FRIDAY: Jobs Report Dyslexia

The market seemed to contract dyslexia Friday, as a poor jobs report somehow helped stocks. Markets had taken such a beating heading into the report, though, that this was more likely a sell the news type event (reversed in this case). Also, investors have begun speculating about a Fed tapering of its asset purchase tapering, while blame is also being given now to the weather, which is just a temporary problem. Follow us at the blog for more like this.

Jobs Report Dyslexia

Market ETF	Feb. 7	Year-to-Date	Last 12 Mos.
SPDR S&P 500 (NYSE: SPY)	+0.7%	3.2%	+18.4%
SPDR Dow Jones (NYSE: DIA)	+0.5%	-5.2%	+12.6%
PowerShares (Nasdaq: QQQ)	+1.2%	-1.3%	+29.0%
SPDR Gold Shares (NYSE: GLD)	+0.4%	+4.8%	-24.8%
iShares US Real Estate (NYSE: IYR)	+0.4%	+4.2%	-2.3%
United States Oil (NYSE: USO)	+0.8%	-0.4%	+1.4%
PowerShares DB US$  Bullish (NYSE: UUP)	-0.2%	+0.7%	-1.0%
PIMCO Total Return ETF (NYSE: BOND)	+0.1%	+1.7%	-2.5%

Stocks are sort of selling the news, or buying it in this case today. Bad news from the Jobs Report had no impact on stocks, as they rose broadly through the afternoon. Two factors that could be at play are increasing blame given to the weather and increasing discussion about the Fed possibly tapering its tapering program. As such, gains should fade into the close, and we suggest avoiding long positions lasting more than a day.

Economic Events

ECONOMIC REPORT SCHEDULE
Economic Data Point	Prior	Expected	Actual
FRIDAY
Jobs Report – Unemployment	6.7%	6.7%	6.6%
-Nonfarm Payrolls	75K	181K	113K
-Private Payrolls	89K	182K	142K
Consumer Credit M/M Change	+$12.3 B	+$12.0 B

The economic radar today was solely focused on the Employment Situation Report for January. The data was relatively poor, with very little revision to December’s miserable nonfarm payroll result and January’s number coming in about as bad. The suspect unemployment rate continued to improve, but it remains burdened by the realities around civilian workforce erosion and structural fault in American labor. Private nonfarm payrolls improved a bit, but remain relatively poor for an economy being increasingly expected to walk on its own two feet without Fed crutches.

INTERNATIONAL MARKETS

EUROPE	CLOSE	ASIA/PACIFIC	CLOSE
EURO STOXX 50	+0.9%	NIKKEI 225	+2.2%
FTSE 100	+0.2%	Hang Seng	+1.0%
CAC 40	+1.0%	S&P/ASX 200	+0.7%
German DAX	+0.5%	Korean KOSPI	+0.8%
Athens ASE	+0.4%	BSE India SENSEX	+0.3%

Stocks were up across international markets as a buy the bad news event followed the sell the rumor run-up to it.

ASIA Today

Markets are closed today in China for the last business day celebration of the Lunar New Year.

ASIAN ETFs	Today
iShares MSCI Japan (NYSE: EWJ)	+1.4%
SPDR S&P China (NYSE: GXC)	+1.1%
iShares MSCI Australia (NYSE: EWA)	+0.5%
iShares MSCI S. Korea (NYSE: EWY)	+0.6%
iShares S&P India (Nasdaq: INDY)	+0.5%

EUROPE Today

The world is walking on eggshells as the Olympics kick off in Russia. Unfortunately, it appears a terrorist attack was in the works to disrupt the opening ceremony, as a hijacked plane ordered to divert to Sochi was grounded by its pilots in Istanbul instead. If European shares were still trading, we suspect they would have reversed course on this news.

