Tax Euphoria Fades As Tech Rout Spreads

Jon Alternative Media, Blogosphere, Corporate, Economy, Government, Market Commentary, Politics, Real Estate

One look at S&P futures this morning reveals an unchanged market, however it is again the violent sector rotation that is taking place behind the scenes that is the real story, with defensive sectors real estate, retail, food, utilities outperforming while investors continue to bail and book profits on tech stocks after sharp gains since the start of the year. Monday’s Nasdaq rout also spread to European and Asian markets which fall on last minute changes to the tax plan, most notably the retaining of AMT which could prevent companies from making use of intellectual property tax breaks, effectively raising their tax rates. As a reminder, on Monday the Nasdaq fell 1.2% following broad based hedge fund liquidation from the most crowded sector, after tax experts said Senate Republicans unwittingly passed a bill that would mean higher-than-intended taxes for technology firms and other corporations; in sympathy Europe’s Stoxx tech sector index SX8P hit the lowest since late September, down 8% since mid-November
European stocks dipped, trimming the previous session’s sharp gains amid a renewed selloff in tech stocks globally and as weaker industrial metal prices weighed on mining shares which slumped ‘due to a marked slowdown in China’s metal consumption growth, with market participants foreseeing weaker public infrastructure spending growth extending into 2018,’ SP Angel analysts including John Meyer, Simon Beardsmore and Sergey Raevskiy write in note.
The Stoxx 600 is down 0.2%, remaining in a range between its 50-DMA and 200-DMA started in mid-November. The Stoxx tech sector SX8P index falls 0.6%, mirroring a drop in the Nasdaq Monday. As noted above, Europe’s tec sector is down about 8% since a peak in early November, amid a sharp sector rotation out of momentum stocks and into potential winners of the U. S. tax reform. UK’s FTSE 100 outperforms peers amid the weaker pound which had briefly tripped through 1.34 as Brexit talks had been unravelled over disagreements from the DUP in regards to a hard border between Ireland and Northern Ireland. UK grocery retailers are among the top movers in the FTSE 100 after a positive note from Goldman Sachs. Elsewhere, to the downside, health care and material names lag.

This post was published at Zero Hedge on Dec 5, 2017.