Stocks continued their rally on Friday morning amid strong earnings reports from American Express and Twitter. However, Intel shares fell more than 6%, despite solid second-quarter results, after the company projected declining gross margins over the remainder of the year. The Dow rose 0.5%, the S&P 0.8%, and the Nasdaq 0.8%. Crude oil traded near $72 per barrel, while gold fell $6 to $1799 per ounce.

Stocks rose on Tuesday morning, recouping some of Monday's sharp losses. IBM reported strong 2Q earnings and housing market data was mixed. The Commerce Department said that U.S. housing starts rose 6.3% to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 1.643 million units in June, above the Reuters forecast of 1.590 million. However, building permits, a longer-range indicator, fell 5.1% to an annualized 1.598 million. The Dow rose 1.6%, the S&P 1.4%, and the Nasdaq 1.0%. Crude oil traded near $67 per barrel, while gold fell slightly to $1808 per ounce.

The Vickers Top Buyers & Sellers is a daily report that identifies the five companies the largest insider purchase transactions based on the dollar value of the transactions as well as the five companies the largest insider sales transactions based on the dollar value of the transactions.

The Vickers Top Buyers & Sellers is a daily report that identifies the five companies the largest insider purchase transactions based on the dollar value of the transactions as well as the five companies the largest insider sales transactions based on the dollar value of the transactions.

The Vickers Top Buyers & Sellers is a daily report that identifies the five companies the largest insider purchase transactions based on the dollar value of the transactions as well as the five companies the largest insider sales transactions based on the dollar value of the transactions.

The Vickers Top Buyers & Sellers is a daily report that identifies the five companies the largest insider purchase transactions based on the dollar value of the transactions as well as the five companies the largest insider sales transactions based on the dollar value of the transactions.

In late May, we commented on a trend that was developing in the weekly insider-sentiment data from Vickers Stock Research. Specifically, we noted a seeming shift in the behavior of insiders at companies that list on the NYSE as compared to those that list on the tech-heavy Nasdaq.

The Fed Calms the Markets: Our Monthly Survey of the Economy, Interest Rates, and Markets

The Vickers Top Buyers & Sellers is a daily report that identifies the five companies the largest insider purchase transactions based on the dollar value of the transactions as well as the five companies the largest insider sales transactions based on the dollar value of the transactions.

This pick list highlights constituents of the Morningstar US Large Cap Index that we believe offer investors the best risk-adjusted return prospects. Stocks of large-cap companies where neither growth nor value characteristics predominate. Stocks in the top 70% of the capitalization of the U.S. equity market are defined as large cap.

The Vickers Top Buyers & Sellers is a daily report that identifies the five companies the largest insider purchase transactions based on the dollar value of the transactions as well as the five companies the largest insider sales transactions based on the dollar value of the transactions.

Damon Runyon once commented that watching a yacht race is like watching grass grow. Well these days, watching changes in insider sentiment is like watching a yacht race. Indeed, overall insider sentiment remains cautious and stock indices remain at or near all-time highs.

The Vickers Top Buyers & Sellers is a daily report that identifies the five companies the largest insider purchase transactions based on the dollar value of the transactions as well as the five companies the largest insider sales transactions based on the dollar value of the transactions.

Stock Market at Midyear: Rotation, but an Old Favorite is Back

Last week, we talked about the relative-strength turn towards Technology stocks that started in the middle of May. It just happened to coincide with the decline in the long end of the Treasury yield curve to the downside. If a pop in rates hurts Tech stocks, then a retracement in rates should help the sector. The 10- and 30-year Treasury yields have fallen only two to three basis points over the past month, which is not all that much. But perhaps more importantly, they stopped going up.

Last week featured a Fed meeting in which nothing changed (yet everything changed), and the stock market suffered its worst five days since January. The pain was distributed unevenly, with the DJIA dropping 3.5%, the S&P 500 down 1.91%, and the Nasdaq off only 0.3%.

The Vickers Top Buyers & Sellers is a daily report that identifies the five companies the largest insider purchase transactions based on the dollar value of the transactions as well as the five companies the largest insider sales transactions based on the dollar value of the transactions.

With Treasury yields falling back toward the lower end of their three-month range (in a move that started in mid-May), the S&P Technology Sector SPDR Fund (XLK) as well as the Nasdaq 100 (QQQ) have risen from their recent slumber and are again demonstrating market leadership. The interest-rate scare for some of the mega-cap Tech stocks began early this year, though others started to lag back in 2020.

Sustainable Impact investing continues to grow. According to Opimas, a management consultancy focused on global capital markets, global assets under management in ESG strategies grew to $40.5 trillion in 2020, doubling in four years and tripling in eight. As assets have flowed in, SRI investing has evolved over the past 40 years. Now, instead of merely identifying industries to avoid, the discipline promotes "sustainable" business practices across all businesses that can have an "impact" on global issues such as workers' rights, poverty, hunger, and the climate. Based on numerous requests from clients, we have compiled a portfolio of companies followed by Argus Research that are in position to have this type of "sustainable impact" on the environment, workplace, and community. These firms have exemplary records not only in delivering on the bottom line, but also in improving the environment, contributing to community relations, and showing respect for their employees. We built our portfolio by identifying companies that are BUY-rated by Argus analysts and also score well on ESG (Environmental, Social and Governance) criteria established by the JUST Capital Foundation. JUST Capital utilizes a combination of polling, data-driven research, and strategic engagement to shift behaviors and activities in corporate America and the financial markets. JUST Capital's mission is to drive measurable corporate change to create a stakeholder-centric, inclusive form of capitalism that reflects the priorities of the American public. JUST ranks the Russell 1000 on these criteria against a scale of 1-100. Here are company highlights from the Argus U.S. ESG Model Portfolio.