EUROPEAN ETFs	Today
Vanguard FTSE Europe (NYSE: VGK)	+0.7%
iShares MSCI U.K. (NYSE: EWU)	+0.5%
iShares MSCI France (NYSE: EWQ)	+0.9%
iShares MSCI Germany (NYSE: EWG)	+0.7%
Global X FTSE Greece (NYSE: GREK)	-0.4%

Commodity Markets (9:33 AM ET)

WTI Crude	+0.3%
Brent Crude	+0.4%
NYMEX Natural Gas	-1.5%
RBOB Gasoline	+1.0%
Gold Spot	+0.2%
Silver Spot	-0.5%
COMEX Copper	+0.5%
CBOT Corn	-0.1%
CBOT Wheat	+0.5%
CBOT Soybeans	-0.2%
ICE Cocoa	+0.5%
ICE Sugar	0.0%
ICE Orange Juice Conc.	+1.2%
CME Lumber	+0.5%
CME Live Cattle	+0.1%

The weather is still playing havoc on all commodities, but today we saw a reversal in natural gas prices. Orange juice concentrate prices advanced though on a Southern storm strike.

Corporate Events

Wall Street firm Stifel raised XPO Logistics (NYSE: XPO) and Netflix (Nasdaq: NFLX) to “Buy” from “Hold” and C.H. Robinson (Nasdaq: CHRW) to “Hold” from “Sell”. Earnings season is running down now, but a good number of companies still reported today.

HIGHLIGHTED EPS REPORTS
Company	Ticker
FRIDAY
Aaron’s	NYSE: AAN
ArcelorMittal	NYSE: MT
Beacon Roofing	Nasdaq: BECN
Cigna	NYSE: CI
CommunityOne Bancorp	NYSE: COB
Corporate Office Properties	NYSE: OFC
EnPro Industries	NYSE: NPO
Farmer Bros.	Nasdaq: FARM
FLIR Systems	Nasdaq: FLIR
Forum Energy	NYSE: FET
Imation	NYSE: IMN
Ixia	Nasdaq: XXIA
Laboratory Corp.	NYSE: LH
Liquidity Services	Nasdaq: LQDT
Moody’s	NYSE: MCO
MoSys	Nasdaq: MOSY
OneBeacon Insurance	NYSE: OB
Sirona Dental	Nasdaq: SIRO
Snyder’s-Lance	Nasdaq: LNCE
Taro Pharmaceutical	Nasdaq: TARO
TC Pipelines	NYSE: TCP
The Madison Square Garden	NYSE: MSG
Viad	NYSE: VVI
Viasystems Group	Nasdaq: VIAS
Wyndham Worldwide	NYSE: WYN

TODAY’S MOST ACTIVE STOCKS
BIGGEST GAINERS	% Gain
Cytokinetics (Nasdaq: CYTK)	+33%
Smart Technologies (NYSE: SMT)	+32%
Athenahealth (Nasdaq: ATHN)	+25%
Adept Technology (Nasdaq: ADEP)	+22%
Corporate Resource Service (Nasdaq: CRRS)	+22%
Net 1 Ueps Technology (Nasdaq: UEPS)	+20%
Bebe Stores (Nasdaq: BEBE)	+18%
Sunesis Pharmaceuticals (Nasdaq: SNSS)	+18%
American Spectrum Realty (NYSE: AQQ)	+17%
Puma Biotechnology (Nasdaq: PBYI)	+17%
BIGGEST LOSERS	% Drop
Fairway Group (NYSE: FWM)	-29%
Giga-tronics (Nasdaq: GIGA)	-19%
Montage Technology (Nasdaq: MONT)	-18%
Genpact (NYSE: G)	-18%
Echelon Corp. (Nasdaq: ELON)	-18%
Internet Initiative Japan (Nasdaq: IIJI)	-16%
Prima Biomed (Nasdaq: PBMD)	-17%
TrovaGene (Nasdaq: TROVW)	-16%
Uranium Resources (Nasdaq: URRE)	-16%
Life Partners (Nasdaq: LPHI)	-13%

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