1:00pm (EST)
The market is trading higher on a couple of good economic reports this morning but the bulls are celebrating Friday’s unemployment news as they continue to push the Dow towards 11,000.
The Institute for Supply Management (ISM) number rose in March to 55.4 from 53 in February. Wall Street had forecast a reading of 54. The growth is the fastest since January 2008.
Elsewhere, the National Association of Realtors said the Pending Home Sales Index rose to 97.6 in February from a downwardly revised 90.2 in January.
The reports added to expectations that the economy is making strides.
The Dow is currently up 43 points, or 0.4%, to 10,970 and is nearing the psychological benchmark of 11,000 for the first time in 18 months.
The S&P 500 is higher by 8 points, or 0.7%, and stands at 1,186 while the Nasdaq is up 24 points, or 1%, to 2,426.
Netflix (NFLX, $79.66, up $4.66) continues to explore new highs and is the number one application that is being downloaded on Apple’s (AAPL, $237.79, up $1.82) iPad.
Cree (CREE, $76.88, up $6.28) is up 9% after getting an upgrade this morning from “Neutral” to “Buy”. We have been waiting for this breakout and our subscribers made a little change in early March with our Cree call option trade.
We closed the April 75 calls (CQR100417C00075000, $3.15, up $2.40) on March 3 at $1.60 and they closed Thursday at 75 cents. Today, they are up 320%.
We don’t regret missing out on the gains because we have a couple of current trades that are capable of making the same explosive moves but we are disappointed that shares waited a month to jump to new highs.
The bulls look determined to push the market to new highs this week and Dow 11,000 would be a nice start by the closing bell. We also released a new trade today and have another one lined up right now.
]]>