Stocks Extend Gains Before Trump Speech; ATI, TJX, Viking Holdings In Focus

0:00Today we helped a latte for Sam coffee shop get an insurance quote simply and easily and made sure a floral delivery van was able to make someone's day. We're the Hartford with decades of experience insuring millions of unique small businesses. When it comes to your small business insurance. Thank you. One size absolutely does not fit all. Get a quote or find an agent today at the Hartford dot com slash small business.

0:40Good afternoon, everyone, and welcome to Stock Market. Today it is Wednesday, April 1st, April Fool's Day. My name is Ken Shreve, and today I'm joined by our news editor, Ed Carson. Another up day for the stock market, a strong day for the NASDAQ composite. Ed has got three stocks to watch as usual. Good afternoon, Ed. Good afternoon. I'd like to take a look at ATI, TJX, and Viking Holdings. All right. Well, we'll take a look at those stocks in just a moment. Let's go ahead and take a look at the market here. And we'll start by taking a look at the NASDAQ composite. Closed near its lows for the day here.

1:26Let's take a look here. And it closed with a gain of almost 1.2%. Second day of a rally attempt for the NASDAQ composite, S &P 500. Let's take a look at S &P 500. That also closed off highs. That ended with a gain of 0.7%. Dow Jones Industrial Average off highs as well. That was up 0.6%. You can see the Dow came up to its 200-day moving average and also closed off highs, met with a little bit of resistance. And the Russell 2000 Small Cap Index, that also closed near its low for the day, up 0.7%. But let's go back to the NASDAQ composite. Ed did have some economic data before the open ADP private payrolls, better than expected.

2:27Decent reading on retail sales as well. Market's going to be closed Friday for Good Friday. We're going to get that jobs report still Friday morning. I'm not sure how many people are going to be around to see it. We've got President Trump speaking tonight about the Iran war. But let's talk about the day's action, day two of a rally attempt, seeing a lot of good action in growth stocks underneath the surface, but still too early to say we're out of the woods here, right? Yeah, and I was writing up an article for overnight, and I just listed 19 stocks that were either flashing buy signals or setting up, and by no means was that exhaustive.

3:05That was just me just sort of like almost picking things out of a hat. Yeah. So the growth stocks, the stocks are there. I mean, when we look at the market, we look at the indexes and leading stocks. Leading stocks are promising. But how many times have we gone up one or two days and then rolled over? Now, this bounce looks stronger, but that's also because the sell-off was intensifying. So even if you strip out all the news about the Iran war, have we really done anything differently this last couple of days that we haven't done like 10 times? I mean, you know, over the last couple of months, over five, six, seven months.

3:41So that's just a limit of caution. I think if people wanted to take pilot buys because there were some buy signals, I totally get that. Just know that you might have to step out. President Trump has signaled maybe we're winding down the war, you know, so his speech tonight will be important. Will he reinforce that or will he take another act? I mean, in some way, because he has changed his opinions on how things will go. So it's just something to note. It's encouraging, but this is why we wait for a follow-through day, which really probably wouldn't come until at least Monday. This is when you build your watch list.

4:17This is when you get things ready, prepared. It's like, okay, get ready to get back in, but still show some patience. I want you to talk a little bit about this concept of overhead supply, too, where you have the NASDAQ that has come in pretty hard. I mean, that high back in January hit that high near 24 ,000. You see the Nasdaq still below the 200-day moving average, which is this dark line right here. Still below the 50-day moving average, this red line right here. And then this sharp, sharp pullback. So as the NASDAQ starts to climb its way back, it's going to run into potential selling pressure and resistance levels.

5:05And sometimes that can be a long way back for a stock or an index. And that concept is kind of known as overhead supply, right? Yeah. I mean, certainly from 22 ,000, 24 ,000, there's a lot of people who, if you were trying to guess the bottom or buying on strength anywhere along this way, you might be saying, I'm finally going to get a chance to get out. I mean, that's what can happen. So, yeah, it's just something that could be there. Now, maybe we bounce and then just hit a resistance at the 200-day line or the 50-day line and pause for a little bit and then we move on. You just don't know. Sometimes you get up to those levels and then you fall back.

5:43Obviously, it's a news-driven market. But even if you took out the Iran war, it's not like we were having this rip-roaring uptrend. I mean, what if we go back up to, say,$23 ,000 and then we go back into CHOP? I don't know. I mean, we could do that. I mean, that would be – so you just have to – you know, this is why you just – I mean, we can go this. You can game out scenarios. And it's important to look at, well, what might happen. But ultimately, you have to watch what is the market doing? What are the individual stocks doing? something, but don't know if it's meaningful yet. Any ideas on what specifically President Trump might be talking about?

6:19Obviously, he's going to be updating people on the Iran war and United Arab Emirates this morning, saying that they support the U.S. sort of reopening the Strait of Hormuz. You think he's He's going to be talking more about the importance of sort of an international coalition, you know, banding together to help the U.S. opening the strait. He's not given up on that yet. Yeah, I think that's one of the big issues is that will he signal that we're back in a way and the U.S. isn't going to be involved and we're going to leave it to other countries? Or is it going to be, you know, we may get a coalition of countries that might try to force Iran to open up.

