Leaders Index 7-21-14

The markets opened slightly lower today and were down all day. The major averages tried to rally and almost got back to even but then sold off into the close. The SPY was lower by .23% and the COMPQ was down .17%. Small caps again put in the worst performance with the RUT down by .43%. All the major averages closed in the upper half of their intraday ranges. Volume was lower across the board so there was no distribution on the New York averages. Leading stocks did better than the overall market with the leaders index rallying a modest .22%. Volume was also lower than Friday, indicating a lack of conviction on the part of institutional players. The index remains above it’s important short term moving averages. Both the major averages and the leading stocks remain in a volatile consolidation that has been in effect for a couple of weeks. We will not have a real sense of which way the market is going until it breaks out of this consolidation in one direction of the other. Jerry