March 12, 2017 The Week Ahead

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Nearly all major indices closed the week lower, except for the Nasdaq which bucked the trend. The weakest performer was the Russell 2000 Index, which saw a drop of nearly 2%. Interestingly, it also happens to be the weakest performing index year to date as well, posting gains of less than 1%

With earnings mostly behind us, the attention will shift towards the FOMC, and the upcoming policy meeting which will be conducted on Tuesday and Wednesday. On Friday, nonfarm payrolls rose to 235,000 compared to expectations of 200,000. Some market pundits believe that those positive numbers should give the FOMC enough confidence to raise the key interest rate at this upcoming meeting.

We’ll find out soon enough.

Where is the VIX in all of this?

The VIX continues to hangout below 12. On Friday, the VIX closed at 11.66. Based on some of the volatility estimators that we look at, the SPDR S&P 500 has a 20-day volatility of 7.31% compared to its median of 10.90% over the last 3 years.

Now, here is how some of the other closely followed ETFs did on the week: United States Oil Fund (USO) -9.27%, iShares 20+ Year Treasury Bond (TLT) -1.78%, SPDR Gold Shares (GLD) -2.40%.

Here is a list of some events that traders will be following during the week:

Key Economic Data:
14 March 2017- PPI 8:30 AM ET,
15 March 2017- Consumer Price Index 8:30 AM ET; Retail Sales 8:30 AM ET; EIA Petroleum Status Report 10:30 AM ET; FOMC Meeting Announcement 2:00 PM ET; FOMC Forecasts 2:00 PM ET, Fed Chair Press Conference 2:30 PM ET
16 March 2017- Housing Starts 8:30 AM ET; Jobless Claims 8:30 AM ET; Philly Fed Business Outlook Survey 8:30 AM ET
17 March 2017- Industrial Production 9:15 AM ET

Key Earnings:
13 March 2017- AR, REN, TACO, CHRS, KMG
14 March 2017- BONT, DSW, HDS, ARNA, CLDX, NPTN, PTCT, RUBI
15 March 2017- AXAS, ALRM, EVOK, GES, ORCL, WSM, JBL
16 March 2017- INSY, ADBE, CATB, MNKD, XONE, VSLR
17 March 2017- TIF

Key Events:
13 March 2017- J.P. Morgan 2017 Aviation, Transportation & Industrials Conference, 3/13-3/15; J.P. Morgan Special Situations Investor Forum, 3/13, in Washington, D.C.
14 March 2017- Barclays Global Healthcare Conference, 3/14-3/16, in Miami, FL

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