As the week ended the markets were becoming calmer following the departure of Greece's Prime Minister on Monday and the impending departure of Italy's Berlusconi this weekend. It remains to be seen if their replacements can make progress on resolving the sovereign debt issues of their respective countries and we seem destined to revisit the problems of restructuring their economies in the not to distant future. At home there was cause for cautious optimism also as the number of new unemployment claims fell below 400,000 and consumer confidence rose in the University of Michigan's monthly survey.


Our trend indicator for the NASDAQ Composite continues to be positive but the index is moving sideways with the 200 day moving average providing resistance to attempts to move higher. In the last two weeks the index has powered through the 200 day level on stronger volume only to quickly fall back. While we may see further attempts to move higher as the focus on Europe lessens, there looms the pending report to Congress of the "super committee" due by November 23. A failure to produce an agreement will threaten the country's credit rating and likely trigger a big market sell-off.

No new features this week but did you check out our Trend Reversal Indicator for individual stocks?

This feature will return next week.