The Nasdaq (QQQ) has been lagging for the entire year and that's simply because of the higher P/E's associated with those four letter stocks. In a declining global environment within a forced fed bull market the majority of the big money doesn't want to get caught in a bad Nasdaq earnings report and get slaughtered so that big money plays it safe and goes to the lower P/E, higher dividend world. The result is under performance in the Nasdaq and out performance in the S&P 500 (SPY) and Dow (DIA).

The Nasdaq got hit by a threesome of bad reports last week. GOOGL, SBUX ( and MSFT. All three hit hard and that trio, which is very heavily weighted, took the QQQ's down very hard although there was the usual strong move off the lows as the day wore on. The bull market very much in tact with zero signs of topping out although there was some technical damage on the Nasdaq. I'm sure it'll heal up just fine in the days and weeks ahead as the Sp tries to break out over 2134. The damage done to the leaders such as Msft, Sbux and Googl will take time to heal up. Could take many, many weeks so you'll need patience in that part of the stock market world but that doesn't mean there aren't a tremendous number of great set ups out there that can work their way higher some of which we've been playing.            

The market is very healthy but many will see things are bad now because a few stocks got hit hard and didn't really come back all that much. There were plenty of good earners that flew up so it's not all bad although the earnings season overall has been pretty bad. That said, we all know that doesn't matter any more for the stock market. The only thing that matters is the fed and she'll be sure to try and keep the market up through the elections. The bull should last until they're over. So last week was bullish since most of the areas of the market performed well while the big laggard known as the Nas followed the usual script. Nasdaq is down for the year while all else is doing just fine. Check under the hood by studying the advance/decline line which was nearly 2-1 positive across the board.               

My big concern is the ever growing world of froth and complacency. When the Nasdaq was at the lows, down over seventy points, the VIX was red. No fear anywhere to be found. Complacency is jumping big time and that's never a good thing for soon it'll get to a point where things will snap as they did last time when we fell between 14-22% depending on the index. We're not there yet but we're probably approaching the 30% spread and once there things usually ramp even faster so now I have that concern to deal with on top of the negative divergences that are everywhere on all the index charts. Daily and monthly charts are nasty. I know they may never matter but I still concern myself with these things as they remind ME NEVER to get complacent. Once I do I've joined the herd and even though that may be the prudent thing to do it's just not something I'm comfortable with. I always want to be against the herd even if I join their party just a little bit. I'll never jump in completely even if it's to my detriment. Have to play things appropriately even that appropriateness isn't working any more. So now I'll focus on those two normally bad things for the market bulls. Complacency and negative divergences. Of course I'll have longs as well but I will do so gently.