The markets finished the day mixed as all eyes turned to Hurricane Irma. The storm is expected to hit the southern part of Florida this weekend and work its way through the spine of the state. This was the dominant media focus today and trading volume was light.
This week the markets accomplished very little overall. The S&P 500 (NYSE: SPY) finished the day down 0.12%, and basically traded inside a range all week. Overall traders seem to remain optimistic about the future bullishness of the market though there are signs that show more market weakness ahead. The Nasdaq 100 showed a loss of 37 on the day as names like Tesla (NASDAQ: TSLA) and Nvidia (NASDAQ: NVDA) were some of the names that held the index back.
Alcoa (NYSE: AA) sold off 4.74% today, giving back almost two weeks of gains. The stock has been quite strong lately, with a 3 month rally gaining over 50% in that period. This has many investors looking to take profit and it seems that today some decided to do this. Overall the stock is quite strong still and many analysts are still bullish.
Oil was lower on the day which sent names like Marathon Oil (NYSE: MRO) lower by 4%. Recently these names had been trying to rally but the weakness today eliminates a lot of those gains. Marathon is still in a perfect downtrend so technical bulls are still skeptical of the move.
Symantec (NASDAQ: SYMC) popped 3.37% today as the cyber security stocks continue to be in focus. After recent cyber attacks Symantec popped to 3 month highs on higher than average volume. For the year that stock has added over 30% and a few upgrades suggest that analysts expect more.
Next week traders expect more focus on Hurricane Irma as scheduled news is very light during the first part of the week.