Morning Market Comment 1/22/07

Stock futures are pointing a bit higher this morning. Pfizer (PFE), part of one of the strong drug stock group of late, posted EPS a penny better than expected and revenue that was a tad stronger than expected. The Pfizer earnigns comes ahead of news from the company on restructuring plans which could include over 10 thousand job cuts and plant closings. Pfizer shares are up only 8-cents pre market, but at least it was able to beat street estimates and perhaps the news bodes well from other big name drug companies like J and J (JNJ) and BMS (BMY) which will be posting earnings later in the week.

With the Nasdaq/QQQQ able to withstand a test of the 50 dma on Friday and with the SPX bouncing back to 1430 again and with the VIX well below 11 and the VXO in free fall on Friday, it's back to the range bound fun and games once again featuring an attempt by the bulls to push the market higher at least this morning. A close above 1432 is still what I'm looking for to bring on some bullish feelings. As noted yesterday, Texas Instruments posts tonight. We already know top and bottom line will be at the low end from their December guidance, but their outlook will certainly give additional sense of demand in the world o' tech.

Natural gas is still up about 4-1/2 percent as weather conditions are similar to what we once called 'winter'. Sure, supplies of nat gas are 33% above normal for this time of year, but traders feel the cold, look at the forecasts, etc and it's only natural that the price gets pushed up. DT over at WXRISK.COM is even talking SECS again http://dtwxrisk.blogspot.com/ (for the definition of SECS go to DT's blog). In sympathy, crude oil got to as high as $54 basis March, but has pulled back to being unchanged. There's certainly crude over supply as well, but these markets are subject to the psychological effects of weather forecasts which is what makes trading them so much fun; it's also why I prefer to remain nimble with crude oil futures as opposed to the use of options on energy futures (I like to sleep at night).

Gold and silver showing weakness to the tune of a quarter percent. I sold my long gold futures position last night to lock in a profit of about $5/oz from Friday's rally.

EuroFX down 29 points, but pretty much stuck right near $1.3000.