Stocks Tumble But Pare Losses; Viking Holdings, Google, MongoDB In Focus

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0:25Good afternoon, everyone, and welcome to Stock Market Today for Thursday, January 29th. It's Alexis Garcia here, and stocks tumbled in early trading action, but were able to pair losses at the close as investors digested the latest Fed meeting and a swath of earnings reports. And here with me to help break down everything you need to know about today's trading action, let's the swath of the IBD News editor, Mr. Ed Carson himself. Ed, what's on tap for us today? Yeah, I'd like to take a look at Viking Holdings, Google Parent Alphabet, and MongoDB. All right, we'll get to those stocks. But let's just quickly check in on the major indexes.

1:08The S &P finishing the day down three-tenths of a percent. The Dow looks like it might have turned positive here at the close, Ed, up fractionally. The Nasdaq down about seven-tenths of a point and small caps down about two-tenths of a point. So I'm going to go ahead and get our trusty market surge charts going here. But talk to me about today's action. Was it Microsoft that was weighing on the market? or it seems like tech was a little out of favor today. Well, it's different things. I mean, Microsoft and ServiceNow and SAP really slammed the software sector, which has been doing poorly anyway.

1:47And I think it's also just that also raised concerns. Well, where's the payoff for AI? I think that so that hit a lot of other stocks for a while. There's also fears that Trump might attack Iran, you know, and so that was weighing on certain things. You know, but yeah, some things did well. And then at the end of the day, the market really closed well because it appears that reports that President Trump and congressional Democrats might be close to some kind of deal to avoid a government shutdown on Saturday morning. Even if they can't avert it, I think the feeling is that it may be short term, that they'll find a way to do that.

2:26So all those things. But wow, pretty wild session. Did not look good to start. It did not look good to start at all. Yeah, we're looking at the S &P 500 chart here and we can see it. At one point it was below the 21 day, almost flirting with a 50 day line that came right back up. And, you know, pretty much flat compared to yesterday's close. Yeah, we saw some strong, strong performances. I mean, so all the indexes tested and undercut key levels. The S &P, the Dow and the Russell all undercut their 21-day lines intraday and they came back off. So, I mean, the Dow turning positive. I think the Russell ultimately is going to end right flat or fractionally higher.

3:10So that, you know, IWM is just fractionally higher. The NASDAQ looked the weakest. that was down all the way below its 50-day line. So it was like, sometimes we talk about an escalator up and an elevator down. And it was a nice escalator, but boy, it came right down and then, but came right back up again. So it was not a pleasant start. You know, there's other things. I think if you look at zero BUL, this measures, this is one of our psychological indicators and you can find it on investors.com. It's easier to see it on a weekly because this is a weekly reading. When the reading gets above 60 % bullishness, that's often when the market tops.

3:53And yeah, see, the bullishness quickly rolls over. And that's not because people, for no reason, become bearish. It's because the market sells off. You know, it doesn't have, the timing isn't perfect. And sometimes it can stay above 60 % for an extended period. But it is a sign of like, whoa, whoa, whoa. And it just gets you, oddly enough, when people are that confident, it actually makes the market really prone to sell-offs because it's like, oh, boy, we're all too bullish. So even if it's a one-off blip, I think that's where even though we had mixed news, that's one reason I think why the market had such a negative reaction to mixed news because meta was strong and there was some other stuff that was good out there.

4:34Yeah, maybe people just tapping the brakes here. Why don't we check in on RSP just to get a sense of market breadth here, Ed? Again, this up about a tenth of a percent here, pretty much in line with yesterday's close. But there's thoughts here on the names participating. Yeah, I mean, it was, you know, because tech was mixed. I mean, once you take out software, it wasn't so bad. And gold and silver was bad. But yeah, this was, you know, this was another positive day. I mean, RSP didn't even have that much of a move. And I think this is a day, and we'll look at some stocks. But you want to look on stocks.

5:13Are they holding up well on a bad market or a whipsaw day? Did they not fall too hard? Did they hold key levels? You know, and obviously the market coming back to help, but there were definitely names. Even RSV at the lows really wasn't down that much. Yeah, and I want to jump over to IGV. That's the tech software ETF. You've mentioned this a couple of times. Bad day today, down about 4.9%. It's just been any downtrend here for the better part of two months now. You know, we've been talking about, it seems like the sector not really in favor right now. So talk to me about the action here. Yeah, I mean, it's just there are plenty of signs there and we're going to look at one of the last holdouts in a little bit.

