Three Titans Mask Broader Weakness; Apple, Rocket Lab, ELF Beauty In Focus

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0:40Good afternoon, everyone, and welcome to Stock Market Today. It is Wednesday, September 3rd, 2025. My name is Ken Shreve. On today's show, we'll talk about a nice close for the major stock indexes. Some buyers come in during the final 30 minutes of trading to help me talk about that. I want to bring in our news editor, Ed Carson, who has got three stocks to watch. What are you looking at today, Ed? Yeah, I want to take a look at Apple, Rocket Lab, and Elf Beauty. Apple had a good day. Rocket Lab, not such a good day. Elf Beauty also outperformed. But we'll let's go ahead and take a look here at the major stock indexes.

1:24And we'll start with the S &P 500. That actually ended with a gain of about a half a percent. The big movement today was in the NASDAQ composite, which closed near its high, ended with a gain of around one percent. small caps and blue chips lagged, Dow, DIA here, just down fractionally along with IWM. So, Ed, NASDAQ, pretty good close. Like I said, some buyers came in during the final few minutes here, and we get a nice 1 % gain, and the NASDAQ is kind of moved back above its moving averages here. Yeah, the NASDAQ itself, I mean, a lot of that's to do with Google, Apple, and a little bit Tesla.

2:14So there was some underlying weakness. But yes, it's nice to see this back above the 21-day line after testing the 50-day almost yesterday. You could sort of argue that the NASDAQ is just – well, I don't argue. The NASDAQ is in a range for the past few weeks. And on the one hand, that means that that's after – it deserves a break and you're seeing a lot of stocks set up. The downside is that when you get into these kind of markets, you'll see stocks flash buy signals and then give them up as the market goes up and down. So it just makes it a little tricky to buy. But at the same time, you never know.

2:49Is this the moment that the market's going to take off? You don't want to wait until the market's blown past it. So it just makes it a little tricky, these sideways markets. Enough stuff is going on to tempt you, but hard to follow through. Yeah, well, taking a look at the Qs, they rose pretty much in line with the Nasdaq composite, It maybe lagged just a little bit, but the Q's up eight-tenths of a percent. But the breadth on the NASDAQ, you mentioned that it was a pretty narrow rally. We had, you know, Google had a big day, Apple, which we'll go over in a second, and Tesla outperformed. But you see QQEW, which is that equal-weighted ETF that we like to look at.

3:29So on a day where the NASDAQ 100 was up about eight-tenths of a percent, the QQEW was actually down 0.2 percent. That's sort of indicative of some weakness and just kind of waning breadth below the surface. Yeah, it's just something to note. It wouldn't take that much to look strong again. But, you know, that's one thing with a sideways market. You don't know how it's going to resolve itself. And right now we're just sort of sideways. All right. Well, take a look at the S &P 500, kind of in a similar situation to the NASDAQ. It crept above its 10-day moving average here. breadth was actually a little bit positive on the NYSE.

4:10So it was really the NASDAQ where we saw breadth a little bit weak. And then the Dow Jones industrial average lagged a little bit today, but still holding at its 21-day moving average. And at one point, this index was lagging pretty good with the Russell 2000, but the Dow has picked up the performance at least a little bit back near all-time highs here. Yeah, I mean, I think we also have to remember that there's a lot of big techs in the Dow now. I mean, NVIDIA hasn't done well late, you know, but, and that was a negative, but today is that it was hitting resistance. But, you know, there's Apple, there's Microsoft.

4:50So there's names in there that help it in there. But Amazon, and there's been a lot of others. And if there seems to, there have been tentative hints at a rotation or maybe a broadening out. And so you're seeing the Russell and the Dow maybe reflecting that a little bit. So there's a lot of things that are positive in this market, a few things that are negative, and you just sort of have to wait to see how the market's going to really resolve itself when it's clearly strong or clearly weak. Yeah, yeah. And then IWM, which has turned into a pretty, pretty strong performer. IWM still holding right at its 10-day moving average here.

5:31Ed, I wanted to know, maybe you can provide a little color. Was it economic data that fueled this big drop in the 10-year treasury yield? It was up about five basis points, six basis points yesterday, but pretty sizable drop for that 10-year yield today. There was pretty weak job openings figure today from the JOLTS survey. So that may have had a factor, though. It seemed like yields were falling even before the 10 o 'clock Eastern drop. But still, it really sold off at that point. So I think that was it. But it's also it's sort of in a range as well. I mean, this is it's near four month lows.

