DJIM #17 2007

Last week was quite the interesting week.  We go off to a fast start as our closely followed from the previous week struck new big highs come Monday..TSL $68.9, JSDA $32.6, UXG $7.17, JASO $28.30.  What followed was our noted exit before the downdraft began for these plays, which included a few D-grades of note we alerted to Tuesday premkt.  In regards to D-grades, we've said many times we prefer to move on when we see these hit the wires.  Yes..even if your stock wasn't D-graded but is in the same sector, you can expect a sell-off as well.  Especially after a big momo run.  Coincidently, what followed was a few days of boring action in the small caps as the larger caps moved forward.  This action, this divergence started getting many out there saying the market was hanging by a 'thread' or was 'troubling', as the broader market was not playing along.  To us, this isn't some conspiracy that the market is going to implode....it was just boring as we all probably had a rush going into the week off the momentum runners that ran into Mondays action.  Luckily, we had AVNR for a few days to keep us sane ..or is it insane if we're playing these?.  By end of day Friday, we had the large caps confirming the trend, we had the Nasdaq showing support and moving higher on bullish earnings all over the place.  Do we think the bearish mood on small caps seen mid-week will continue?....NO!....if the earning keep surprising!   It's just a matter of time before small-micro caps play along in the bullish trend.   See yesterday note with charts.  Also, S&P Equity research reasserted late last week that mid cap asset class is where investors should stay focused in '07 , going against the grain of Wall street by saying this class will out perform the large caps.   This week as seen in our earnings dates calendar, small caps earnings will start to flood the market and we will most likely concentrate on new names going forward or looking to recycle names off reports. A few small cap stocks came out with excellent earnings last week. These include...

SYNL, its Q1 profit increased to 56c, a fivefold increase yoy and sales climbed to 44.4mln. The report was also sequentially better which shows growth not only year over year, but Q after Q which we like to see.  We didn't feel SYNL was the type of stock to chase pre market, especially as it hit $37.  We simply thought we might get some selling early from those anticipating excellent earnings and holding through, we thought we could get it cheaper.  The stock never saw those premkt highs Friday.  The stock bounced off the recent high, filling the gap and we bought back a position.  Still under a million shares traded, but we definitely like the volume bar it put up Friday and think this could start to trade a little differently than it did in the past 6 months.

ATR, manufacturer of dispensing systems for personal care, cosmetics, food and beverage put out a nice report as well last week that we covered Thursday. A nice spike at the open to $77 before closing up at $75.12. 86 EPS/89 RS #'s.

DXPE, a combo of a favourable chart and the good ole pre-earnings walk up played a role in its 9% action Friday. We are trading this and will let loose our positions before earnings on the 24th.

Steels/speciality Alloy manufactures, we are still holding SCHN.  Other stocks in these groups of interest to trade are RS and TONS.  TONS is for the bungee jumping aficionados.  USAP and its steel-alloy group have a nice chart after a recent pullback.  If the group has a breakout, we'd look for USAP again.

Solars, volume has declined daily on almost of the players. The short squeeze, momo run is over for now.  We have no reason to test the calm waters.  We'll be there when the waters get infested again.       We are also away from the cheap mining plays here as we head into earnings for the smaller names.

Shipping stocks like DRYS have been doing well lately, ISH remains a play too look at.  Very small float here. RCCC, FCSX, ROS, MFW, GLDN, USAT, TNH , some names up there on the watch-trading list going into the week,  but we'd expect new earning names to take the thunder away from the more mature plays in the coming week or maybe a biotech feverish stock or two to be the big plays.