May 15, 2016 The Week Ahead

The S&P 500 finished lower for the third straight week, and is currently riding a 3-trading day losing streak. The NASDAQ has been down 14 out of the last 18 sessions, as is more than 5% off its year-to-date highs.

Overall, it feels like the market has lost some steam. However; we haven’t seen much selling pressure come in yet. Well, at least anything that has had some legs. This can easily be observed by the VIX. Despite the market being down again, the VIX was relatively unchanged, closing at 15.04.

Crude oil futures prices bounced back, closing the week nearly 4% higher. With that said, we’re almost back to the year-to-date highs.

This coming week we’ve got a decent amount of earnings from companies related to the retail space. This sector has been taking it on the chin over the last week or so, we’ll have to see if that bearish sentiment continues. In addition, we’ve got the FOMC Minutes along with a number of industry related conferences.

Key Economic Data:
17 May 2016- Consumer Price Index 8:30 AM ET, Housing Starts 8:30 AM ET, Industrial Production 9:15 AM ET

18 May 2016- EIA Petroleum Status 10:30 AM ET, FOMC Minutes 2:00 PM ET

19 May 2016- Jobless Claims 8:30 AM ET, Philly Fed Business Outlook Survey 8:30 AM ET

20 May 2016- Existing Home Sales 10:00 AM ET

Key Earnings:
16 May 2016- VRTU, A, AKRX, VOXX

17 May 2016- HD, PLCE, TJX

18 May 2016- DSX, LOW, PGR, QIWI, TGT, CRM, CSCO, EXP, FLO, RXN, LB, TTWO, URBN

19 May 2016- DKS, AAP, SSI, WMT, ADSK, AMAT, BRCD, GPS, ROST, MENT

20 May 2016- FL, DE, CPB, BKE, HIBB

Key Events:
16 May 2016- Electrical Products Group Conference (runs till 5/18); Goldman Sachs Leveraged Financial Conference (runs till 5/18)

17 May 2016- Bank America/Merrill Transportation Conference (runs till 5/18); Barclays Americas Select Conference (runs till 5/19), Citigroup Internet, E-commerce & Digital Media Conference (runs till 5/18); JPMorgan Global Consumer & Retail Conference (runs till 5/18); JPMorgan Homebuilding & Building Products Conference (runs till 5/18)

18 May 2016- Needham Emerging Tech Conference (runs till 5/19)