6:05It's been hitting resistance at the 50 day line. So, you know, that those lower yields have been a positive probably, you know, for the market. But it's just sort of sort of holding in that area. Yeah, just kind of holding right above that 4.20 % level. We've been talking about the strength in growth stocks. And while it's been kind of a mixed bag, there were some growth stocks under pressure today. But the FFTY, which is sort of our proxy for the health of growth stocks, Innovator, IBD50 ETF, this one is still holding near highs and above its short-term moving averages. Yeah, and it's sort of been trading.

6:44I mean, there have been ups that hit a record high a couple of days ago. But really, again, you have to squint, but you can sort of like in the last few weeks, it's basically gone sideways. It hasn't been a nice, leisurely river cruise. But along the way, it hasn't really gone anywhere ultimately. Relative strength line up near high. So 50 still looking good and still seeing a lot of outperformance in gold stocks. GLD, the benchmark sort of gold ETF here. Nice breakout yesterday and a little bit of follow through today with volume. Yeah, obviously uncertainty is really carrying just a lot of demand.

7:22And the miners have took off long ago. So a lot of strength. I mean, gold is just really, really strong. And just the uncertainty and concerns about what's going to happen has really pushed people into gold. Gotcha. We got a big jobs report this Friday. any initial color on the jobs report in terms of what the market wants to see, what the market's expecting? I mean, we have seen some softening in the labor market. What are you expecting Friday? Yeah, I think the market is expecting and hopes for sort of weakish, modest, but continued job growth, something that will make sure the Fed will cut rates.

8:02They certainly don't want the economy to go under. They want just enough to keep the Fed going, but not really to, have an impact there. And yeah, it'll be interesting to see if there's any revisions. Obviously, revisions took a lot of attention last time. Again, with all this policy uncertainty, and not many companies, people have to forget, not many companies actually respond to those initial surveys. And so when you're trying to guess 120 million payrolls, if you say 120.2, and it turns out it's 120.1, that seems like a big difference on job growth. But in terms of actual employment, it's remarkably close.

8:38So, but, you know, those revisions could be a big factor as well. Last month, when we got the jobs out, I believe it was May and June, right? That was revised sharply lower, which obviously spooked the market. So that'll be the next big economic report this Friday. All right, well, let's take a look at some... If your organization isn't managing its data with Everpure, then it's likely scattered all over the place. My lord, for three days have I ridden to bring thee warning. The records thy great AI machine requires are strewn across five kingdoms. Yeah, the Everpure data management platform unifies data so you can always find it.

9:21No messenger needed. No more running around. Get out of the data dark ages with Everpure, a new era in data management. Movers today, starting with Apple. We mentioned Apple. Definitely, the Dow has got plenty of tech flavor these days, Apple in that blue chip index. But this was a beneficiary of the Google news today. How so, Ed? Yeah, I think a lot of people expected that the federal judge overseeing the antitrust case was going to order an end to search deals like where Google pays Apple$20 billion a year, I think, is what the figure is, to be the default search provider. It's not an exclusive deal, but it's the default one.

10:05But that was left untouched. So that's just a big windfall. I mean, it's not going to change the numbers, but the fear was that they were going to lose that money. so that that's even for Apple$20 billion is a lot of money and so that cleared this buy point at 235.12 that is a legitimate handle it's a big consolidation a little bit like like the Dow and and the Russell you're seeing the red a little strength line turn up in the last few weeks certainly well below recent highs it's come down a lot but you're definitely seeing an improvement ramped up around earnings, kept on going so far. So this would have been an opportunity.

10:47And I think with something like a slow mover like Apple, if you're going to do it, you certainly don't want to wait too long because it's sort of like how fast can they run before needing to take another break? And this seemed like a buying opportunity here. This is a classic technical breakout. Volume picked up the pace, came in slightly above average, nicely higher from yesterday's level and that 235.12 buy point, you know, crystal clear. So we say a stock is in a buy zone so long as it stays within 5 % of the pivot. So Apple still well within that 5 % buy zone, gave a good buy signal today.

11:28Let's also take a look at Rocket Lab, RKLB. There were some sellers came into the stock today. I didn't see any particular news, but this was a fairly volatile drop for the stock today. Yeah, and you could have argued that when it moved today, it was sort of peaking above short-term highs or at least a trend line. So right at the highs, you could have enticed people in. Yeah, just a huge sell-off. And this is the kind of thing when you're in a choppy market, when it's volatile names. You know, it's one thing we have that huge tailwind, your mistakes can still work out kind of thing. But it's just this can happen with these high beta names.