5:58And it didn't hold out anymore. And it's just sometimes it's just overwhelming. There's just concerns that maybe AI will take over software, either because software will be replaced or maybe more short-term. Maybe you need fewer workers. And so there's fewer licenses. I mean, just things like that. Yeah, just really hard hit. I mean, ServiceNow had good results. SAP had mixed results. It wasn't terrible. And they've already been selling off. I could have easily imagined that ServiceNow's results would have triggered a gain. But it didn't. It triggered a big sell-off. I mean, it's like, I mean, again, given the sell-off service now it already had, I could have easily imagined a relief rally.

6:37Aha, here we go. Better than expected results and guidance. It's like, didn't matter. It just didn't matter. Microsoft weighing on things. And basically everything came under pressure today. It wasn't just these names, they're big names, but everything in software seemed to take really big hits. What about chips? We've been looking on SMH. Chips faring much better, up about two-tenths of a percent. But we've just seen such a nice run here since breaking above kind of this 372, 375 level. Yeah, strong action. I mean, NVIDIA rose, a lot of names rose, memory plays. And we'll look at a couple of memory plays, which may not be in that ETF.

7:19But that was doing well. So, yeah, this was not the problem. that this was not the problem. I mean, the problem was in some of the mega caps, not all of them, and it was in software, but it really wasn't in chips so much. Let's take a look at gold, GLD, see if that was a problem child today, up about three-tenths of a percent, but again, a wild swing today, but closing in the upper part of this trading range. Yeah, there were some, you know, GDX, if you look at that, that's where like the miners are. Those took some hits, and SLV, which is, SOV is a silvery chef. And again, they came out, it was just really whipsaw action.

7:57I'm not sure all the things going on. It just seemed like people were selling it. They've gone parabolic and copper was up a lot, palladium, platinum. So there were some big sell-offs. But, you know, yeah, ultimately it may just be a blip or, you know, you certainly could have a pullback. I mean, these are so extended now, it wouldn't be surprising, but there's a weak dollar. There's a lot of concerns around the world. So there's a lot of still reasons to be bullish on metals right now. All right. How about we close this portion out by taking a look at ARKK? That's, again, tracking more of the speculative growthy names.

8:33This went down about 1.7 % today and below this 50-day line. Look, Tesla's the biggest holding here, but there's also it has crypto. This one doesn't have as much of the memory chip, you know, and some of the things that have really been working. I mean, it just hasn't. It's just out of favor. That's just the way it is. And it's just so like, this looked like it was coming back a couple of weeks ago, but not right now.

9:18at fidelity.com slash trader plus. Investing involves risk, including risk of loss. Fidelity Brokerage Services, LLC. Member NYSE SIPC. All right, well, let's go ahead and jump over to some of the individual stocks you mentioned, starting with Google, this finishing the day up about seven tenths of a percent in this buy zone. You know, we had this breakout, I think it was either back on January 8th, It looks like peaked above this 328.83 flat base by PointEd. So talk to me about the action. We had a little bit of a pullback, found support at the 21-day. But again, earnings next week. Yeah. So that's the thing.

10:01I mean, look, this is – but this has showed really nice action. Even at the lows, it wasn't down that much. And it, you know, rebounded off the 21-day line. You know, it closed positive. It's just acting really well. The RS line is at a new high on a weekly chart, I believe. If it weren't for earnings, I would definitely be saying this is actionable. I'd say now, just like it's heading in there. It is interesting. It sort of split the difference between Meta and Microsoft. Meta had terrible, Microsoft strong. So we'll see. I mean, you guys are like, oh, no, Google will be great. You don't know it'll be great.

10:36You don't. I mean, there were some strong-looking stocks that had terrible days today outside of software earnings, and others had huge gains. So, you know, there have definitely been some enormous moves in the last few days. So just be careful. For longer-term holders, not an issue, but this is what you like to see. It was nice action, definitely. So if you recently bought into the stock then with earnings around the corner, what decisions are you likely having to make right now? Well, if you bought it really recently, if you don't have a cushion of at least 5%, and maybe 10%, you know, you may want to sell or you could sell a portion.

11:14You could also say, you know what, I'm up 4 % or 5%. I'm going to sell half because I'm really not that much. Even if Google for some reason tumbles 10%, I'm still flat on it, you know, and I still have a position. And you could decide to buy back if it does well after earnings. I mean, there's a little bit of security there. There's a reason why you put on your seatbelt, a reason why you buy insurance. You know, it's like, it's not to absolutely maximize everything. It's to protect yourself as well. Well, you know, maxing is the big thing these days, Ed. Let's take a look at Viking Holdings. That's V-I-K.

