Larry Wachtel Quotes (70 Quotes)

It's an earnings-driven market. The big question is whether the flow of earnings can rescue the market from the twin dreadnoughts of higher oil and interest rates.

There's a cautious backdrop (on Wall Street). We're heading to that glide path toward the Fed meeting. I think there has been a gravitation toward the cyclical stocks and away from the blue chips. And I think we'll continue to see movements into the papers and the metals.

Cyclical stocks are helping the Dow today, ... Morgan Stanley upgraded some chemical stocks and that's giving cyclical stocks -- paper, chemicals -- a boost.

We had a good day with surprising strength, but I need to see a follow-through tomorrow to believe it will stick.

Now, this day prior to the long weekend, I don't think we'll have the cavalry charge at the close today. But I think this has legs. I think it could drive forward to, say, Dow 8500,

Attention will be focused on the statement that follows the 215 p. m. ET rate announcement, as it will give us a better indication on the Fed's future course of action. Noteworthy is that the tendency has been for the market to rally ahead of the Fed meeting and to sell-on-the-news after the announcement, ... While the market is advancing, it is on light volume due to this being a Monday in the slow month of August in front of tomorrow's economic policy uncertainty.

We knew deep down there was some good news in the bottom line, but we were beginning to have our doubts.

So far the earnings season is kind of a mixed bag. It's not the catalyst that everyone was expecting it to be. Nokia was disappointing, Apple was positive and Citigroup is in the middle. We're still waiting for IBM,

The abbreviated week will bring with it a rash of economic numbers, culminating in the May job figures on Friday. The Street would like to see some signs of a slowing economic pace so as to assuage the inflation junkies on the Federal Reserve.

The Microsoft delay has hurt the Nasdaq and will reverberate throughout all of technology. That will be today's big headline. We closed ragged yesterday, so we're going to have a tired market to start.

Rising long rates threaten the bellwether housing industry as well as consumer spending. The higher bond returns begin to compete with stocks for institutional affection.

I don't know that money managers controlling billions of dollars are going to make major choices based on this minor development,

The Dow components are weak because the Fed is threatening to slow the economy down. Its cyclical components are the ones that are most sensitive to that.

They were destined to be disappointing. One, the weather was against you and we have a cautious consumer.

Cisco reports earnings tomorrow (Tuesday) and certainly that stock is at a price where there may be a split.

It's a catch-22. If any of these numbers comes in too strong, it's going to hurt stocks because it means the Fed is going to keep hiking.

Obviously, companies split when the stock price has gotten beyond the pocketbook of the average investor.

At this point, the task of the component suppliers is to find enough chips to meet the demand, ... But there's always the psychological turning point as to when you begin to slow the demand down. I think that's the problem. I think it's been overdone, and I think the chip stocks are very good buys here.

It's becoming a day-to-day struggle between bears and bulls. Once oil and yields move to highs, the bears take advantage. Those are the twin dreadnoughts of the market. But earnings news has been strong and has kept bulls on top.

The only thing that was positive today was that there was nothing negative, especially no lousy economic reports that we've had over the last four trading days. The summer doldrums have not appeared so far.

Today bonds rallied because of the softer new home sales. Yesterday, bonds fell because the purchasing managers report was too strong. Now we go to Friday and the non-farm payrolls, which is the main part of the economic reporting cycle, and if that number comes in too strong, the bonds get whacked again -- and so do the stocks.

There were a couple of one-shot deals in the PPI -- auto prices and tobacco prices. If you took those two items out, the core rate was up 0.1. That's the reason why the markets have come back a little. I've analyzed the numbers and realized that this is not inflation out of control.

The traders wanted 75 basis points (three-quarter percentage point) so they sold on the news. After the traders sold, investors stepped up to the plate (to sell).

This is the first day of the month, you may have seen some end-of-the-month portfolio selling dissipating, ... And this is the day that Microsoft is distributing 33 billion in cash, so there is some anticipation of that finding its way back to the market.

Clearly, the gulf between technology and the rest of the market was so wide it was impossible to sustain. And there had to be a correction somewhere and the correction is under way.

The key this morning is the 10-year note hovering around a yield of 5. This news trumps any economic or earnings data. It's a rate-driven market, even with oil competing for headlines. Any weakness we may see will be due to these bond yields.

There are many facets to the market. One facet has been that money managers have been willing to dip their toe in the water.

Tech is suffering from one big inventory overhang. It's going to take a long time to work through that.

However, the history of the stock market is that everyone sells into the strength. So I'll be taking it one hour at a time. I'm in a show-me mood today.

Everything continues to revolve around oil after we got licked pretty good yesterday. Everything is a knee-jerk reaction now.

We have good earnings today, but there's just too much good economic news. We're increasing the likelihood of a rate hike in June. The data are coming in stronger than expected, so the Street is expecting another hike. The better the news, the more likely the Fed will tighten. It's a strange phenomenon that good news can be bad news.

It was a very gratifying day. But I'd like to see some follow-through tomorrow (Tuesday).

However, given that the volume yesterday was almost at the lowest level of the year, caution prevails. I can promise a decent opening but it's still a bell to bell story.

Once we get to April and the first quarter earnings are reported -- and I think they're going to be pretty good -- (that) could be helpful. I doubt if you'll get anything out of the Fed meeting.

This is all promulgated by overseas markets. We started with the festering Asian situation, Russia then spilled over into Latin America, and Wall Street has trouble dealing with all these overseas situations.

If we get any kind of word that we can avert military action, avoid a war, certainly that would be helpful.

Tomorrow (Tuesday) we get numbers on industrial production and housing and big reports from Intel, Coke, Johnson Johnson -- maybe that can turn us around.

For Warner-Lambert shareholders, the danger is that Pfizer takes its marbles and goes home. But the potential reward is that you can get the deal for a higher price.

The leadership of the marketplace moved out of techs and into quality stocks today,

The earnings numbers are still respectable, but they are softening. The psychology is that you can't make projections about future earnings without having some sense about where the price of oil is going and what the consumer will do.

When we arrive on Monday, we may or may not know the full extent of Hurricane Rita. The stock market can attempt to discount what is discernible, but when it comes to acts of nature, it can only make assumptions.

The high drama was yesterday, and now it fades into the void as we await the appeals process,

so you can see how narrow (the rally) really is.

The bull market only ends on a fundamental reason. It ends if inflation rises and rates rise. It ends if profits dive. It doesn't end because the Dow goes down on a random day based on program trading.

The two major hurdles continue to be oil and interest rates on the Treasuries. The market has demonstrated through the first quarter that we can snap back.

Getting back to inflation, it is important to note that the producer price Index does not reflect wage pressures -- and that is where the inflation threat really lies.

A lot of the results yesterday have been a little disappointing. Microsoft had a decent quarter but was a little below expectations. It was the same with both Amazon and Coke.

Low-end consumers, the ones that spend every penny of their paycheck, are really hurting with these gasoline prices.

Suddenly these inflation figures have a psychological impact.

Last minute tax-loss selling, that's why they stay open on the day before New Year's, so there might be some excitement, but it's just a beginning phase.