Market Insights
Opportunity knocks for those with trading in their DNA.
Curiosity creates opportunity. Insights create strategy. Born traders create their destiny.
Stocks
Options
Futures

Stocks Keep Climbing as Chips Falter and ‘Everything Else’ Advances
by David Russell | Oct 21, 2024
Chipmakers have led the market all year, but they could be losing their edge as investors position for new conditions into yearend. The Philadelphia Semiconductor Index ($SOX) dominated price action in the first half and remained the top performer through the end of...
Tesla Is Headed for Its Worst Month Ever As Elon Musk Veers Into the Twitterverse
by David Russell | Nov 22, 2022
Tesla is headed for its worst month ever as Elon Musk focuses on Twitter and China continues pandemic lockdowns. The electric-vehicle giant is down 26 percent in November through Monday's close. The only other month with a similar decline, according to TradeStation...
Stock Investors Could Gain Optimism as Fed Officials Eye Smaller Hikes
by David Russell | Nov 21, 2022
Conditions may be improving in the stock market as investors prepare for a busy week before the homestretch of the year. The S&P 500 slid 0.7 percent between Friday, November 11, and Friday, November 18. The index held its ground following a rally of almost 6...
Positive Inflation News Propels the Nasdaq Higher: Finally a Turn?
by David Russell | Nov 14, 2022
Stocks jumped last week on signs inflation may finally be coming under control. The S&P 500 rose 5.9 percent between Friday, November 4, and Friday November 11. It was the biggest weekly gain since June, with 95 percent of the index's members advancing. The...
Art of TradeStation: Go Deeper With Market Breadth
by David Russell | Nov 14, 2022
Market breadth analyzes the strength of the overall market by showing how stocks are performing in aggregate. It's a kind of technical analysis that looks deeper than the simple price performance of market-cap weighted major indexes like the S&P 500 and...
Chart of the Day: Does the S&P 500 Have Lessons From History?
by David Russell | Nov 11, 2022
Yesterday's CPI report was a reminder that, despite how it feels, the inflation crisis might not last forever. This raises the question of how to think about the Federal Reserve, and makes us look back to previous moments in history. The most relevant precedent could...
Layoffs Increase, Potentially Welcome News for the Federal Reserve
by David Russell | Nov 10, 2022
Layoffs are a new trending theme, which is potentially welcome news for the Federal Reserve. The Google Trends chart below shows interest in the term "layoff" tripling since the beginning of October. It's now back to its highest level since May 2020 near the start of...
Top Stocks for Options Trading
Technology & Communication

Options Alert: Bearish Traders Could Be Sticking With Western Digital
by David Russell | Oct 7, 2022
Western Digital tried to bounce after a big drop, but the bears don't seem to be going away. Check out this unusual options activity in the maker of data-storage products: A block of 7,500 October 36 puts was sold for $2.05.A trader bought an equal number of October...

These Were the Top Symbols on TradeStation in May as the Nasdaq Surged
by David Russell | May 29, 2020
The Nasdaq-100 rallied in May, and TradeStation clients played the move with several stocks and exchange-traded funds. Seven of the 10 most popular symbols on our platforms this month traded on the Nasdaq Stock Exchange or tracked its index. Some were new to the list....

E-Commerce and the Cloud Have Taken Over the World: Earnings Season Recap
by David Russell | May 21, 2020
Earnings season is pretty much finished, and the main story wasn't Covid-19. Instead, it was the complete dominance of e-commerce and cloud computing. Megacap Internet companies like Amazon.com (AMZN), Facebook (FB) and Alphabet (GOOGL) climbed on strong results. They...

Tech Keeps Beating Estimates as Lockdown Drives Growth: Earnings This Week
by David Russell | May 14, 2020
Technology stocks continue to lead a small group of companies doing well amid the coronavirus lockdown. Cisco Systems (CSCO), Square (SQ), Logitech (LOGI) and Datadog (DDOG) all reported strong quarterly results over the last week. Several are direct beneficiaries of...

Worried About a Pullback? Here Are Three Go-To Options Strategies
by David Russell | May 13, 2020
Sentiment has turned more negative this week as investors worry the economy will keep struggling with coronavirus. Let's consider some ways to protect your investments with options. Managing Risk with Collars The first strategy is known as a collar. Say you purchased...