Year-end rally: Right on schedule?
Thanks to last week’s follow-through rally in all of the major indices – including an impressive move up in the NASDAQ – the market’s overall trend picture is now positive. With technology stocks once again in sync on the upside, it seems likely that – barring a move on the S&P500 back below 1190 or so – the widely predicted “year-end rally” may be underway.
With this in mind, I’m moving up many of my downside put-selling targets on many of the stocks on my watchlists. Most have rallied with the market, and I’ll be looking for opportunities on any pullbacks here to sell some puts.
For example, some stocks I’ll be watching especially closely for further pullbacks include 3M (MMM), Automatic Data Processing (ADP), General Mills (GIS), Merck (MRK), and Molson Coors Brewing (TAP), with downside put-selling targets of 72-73, ~45, ~46, ~28, and ~62, respectively. Among stocks that haven’t rallied, but that are attracting my interest as they move lower, are many of the healthcare stocks, including Health Management Associates (HMA), Triad Hospitals (TRI), and Universal Health Services (UHS), and some auto-related stocks, like General Motors (GM) and Lear (LEA).
