-Ahrar, claimed responsibility for the attack and said Christians were the target of the blast, Reuters reported. The mostly-Muslim country has a small Christian community, accounting for less than two percent of Pakistan's total population. About 300 people were injured when the bomb detonated in the parking area of Gulshan-e-Iqbal Park in the eastern city of Lahore.

CNBC:

• California legislators, unions reach deal to raise minimum wage to $15 an hour.

Zero Hedge:

• China Warns Officials: Allow Social Unrest, Lose Your Job.
• China Tries To "Suddenly" Pop Latest Housing Bubble While Reflating Stock, Car Bubbles. (graph)
• The World Has 6 Options To Avoid Japan's Fate, And According To HSBC, They Are All Very Depressing. (graph)
• Something Just Snapped In The VIX ETF Complex. (graph)
• Has The Biggest Of All Bubbles Popped: Central Bank Omnipotence?
• Bad - But Better Than What's Coming. (graph)
• "Worse Than 2008" World Trade Collapses To 10 Year Lows. (graph)
• Suicide Bomber Kills At Least 55, Injures 150 In Pakistan Public Park. (video)

Business Insider:

• Taliban kills at least 69, mostly women and children, in Pakistani park suicide bombing targeting Christians.
• Ted Cruz is closing in on Donald Trump in a crucial state. A new USC Dornsife/Los Angeles Times poll of likely Republican voters published on Sunday showed the Texas senator, with 35% support, just 1 point behind Trump's 36% in California.
• HARRY DENT: Civil unrest is coming to America.

Reuters:

• Chinese firms hiring less, capex hits five-year low: Beige Book private survey. Capital expenditure by Chinese companies fell to the lowest in at least five years in the first quarter, a private survey showed, highlighting persistent weakness in the economy even as the government ratchets up policy support to head off a sharper slowdown. The quarterly survey of over 2,200 firms by China Beige Book International (CBB) also showed less hiring by companies, marking the second consecutive quarter of downward pressure on employment as executives scale back borrowing and spending. Only 33 percent of firms reported capital expenditure growth in the first quarter, the lowest in the survey's five-year history. The share of firms reporting capex growth has fallen by over 40 percent since the second quarter of 2014.

 Financial Times:

• US high-street banks face $5bn hit from Fed’s more dovish stance. With only two rises on the cards this year, pain spreads among the more rate-sensitive lenders. 

Night Trading

• Asian indices are -.25% to +.50% on average.
• Asia Ex-Japan Investment Grade CDS Index 153.75 +2.5 basis points.
• Asia Pacific Sovereign CDS Index 58.25 +.5 basis point.
• Bloomberg Emerging Markets Currency Index 71.21 -.02%.
• S&P 500 futures +.3%.
• NASDAQ 100 futures +.36%.

Morning Preview Links

Earnings of Note
Company/Estimate

• (CALM)/.99
• (MRVL)/.09 

Economic Releases 
8:30 am EST

• Personal Income for February is estimated to rise +.1% versus a +.5% gain in January.
• Personal Spending for February is estimated to rise +.1% versus a +.5% gain in January.
• Real Personal Spending for February is estimated unch. versus a +.4% gain in January.
• The PCE Core MoM for February is estimated to rise +.2% versus a +.3% gain in January.  

10:00 am EST

• Pending Home Sales MoM for February are estimated to rise +1.1% versus a -2.5% decline in January.

10:30 am EST

• Dallas Fed Manufacturing Activity for March is estimated to rise to -27.0 versus -31.8 in February.

Upcoming Splits

• None of note

Other Potential Market Movers

• The 2Y T-Note auction, Japan unemployment rate and the (SHPG) annual meting could also impact trading today.

BOTTOM LINE: Asian indices are mostly higher, boosted by industrial and financial shares in the region. I expect US stocks to open modestly higher and to weaken into the afternoon, finishing mixed. The Portfolio is 50% net long heading into the week.

Weekly Outlook

• Week Ahead by Bloomberg.
• Wall St. Week Ahead by Reuters.
• Weekly Economic Calendar by Briefing.com.

BOTTOM LINE: I expect US stocks to finish the week modestly lower on terrorism worries, rising European/Emerging Markets/US High-Yield debt angst, Fed rate-hike fears, global growth concerns, commodity weakness and technical selling. My intermediate-term trading indicators are giving neutral signals and the Portfolio is 50% net long heading into the week.

Today's Headlines

Bloomberg:      

• Brussels Terror Suspect Charged Amid Fears of More Attacks. Federal prosecutors in Brussels charged a suspect in the March 22 suicide bombings that left more than 30 people dead as counter-terrorism investigations in several European countries advanced amid fears of further assaults. The suspect, identified as Faycal C. and apprehended Thursday evening in the Belgian capital, was charged with terrorist murder and being part of a terrorist group, federal prosecutors said on Saturday. Two other suspects also were charged with terrorism offenses, they said. Faycal C. may have been the man in a cream-colored jacket seen on security cameras at the Brussels airport at the time of the Tuesday bombing that killed 11 people in the departures hall, according to Le Soir newspaper. He was one of three suspects taken into custody outside the prosecutor’s office on Thursday.

