U.S. stock index futures were falling slightly Monday morning, following a Friday session that saw the major indices all climb over 1%.
U.S. markets rose for the fourth straight week last week, with the S&P 500 climbing 1.1% to close above 2,000. The Dow Jones Industrial average added 1.2% and the Nasdaq rallied 0.7% in the week.
Rising crude prices helped lift the market as the oil rig count in the U.S. fell to its lowest total since at least 1949, according to a Baker Hughes report released Friday. Crude prices have bounced back significantly from a $26 barrel low set in February as global production of the commodity has fallen even as inventories continue to increase.
Gas prices will be on the mind of primary voters this week as candidates make their way to the polls in some of the biggest states in the country on Tuesday.
The Presidential candidates will turn their attention to the Ohio, Florida, Illinois, North Carolina and Missouri primaries on Tuesday. This follows a wild weekend that saw Donald Trump's rally in Chicago end in a near riot on Friday. The Republican front-runner was then attacked at his rally in Ohio on Saturday. The Secret Service was able to stop the attacker before he reached Trump.
Looking to the week ahead, analysts will be watching the release of the February retail sales numbers on Tuesday. Wednesday sees the release of the consumer price index, the latest housing starts numbers, the weekly Energy Information Administration petroleum status report and the quarterly Federal Reserve chair press conference.
Jim Cramer told his Mad Money viewers on Friday that he will be watching the earnings of TravelCenters of America (TA) on Monday. Tuesday we will be watching Valeant Pharmaceuticals (VRX) and Children's Place (PLCE), Oracle (ORCL) and CBS (CBS). FedEx (FDX), Williams-Sonoma (WSM) and Expedia (EXPE) will be on our radar Wednesday, while Adobe (ADBE) and Tiffany (TIF) close the week out on Thursday and Friday respectively.
Finally, Barron's cover story this weekend postulated that value investing is making a comeback, putting growth stocks like Action Alerts PLUS holding Facebook (FB) and Netflix (NFLX) on notice.
"In recent months, however, the market's leadership has begun to change, as growth stocks have grown too rich for investors' liking, and value stocks too cheap to ignore. The value stocks in the large-cap Russell 1000 are down just 0.4% this year, while the growth stocks in the index are off 2.2%. Three of the four FANGs are in the red. Amazon (AMZN) has fallen 15% after gaining 90% last year. Only Facebook is up. Among small-caps, value has a seven-percentage-point lead over growth names," wrote contributor Andrew Barry.
