• If you haven't noticed, natural gas has gone from laughing stock to favorite commodity over the past year as the price of our most abundant fossil fuel has more than doubled.

    While many investors look to lighten up and lock in gains at this time of year, Jeff Hirsch, editor-in-chief of Stock Trader's Almanac, says although the list may be short, there are some bullish seasonal trends in play in May.

    "Two things that are really in the middle of a good season are natural gas and crude oil," Hirsch says in the attached video. "They are impacted by the heating season, but also the cooling season and the driving season. So that whole build up period between December and June/July when the usage that drives that bullish season for gas and oil."

    And of the two, he says nat gas looks to be the better bet right now. Not only is new demand coming on line but the price is breaking out to a two-year high. "We also think we had a secular low last April (at $1.96 m/btu) for the nat gas market. (UNG, FCG)," he says of the crash that took prices to generational lows. "It's nice that we have a lot of gas but there's more demand coming in and the supply is being taken up."

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  • The ADP Payroll report for April has come in under consensus. The report indicates just 119,000 new private sector jobs for the month. Estimates were for 150,000 to 155,000 new jobs. That could move markets lower after yesterday's record-high close. The S&P ended the regular session at 1.597. Major indexes have now logged six consecutive months of gains.

    We've got another hailstorm of reports today as part of earnings season. Among the companies that have already reported this morning: Merck. The company managed to beat on the bottom line posting 85-cents a share, though revenues came in almost $1/2-billion dollars short. Also out with earnings this morning: three media companies with one common theme: a beat on earnings by a penny, but a miss on revenue. First is Comcast, which logged 51-cents a share. Next is Time Warner, which made 75-cents a share though revenue was almost$200-million short. And finally is Viacom which came in at 96-cents a share.

    Apple's (AAPL) bond sale is

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  • Facebook (FB) will be reporting earnings after the closing bell. Consensus is for the social network to report 13-cents a share. There's no year-to-year comparison since the company went public last May but revenue's expected to rise about 35% rise to $1.4 billion. Facebook's main challenge remains monetizing its billion-plus users, particularly with the massive shift to mobile. According to one calculation the company has recently shed millions of users, but that's being disputed. Right now Facebook shares are about 27% below their IPO price. They're sitting at almost the same place where they were when we rang in 2013.

    Next up is BMC Software (BMC). Reuters is reporting that a private equity alliance comprised of Bain Capital and Golden Gate Capital is offering more than $6.5 billion dollars for BMC. That would put them ahead of a rival consortium including KKR which made a takeover bid last week. According to the report, BMC is allowing that first group to sweeten its offer, so we

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  • ADP or the Labor Department: which employment number is more trustworthy? Vote below in our poll. But first listen to Yahoo! Finance's Matt Nesto and Mike Santoli discuss the numbers and what goes into them. The pair also looks at decisions from the Federal Reserve Bank and the European Central Bank.

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