7:03I mean, those are two very different scenarios, both in the short term and the long run. So, yeah, I think, you know, we're looking for straight talk, as it were, from Trump. I mean, what that to me is the biggest issue, because if he wants to stop bombing around, he can do that anytime. The question is, what's the situation with the Strait of Hormuz? What is he willing to accept or not accept? You know, and that seems like it. But again, you don't need to know all that. All you need to know is ultimately what the market is doing. And market's bouncing here, but still has a lot of work to do. Certainly some optimism, hopefully, that there's going to be a resolution sooner rather than later.

7:43But obviously, still a lot of uncertainty. Semiconductor stocks have bounced back with the market. Certainly a great day for the chip stocks yesterday. They did rally back today. SMH getting close to a rendezvous with its 50-day moving average. Chip equipment stocks rallying with the data storage stocks. So definitely seeing strength in the semiconductors and the biotech stocks yesterday. IBB, good move yesterday, but IBB getting some resistance today at that 50-day moving average. XBI, another biotech ETF, that two, nice gap above the 50-day moving average. That actually tried to break out today, closed near its low as well.

8:41Any other particular ETFs that moved today that you wanted to take a look at? Those were two noteworthy ones. Those are the two biggest. And I do think that if you do start thinking about pilot positions, especially in the chip space and the biotech space, these are areas where ETFs may make a lot of sense. I mean, there are some names that are doing things, but a lot of them are out of position. Either they're trying to come back after a big sell-offs or maybe they're extended or it's a little messy. you might say, well, maybe if the SMH can get clearly above its 50-day line, assuming we get a momentum, maybe that's a better way to play or a safer way to play than individual names.

9:16And the same with biotechs, a lot of them moving around. Both of them, you know, XBI, despite today's action, still that RS line is really strong. But again, even there where you say, oh, this is safer, but it still has these big swings. It can often have big swings on a day-to-day basis. So, yeah, those are the two that I wanted to look at. Very good. Very good. All right. Well, lots of lots of growth stocks to look at. Again, yesterday, first day of the rally attempt for the market. And today on day two, lots of lots of growth stocks moving well underneath the surface. And again, it doesn't mean that this market is ready to move higher, but at least when you're in position to get a follow-through day, you want to see stocks around that are at least in position to lead the market.

10:08And at least in that end, there are stocks out there that are setting up and looking good. So let's check it out. Membership means more with American Express Business Gold. Earn four times membership rewards points in your top two eligible spending categories every month, including eligible U.S. advertising purchases and select media and U.S. purchases at restaurants, including takeout and delivery. What are you waiting for? Get the card that flexes with your spending every month. Terms and points cap apply. Learn more at AmericanExpress.com slash business dash gold. MX Business Gold Card, built for business by American Express.

10:44Take a look at a few of them in the Aerospace and Defense Group. Let's take a look at a little-known name called ATI, ticker symbol ATI. And let me go ahead and delete some of my annotations from IBD Live this morning. Well, I like that one. That one I like. Oh, yeah. Let's keep that trend line there. Yeah. So, I mean, you know, this broke the trend line. It's bouncing off the 50-day line in a good market. I mean, I think we'd be definitely saying, definitely, this was a buy signal. Yeah, it's not great how it came off highs, but I mean, that's a reflection of the market. There you go. But I think for there, or maybe a little bit stronger, get above those short-term highs from a couple weeks ago, definitely could be buying it here.

11:29I understand if somebody wanted to take a pilot position here. I mean, that's fine. Just know that if the market sells off, you can see how that RS line didn't really fall too much in the last month, but the stock did. I mean, so if the stock market falls down 10 % from here, and this only falls 7%, 8%, you're still down 7%, 8%. I mean, it's isn't, you know, but this one has shown pretty strong growth. So that's, you know, just positive here. I like the ants that it had before. Often when you see those ants, those black marks showing the high volume gains that we've had on the way up, that's often a sign that things are topping, but you want to look for that next base.

12:07Well, that next base is forming. So again, this is a strong group. There's definitely some winners and losers, but this has definitely been one of the winners in that space. So I think this is one and a group that people should really be looking at. Yeah, aerospace and defense stocks continue to do pretty well here. 197 groups in our database, and aerospace and defense still ranks 33rd out of 197. That just tells you there are a lot of stocks in this group that are still showing a lot of relative strength. That's a look at ATI. All right, let's move on. We've got a good cross-section of stocks here.

12:52Let's take a look at a retailer that has been really a long-time leader in the retail sector. That is going to be TJX Companies. This is the parent company of TJ Maxx and some other retailers as well. This is a nice-looking setup here. Talk about a stock near all-time highs, and you've got the relative strength line with a blue dot here. Yeah, that shows that it's at a new high while the stock is in a base or breaking out. Still in a base. It's only a 6 % deep base. So today, I think it was actionable from clearing sort of the short-term highs. And it's still really close to the 50-day line because, again, it's such a shallow base.

