After a week of bouncing around the Colombian countryside and meeting with a couple private companies, I'm back at my trading turret and ready to work.
But before we talk stocks and the barrage of earnings reports that are about to flood our desks, I want to give Medellin and the Department of Antioquia a quick mention. I highly recommend it if you've never traveled to this part of the world.
We all know that for decades Colombia was not a place you'd want to visit, especially during the evening. But that has changed over the past handful of years. And while every city has its problem areas that are best avoided, I felt perfectly safe walking around Medellin throughout the day and evening.
Moving on to the stock market, earnings season kicks into high gear this week with Johnson & Johnson (JNJ) , Lockheed Martin (LMT) and D.R. Horton (DHI) reporting before the open here on Tuesday and Microsoft (MSFT) , Texas Instruments (TXN) and Intuitive Surgical (ISRG) reporting after the close.
Of the companies reporting today, I'm primarily interested in DHI, MSFT and TXN. After declining around 45% during the first six months of 2022, DHI has rebounded sharply and now sits at a mere 15% beneath its all-time closing high. Given how poorly some homebuilding supply companies continue to trade, I'm curious to hear what DHI has to say. While I neither have nor intend to establish a position in D.R. Horton today, I believe the risk to DHI is to the downside and I look for any gap toward $98.50-$100 to be quickly faded.
It seems like every analyst considers Microsoft to be best of breed, but let's face it, while we may be seeing a higher low in the making, the stock is in a downtrend and has rallied about 11% over the past two weeks. While I'm curious to see how traders respond to the report, regardless of whether the company beats or misses its estimates, the chart is not particularly bullish. I'm staying on the sidelines with this one.
We talk about how brutal the market was in 2022, but if you look at Texas Instruments, you'd never know it. The stock is about 13.5% from a new all-time closing high, and while it endured a few sharp swings over the past 12 months, it is stuck in consolidation more than anything else. Given that tech and momentum traders want to see semiconductors spring back to life and lead the Nasdaq higher, I'm anxious to see the numbers TXN throws up on the board. I don't plan to trade the stock, but if you want to play the range on TXN, look for buyers between $163 and $165 and sellers around $185.
(MSFT and LMT are holdings of Action Alerts PLUS. Want to be alerted before the portfolio buys or sells these stocks? Learn more now.)
