Opening Market Commentary For 04-18-2014

The US and European equities are closed for Good Friday, but the Nikkei index traded 0.68% higher today.

Investors remain wary of the recent market gains and further advances are suspect. Traders are happier as volatility enters the 'normal' trading day and next week should be exciting.

Enjoy your long weekend.

The bullish nature of the markets lately has been good, but will it last?

Stock Trading To Go

With markets closed for Good Friday, stocks finished off a very good week, retracting a decent portion of the losses we had seen in the previous few weeks.

The coast is still not clear thought for major risk taking - but we are seeing some rebounds in the hardest hit areas, specifically internet, biotech, and momentum stocks.

Today the S&P 500 gained 0.14% and NASDAQ 0.23% after both opened in the red with Google and IBM pressured.

Stocks came off their lows after a gauge of manufacturing activity in the Philadelphia region rose to 16.6 in April from 9.0 in March - this was ahead of expectations.

For the week, the S&P 500 added 2.7% and the NASDAQ advanced 2.4%

The Asian Markets continue to be a world wide concern and could derail the bull train of late.

Watch out! Scandal may rock Hong Kong stocks Tuesday

Beware - you may see some volatility in these stocks when Hong Kong markets reopen on Tuesday: China Resources Enterprise (Hang Seng Index component), China Resources Power Holdings Co. (Hang Seng Index component), China Resources Land (Hang Seng Index component), China Resourcse Gas Group, China Resources Cement Holdings.

All of the listing above are for companies directly owned by one of China's largest state conglomerates - China Resources Corp. (CRC) - which has been hit by news that its 51-year-old chairman is now the center of a massive corruption scandal, all due to one journalist's repeated allegations on China's version of Twitter.

The top watchdog agency for China's Communist Party issued a statement Thursday evening saying that CRC Chairman Song Lin is under investigations for suspected "serious" violations of the law, as well as party regulations. The agency didn't elaborate, but it's widely suspected that the probe was triggered by an open letter published Tuesday by a reporter.

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