13:38And those short-term highs, 160, was essentially where the prior buy point was. So, I mean, not that that's that much, but this is really pretty much there. So I think people could have done something today. The growth had picked up in the last quarter. I think the last quarter of EPS on revenue growth was the best in several quarters. So some strength there. I mean, again, this isn't a world beater in terms of earnings and especially sales growth lately. So this one may not be a powerhouse if and when we get a risk on market rally. But as you can see, it's continued to do well. It's not like this sold off.

14:10This isn't like some of the energy names that are coming off. This one can still do well. And maybe actually, if you could just show for a moment, take a look at Ross Stores and Burlington. Those are its peers. In some ways, you could argue those are even better. I mean, I was sort of telling which ones to do. Ross doors, it was a short consolidation, but that one's been even stronger RS line. So clearing, you know, and then Burlington, that one was flirting with a breakout as well today. So again, while this space, the technical group is 68 or 197, but its direct peers are doing very well in this sort of, it's a, we have a growing economy, but it's a little bit challenging.

14:50And that's a good environment for defensive growth named off price. people want to spend, but they'd like to save a few bucks. I mean, these are some names that I think that seem likely to just do well in almost any environment. Off-price retailers, and I don't think people realize, just looking at a monthly chart for TJX, I mean, this has been really a monster. It's been a monster, monster stock. You know, I mean, this thing has been a really, really really you know strong performer for for for quite quite some time as has ross ross stores as well tjx also parent company of home home goods i believe and i want to say marshall's marshall's as well so that's a look at tjx in the retail space and then a name that has been in the leaderboard model portfolio in the past and actually a name that we put back on the watch list today because we like the price action.

15:56This one's been doing well. Hey, as oil prices at least try to head lower. I mean, oil is still stubbornly high, but the oil prices have been heading a little bit lower. Viking, a nice move above the 50-day moving average today. Yeah, this has been the leader in the cruise area. I mean, rivers versus oceans for whatever reason and more affluent customers. So honestly, they can probably pass on prices easier than, say, Carnival. I mean, just not that. That's just my assumption. In some ways, this is a lot like TGX. It's not as close to the breakout, as it were, as TGX, but it's clearing short-term highs.

16:30And now it's, again, it's above the prior base's buy point. So it's just a couple of little things. It's close to the 50-day line in a strong market. I think people could have bought this. It's not showing up as a base yet. It might after today, in which case it probably would have been a blue dot. It looks like that or that RS line is so close. Maybe even on a weekly, it would be there. But, you know, again, it's not it's not a base yet there, at least not on a daily. But there's something that's going on. This is just showing, you know, this is sort of a leisure consumer spending, affluent, doing well.

17:06And yeah, so it just ticks off a lot of boxes. That RS line has been a pretty steady grower ever since it came public. It's definitely one of the leaders in the travel space. You can certainly imagine if the Iran war recedes, that travel will pick up in general. And this just seems likely to be one of those winners. You can see how it's already up 11 percent this week. So, you know, it's just a nice action. Again, pilot buy, you could have done it today. Again, don't want to be too aggressive. You should be fairly mostly in cash. If you're entirely in cash, that's OK. That's OK. but you definitely want to be looking at these names.

17:42Lots of cruise line operators to choose from, Royal Caribbean, Norwegian. We like to focus on Viking because it's a new issue. I mean, it came public in 2024, still in the early stages of growth here. I think I read they're taking delivery of something like 10 new boats this year. like you said a special specialty in the riverboat cruise area so yeah pretty good pretty good company here so we'll look forward to getting this one back on the leaders list we're going to wait for it to set up in a in a base here and yeah leaderboard model portfolio 15 percent invested headed into yesterday and i think we've we increased exposure up to about 20 percent so We realize that the market is still in a correction here and, you know, encouraged by two days of strong gains.

18:39But we're waiting, just being patient and just waiting for the market to prove itself here. So it has been difficult seeing a lot of good movement and seeing a lot of stocks, frankly, giving buy signals. But we're just trying to stick to our discipline and waiting for that follow-through day. And we'll listen to what President Trump has to say tonight at 6 p.m. Pacific time. And we'll go from there. But, Ed, appreciate your insight as usual. Thank you very much. Thank you, Ken. All right. Take care. That's going to do it for today. And just a reminder that Rachel Fox is going to be in the host chair tomorrow for IBD Live.

19:25and be sure to join us. If you haven't checked out IBD Live yet, you can go to investors.com forward slash IBD Live to check out a trial for two weeks. That's going to do it for today's show. I think Allie is going to be back tomorrow and I will be here with Allie for another Stock Market Today video. So thanks very much for joining us today. We'll see you back here tomorrow. Have a great rest of the day, everyone. Take care. Bye-bye.

20:24Stitch Fix makes shopping easy. Just show your size, style, and budget. And your stylist sends personalized looks right to your door. No subscription required, plus free shipping and returns. Man, that was easy. That was good. Stitch Fix, online personal styling for everyone. Take your style quiz today at stitchfix.com.