11:47This is having a nice day up 6.7%. Looks like it's getting up to some recent highs here around the 74 level. Yeah. And if it can hold out for just one more day, and I don't know if it'll do it, it will have a flat base on a weekly chart, I believe. Or just barely. And it has a three weeks tight. So people could use that. I think today it was definitely actionable. It's bouncing off the 10-week line, and it bounced after clearing the 21-day line. It broke a downtrend. I think you could have bought this Thursday morning pretty early on. And obviously, the trigger here, and this is why you pay attention to earnings, is the trigger with RCL, Royal Caribbean.

12:33That one reported earnings. And so this one gapped up quite a bit. And, you know, this was potentially actionable as well. Maybe it forms a handle here, et cetera. But Viking has been the real leader. But this is why you look. Obviously, if RCL had tumbled, you know, given weak guidance, Viking might have fallen 5%. And all of a sudden, it would have looked pretty poor. But, yeah, this was actionable. It was added to swing trader and leaderboard today. really nice action today. All right. Well, how about we round out with a look at MongoDB, that's ticker MDB, in the software space, Ed, taking a 9 % hit today and falling well below the 50-day line.

13:09Yeah. This is, you know, it was actually showing resilience, you know, earlier this week, rebounding back, you know, last few days it had rebounded by the 50-day line, you know, so showing some strength really for software. And it just couldn't. It just couldn't today. You know, it's just like they come eventually for all of them. And maybe it'll bounce back. Maybe it'll say, no, no, it'll move on. You don't have those days. You just can't. I'll have those days. But, you know, you might be the best player on the team. But if your team loses, you're still a loser kind of thing is how it can be.

13:43And so that one, yes, you know, it's also interesting. Next week will be Amazon. It could be that Amazon's numbers because they're a partner with Amazon. so strong Amazon spending and other things could be bullish for this but this one looks damaged and it just was like well what's what's your reason for holding this you know why uh you know it showed real negative action today I mean I know it was there's it wasn't Mongo's fault but you know that's just it came for everything people were asking about various softwares why is this down why is this down the whole sector's down and uh you know this was really heavy volume today you know, so it's unfortunate.

14:23But that sector is, just seems like a no-go area for a while. So if you're in this one here at ClearSellSignal today? I think so. I think it's also given the whole sector. And again, if you bought it at the prior breakout, you're technically still up, you know? I mean, so you're not, you don't have to sell it, but given up a lot of the gain. This was like, you know, it went up about 100 points and now is up about 30 points from the buy point. So you've given up over half. At some point, you would have wanted to have at least taken some profit. You don't want to see, you know, that's a pretty substantial gain.

14:59And you've had chances to get out, you know, somewhat. So definitely should be substantially down on your position, cutting back the position. All right. Well, those were the three main stocks. We have a lot of earnings coming in. You know, we mentioned some computer storage names. Let's take a look at WDC. That's Western Digital. It looks like it's down fractionally here after hours, Ed. Any news on this one? We can also look at SanDisk as well. Western Digital beat views and guided higher, but obviously it's gone up so much. People are expecting things and we'll see how things go. But yeah, SanDisk, which Western Digital spun off last year, that one is still rising.

15:43That one crushed views. Up 12 % or almost 13 % after hours here. Yeah. So like, I guess they reported 620 a share and that was 266 above views. So, and I assume that their guidance was pretty strong too. So we'll see. But it's a really powerful move right now. Powerful. Very extended. Very extended. So. Very extended. Yeah. Oh yeah. These are way out there. I mean, Sandisk had already more than doubled in January. I mean, that's crazy gains. But it's still going on. There's a fundamental shift. The memory chip, memory sector is just enormously hot. KLA chip equipment is very strong, partly because there's tons of demand by memory chip makers for chip equipment.

16:29And Taiwan Semi and others. There's a lot of demand for it. So this has run up a lot. It's down. I don't know why because that one also beat views and guided higher. Maybe not massively, but I think it had a solid beat. And then Visa, that's been struggling, and that one was down after hours. I think that beat views, but I don't know what the guidance was like on that. Apple, I don't think that's out. We're a few minutes away from Apple coming out. That hasn't been doing great. It'll be interesting to see what they have to say. That's still obviously a huge, huge name out there, but that one is not reported yet.

17:05All right. We'll be keeping an eye on investors.com for all the Apple results there. Thanks so much, Ed, for your insights today. We really appreciate it.

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