12:11Now, could this turn around and surge 20 % tomorrow? Sure. I mean, that's the kind of this is the kind of stock it is if the market rallies. But, you know, this is formed a base. It's acted relatively well, so it could still work. But it's done this. And we've seen there's been a few fake outs on this name and a lot of other stocks. Let's be clear, there's a lot of stocks that have made what look like aggressive entries, early entries, and then turn around that day or the next day. But yeah, anybody who bought like near the highs that it's recently got, I think that was a pretty clear sell signal.

12:44Could it set up again? Well, yes, and you could buy it again. But this was really negative, especially since the market, OK, maybe you could argue was just OK or a little mad today. It certainly wasn't a terrible market. But, you know, it was really this was really an ugly, ugly action. Yeah. I mean, you have to go back a long time to find a price bar that had this this big an intraday spread. You can see it's pretty, pretty volatile today. But, you know, just looking at the weekly chart for Rocket Lab, if we can somehow I know that the bulls here want to see a close well off lows by by the end of the day, Friday.

13:19Maybe it does that. Maybe it gets to the middle part of its weekly range. Or if it rallies on Thursday and Friday, maybe it gets up near the top of the weekly range here. That would look much better in terms of finding support at the 10-week line. Right now, it's just a little bit below it. And after that, sell-off today. All right, let's finish by talking about Elf Beauty. This is another name that has come back from, you know, a pretty sharp sell-off, but, you know, is acting very well here and kind of setting up, moving sideways and trying to break out here. Yeah, there is a buy point at 124.31.

14:01Technically, there's probably a handle that's maybe like, I think, 123.94. But either way, it's in the buy zone from that double bottom base. I guess you could argue, you know, so you could also use Friday's high, I suppose, as a sort of an alternate entry. It's not a handle, but something, it's like another thing there. Yeah, I mean, look, it's not going to probably, you know, given that it doesn't have that torrid triple digit growth in earnings and sales anymore. I mean, the earnings are supposed to turn around again later this year. Revenue growth is already picking up again. So there is signs of a turnaround.

14:33So it can definitely go on another run. But that massive run, presumably that's going to be tougher without that huge, huge earnings tailwind. But I saw something. There's maybe some speculation. Maybe Macy's, its earnings today, maybe contributed to Elf. Ulta Beauty, which sold off on Friday, really came back on Tuesday and, you know, bounced back. And some of the negative action in that base, I think, you know, there were some negative moves in the base. That was also related to some rivals or related firms. But yeah, so Alta, that was just crazy how much that went down and back up. Yeah, I mean, volatility.

15:14Volatility. Earnings sell off and then boom, right back above 500. Yeah, but Elf, you know, it looks pretty good. So again, I just don't want to make people think, oh boy, it's going to go for another 300 % run. But you can go on a strong run here. And I think some people made the argument that, well, and if the economy is a little tough, you know, women will often cut out some maybe more expensive things, but they'll still make sure that they, you know, buy their lipstick. I mean, it's a little bit like that, you know, just something that's a cheap way rather than, you know, more expensive, you know, beauty products or apparel.

15:47So, yeah. So, this is our stock of the day. You know, show decent action. Wasn't a lot of volume. That would be one thing. We haven't seen a lot of volume in the last few days, really in the last couple of weeks. So, you know, take that into account. Pretty healthy relative strength line. And again, looking at the weekly, Elf went through some very tough times. That was a nasty pullback off highs, but certainly plenty of accumulation as the stock started to rally off lows. And now it's holding on to the bulk of the gains. There was a pretty harsh distribution week right here. You can see volume picked up the pace when Elf fell sharply, closed in the bottom half of its range.

16:30It has been rallying back. It rallied back the next week in pretty decent volume, but kind of setting up in a new base here. So you mentioned it has the look of a turnaround. You can see a couple quarters in a row of single-digit top-line growth, but that is supposed to ramp up for overcoming the coming quarters. And so I think Elf is a good name to keep an eye on here. So, Ed, thanks very much for your insight. Appreciate it very much. All right. And that will do it for today. Thanks very much for tuning in. As usual, folks, we'll be back with another edition of IBD Live on Thursday. day. Rachel Fox will be in the host chair.

17:21And then Friday, we're welcoming back Scott Bennett from Invest With Rules. He does a lot of work tracking institutional money flow in the market. So he's a popular guest and we'll be excited to welcome him back on Friday. Investors.com forward slash IBD live for more information. That'll do it for today. Tomorrow, it's going to be Alexis Garcia and Ed Carson one more time. And then Justin and Mike Webster will conclude the week on Friday. So thanks very much for tuning in today. And we'll see you back here tomorrow. Take care, folks.

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