Hello traders everywhere! Jeremy Lutz here, with your mid-day market update for Friday, the 3rd of May.
U.S. Employers Add 165K Jobs
U.S. employers added 165,000 jobs in April, and hiring was much stronger in the previous two months than the government first estimated. The job increases helped reduce the unemployment rate from 7.6 percent to a four-year low of 7.5 percent.
The Labor Department report is seen as a reassuring sign that the U.S. job market is improving despite higher taxes and government spending cuts that took effect this year.
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The government revised up its estimate of job gains in February and March by a combined 114,000. It now says employers added 332,000 jobs in February and 138,000 in March. The economy has created an average of 208,000 jobs a month from November through April above the 138,000 added in the previous six months.
An additional 210,000 people started looking for work in April with many of them finding jobs.
Perfect Day For The 52-Week High Rule?
With the DOW, S&P 500 and NASDAQ hitting new all time highs today it may be a prefect time to find some stocks for our 52-week high rule. Here's a couple of stocks that I picked out using our Smart Scan technology.
Kraft Foods Group,Inc. - NASDAQ_KRFT
Gilead Sciences, Inc. - NASDAQ_GILD
American International Group, Inc. - NYSE_AIG
52 Week High Rules
Rule #1: On a new 52-week high, when the market closes at or close to its high on a Friday, buy and go home long for the weekend.
Rule #2: Exit long position on the opening the following Tuesday.
Rule #3: If the market opens lower on Monday, exit this position immediately.
The "The 52-week new highs on Friday rule" works extremely well in futures and in Forex.
There are no guarantees in trading, but you might want to watch this one on paper for a while to build up your confidence in this very simple trading rule.
Watch Today's Video Update Here
On Investor's Minds:
United States - homegrown terrorists
North Korea - an agent for China?
Europe - ITALY has a government. YEAH!
The FED - OMG do they know what they are doing?
May 19th – Debt ceiling suspension expire
Have a great weekend,
Jeremy Lutz