Wall Street Journal:

• Turbulent Presidential Campaign Reaches Paul Ryan’s Door. Donald Trump rally in Janesville, Wis., thrusts speaker further into debate on Republican Party’s future. The Republicans’ presidential campaign has moved into House Speaker Paul Ryan’s backyard, thrusting him further into the vortex of a GOP debate about what kind of party it wants to be.

Barron's:

• Had bullish commentary on (AAL), (IPG), (KEY), (TLMR) and (ZBH).

MarketWatch.com:

• Most U.S. companies won’t be able to do business in Cuba for years.

Fox News: 

• Sanders projected to win Washington, Alaska Democratic presidential caucuses. (video) Sen. Bernie Sanders was projected to win the Alaska and Washington Democratic presidential caucuses -- victories he hopes will spark a Western states comeback and help him cut into frontrunner Hillary Clinton’s substantial lead. The Associated Press projected Sanders the winner of both contests. The results of Saturday’s third presidential contest, the Hawaii Democratic Caucus, will not be announced until at least midnight.
• Americans confirmed dead in Brussels attacks, family, employers say. (video) An American couple, missing since Tuesday's terror attacks in Brussels, has been identified as victims of the bombings at the Brussels airport, the Associated Press reported Saturday evening. Justin Shults, 30, and his wife Stephanie Shults, 29, had not been seen since Tuesday.

CNBC:

• BofA warns ''slowly tightening' Fed may hit earnings. (video) The S&P 500 may have surged 10 percent since its Feb. 11 low, but a Bank of America-Merrill Lynch strategist is warning the bounce is on very shaky ground. Publicly traded companies have seen negative earnings growth two quarters in a row and there are no fundamental underpinnings for the rally, Savita Subramanian, BofAML's head of U.S. equity and quantitative strategy, said on CNBC's "Fast Money" this week.

Zero Hedge:

• Visualizing Why Manufacturing Jobs Aren't Coming Back. (graph)
• Krugman Goes To Japan, Scolds Abe For Worrying About Quadrillion Yen Debt Pile, Leaves.
• Hugh Hendry: "If China Devalues By 20% The World Is Over, Everything Hits A Wall".
• Belgian Media Explains What To Do During A Nuclear Disaster.
• Europe Is Paying A Heavy Price For Complacency As Existential Crisis Deepens.
• Another Volcker Moment? Guessing The Future Without Say's Law.
• Thunder CLOuds Arrive: 6 CLOs Hit Triggers, Fail Tests. (graph)
• "Satanic Cocktail" Of Nails And Acetone Used In Devilish Brussels Bomb Design.
• It's Not The Economy, Stupid; Barron's Admits "It's A Bullard Market". (graph)
• Was This The Worst Economist Forecast Of All Time. (graph)
• Chairman Of Insolvent Chinese Steel Company Hangs Himself Day Before Bond Maturity. (graph) 
• China "Disappears" A Dozen People For Plotting Coup: "There's No Excuse For Taking Away My Parents And Brother".
• Healthcare Is About To Surpass Housing As The Biggest Source Of American "Growth".
• In New Video, North Korea Threatens To "Slap" America With Giant Nuclear Strike On Lincoln Memorial.
• Japan's Finance Minister Accidentally Reveals How It All Ends: "War".

Business Insider:

• 'What momentum is about': Bernie Sanders wins 2 more primary contests.
• 'Like a block of cheese': US authorities busted another huge drug-smuggling tunnel under US-Mexico border.

The Telegraph:

• City wary of Chinese approaches as deals flounder. The wave of Chinese money seeking refuge in the West is provoking unease in the City as the country’s entrepreneurs and businessmen come under increased regulatory scrutiny in the UK. A series of potential deals with Chinese investors around the world have collapsed or been blocked in recent months amid growing doubts over their ability to see through a deal.

Nikkei Asian Review: 

• Abe to propose stimulus package ahead of G-7 summit. Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe plans to put forward an economic stimulus package in a bid to boost consumption ahead of the Group of Seven summit meeting, to be hosted by Japan on May 26 and 27. By pledging stimulus measures before the summit, Abe apparently hopes to promote international cooperation with public money. The government hopes to submit a supplementary budget to back the package during an extraordinary Diet session to be held sometime between the upper house election in July and the fall. Also, depending on the course of the economy, Abe may consider postponing the consumption tax hike, now planned for April 2017. It would be the second time for the increase to be put off. Abe will hold a press conference on Tuesday to announce the package. That same day, the 96.7 trillion yen ($854 billion) fiscal 2016 budget through next March is to be passed into law. The new package will also include measures to help reduce the number of children on nursery school waiting lists.