This pick list highlights constituents of the Morningstar US Large Cap Index that we believe offer investors the best risk-adjusted return prospects. Stocks of large-cap companies where neither growth nor value characteristics predominate. Stocks in the top 70% of the capitalization of the U.S. equity market are defined as large cap.

The Vickers Top Buyers & Sellers is a daily report that identifies the five companies the largest insider purchase transactions based on the dollar value of the transactions as well as the five companies the largest insider sales transactions based on the dollar value of the transactions.

Inflation Fears Shadow Reopening: Our Monthly Survey of the Economy, Interest Rates, and Markets

The Labor Department's Nonfarm Payrolls report for May 2021 will be released on Friday, June 4, 2021. This report is always eagerly awaited by investors, and Friday's may be even more important than usual. That's because the April report was so disappointing, raising questions about whether the U.S. economy's recovery from COVID-19 was stalling. Recall that the U.S. workforce added only 220,000 jobs in April, below the recent trend (650k) and below expectations (900k). Meanwhile, the unemployment rate in April ticked higher to 6.1%. The market is waiting to see whether the April data was an outlier in a positive trend, or the start of a slowdown. We are inclined to think that April was an outlier. For one thing, another employment measure, the ADP payroll report for April, indicated that employers added 742,000 jobs -- the most since last fall. For another, in recent weeks, unemployment claims have continued to fall (to 406,000 from 547,000 a month ago). As the U.S. vaccination count rises and states re-open their economies, service workers are being called back to their jobs. Our forecast calls for a May rebound in payrolls to 650,000.

For the month of May, the S&P 500 managed to eke out a 0.6% gain; the Nasdaq made a nice comeback, cutting its loss to 1.5%; the Nasdaq 100 (QQQ) dropped 1.2%; the S&P 400 rose 0.2%; and the Russell 2000 (IWM) rose 0.3%. Once again, action was seen in all 11 S&P sectors as well as in individual names.

June is not one of the better months for stocks, according to our analysis of market returns since 1980. On average, equity investors in June eke out a 0.3% positive return for the month. Only February, August, and September are weaker months. The winning percentage is 61%, higher than only higher the 3Q summer months. We note that market returns in June have exceeded 5% only twice in the past 37 years: a 5.4% increase in 1999 and a 6.9% gain in 2019. Clunkers? We have seen a few, including 2008 (-8.6%), 2002 (-7.2%), 2010 (-6.1%) and 1991 (-4.8%). June is typically a quiet month, as the second quarter draws to a close. Few companies report earnings. The Federal Reserve meets, and, while it won't be lowering rates, we expect to hear Fed Chairman Powell comment on the potential for the central bank to start a discussion about tapering its $120 billion per-month asset-purchase program. Stocks are off to a strong start in 2021, with a 12% year-to-date gain. Valuations are stretched, though, and June may well be a month during which the bull market takes a breather.

The stock market moved higher last week, with technology stocks outperforming blue chips. During Friday's session, the Dow Jones Industrial Average increased 65 points, or 0.19%. The S&P 500 was up 0.08%, and the Nasdaq Composite was up 0.09%. For the week, the DJIA was up 322 points, or 0.94%, the S&P 500 was up 1.16%, and the Nasdaq Composite was up 2.06%. Year-to-date, the DJIA is up 12.82%, the S&P 500 is up 11.93%, and the Nasdaq Composite is up 6.68%.

This edition features Ford's electric future; the funeral industry in Australia; Amazon's move to buy MGM; and notes from Toll Brothers, General Mills, and Intuit.

The approximately $1.7 trillion cryptocurrency market (Bitcoin, Etherium, Dogecoin, etc.) has been tumbling from a $2 trillion-plus level on a flurry of negative developments. These include Tesla's Elon Musk halting acceptance of Bitcoin for Tesla products due to environmental concerns; China saying it would not allow financial institutions to provide services related to crypto transactions; and Colonial Pipeline paying Bitcoin as ransom to hackers, furthering the notion that cryptocurrencies are ideal for enterprises seeking to evade laws. Prior to the headlines, cryptocurrencies were on a tear despite no clear path to widespread adoption by consumers or businesses, and amid uncertainty over regulation. We estimate that the global equity market capitalization is approximately $90 trillion. Gold is about $10 trillion. For crypto to make it on the radar for most investment managers' asset-allocation models, we expect it needs to at least triple in value, to approximately $5 trillion. By then, maybe there will be more uses for and regulations to define the asset, and more fundamentals to support valuation; this has worked for gold over the years. For the broader market, collapsing crypto prices also signal excessive liquidity in the system, and worries could spill over into other asset classes. Essentially, markets are in risk-off mode when Bitcoin tanks.