an tSionna {04.11.12}

Here's where we stand based on yesterday's close.  Markets are currently up around 1% as I'm writing this.  In our Q&A {Part II} we thought markets had a vulnerability down to a level as represented in the green box in the chart above.  That equates roughly to 1320-1360 on the S&P 500.  I didn't think we would get there as quick as we did!  That move in such a short period of time has put a few things back to levels we find attractive albeit mostly for new money that clients have given us this year where therefore these clients are under invested.   Where we will end up over the next few weeks is any body's guess but we'll take our clues by how markets react to the broken trend line pictured in the chart above and how markets react to what is clearly defined resistance now at the market highs from last month.

To reflect what we have been doing recently for clients we will move our shortest term rating back to NET MARKET POSITIVE while leaving the intermediate term rating at NET MARKET NEUTRAL.  This again reflects that for the most part what we are investing today is new money.  These are accounts where we are under invested relative to our investment strategies and to the unique risk return aspects of these individual clients who have signed up with us in the past few months or clients who have given us new money in 2012.  The markets have given us little opportunity to put this money to work this year for these clients and we will use this pullback to our advantage to add some exposure to assets we think have reached attractive levels.  You can go here  for a definition of what these terms mean.

One final note.  I'm hoping to get back to the Q& A to finish up what I think could happen to the markets going forward this year tomorrow.  But the rest of the week is lining up to be somewhat hectic so the rest of this might get pushed forward to next week.

*Long ETFs related to the S&P 500 in client and personal accounts.