Self-Employment Boom

On Friday, the Canadian jobs report surprised to the upside but a large proportion of this number was an increase in the number of people saying they are self-employed.  This is an interesting phenomenon that also occurred in the last recession during the 1990’s.  While self-employment can potentially be an engine for job creation, this is only one month of data. Also, the statistics show that on average, only 15 to 20% of these small businesses succeed.  The majority of these jobs are in the services sector.  In general, the economic news and the news around the banks has been better than expected, which appears to be the catalyst for the recent shift in sentiment from a doomsday scenario to one where most people see that the banks will survive.  However, make no mistake; the banks still have much work to do.  While lending margins are intact, the additional earnings many banks were generating through proprietary trading, securitization, and other investment banking type activity, will not reach the pre-crash levels any time soon.  We will continue to see consolidation and reform within the investment and banking community, particularly in the U.S. 

Looking at the futures this morning, they are indicating a down open.  The DAX is also negative.  The market condition scans are showing a slight bias to the upside, but we remain in a bottoming market.  The market bias indicators are showing a stronger statistical bias to a correction.  A small correction or flat sideways price action would be healthy for the markets as the recent rally has a relatively steep angle of ascent.

This week is a relatively light news week as earnings season wraps up and there is very few economic reports.  This morning th the Canadian Housing report was released and  indicates new home prices slipped in March. 

 

Index	Change	%Change	Level	Phase
TSX	+270.94	+2.72%	10237.99	Recovery
DJIA	+164.80	+1.96%	8574.65	Recovery
Nasdaq	+22.76	+1.33%	1739.00	Recovery
SP 500	+21.48	+2.41%	929.23	Recovery
Russell 2000	+18.88	+3.83%	511.82	Recovery
NYSE	+200.30	+3.45%	6000.39	Recovery

Source: Telechart

Short Term market outlook:

Bias: Scans showing a neutral bias but more positive momentum than negative momentum

Energy: moderate

 Primary Trend: Remains down to sideways

Sector	Phase
Consumer Staples	Recovery
Healthcare	Recovery
Technology	Recovery
Utilities	Recovery
Energy	Recovery
Financials	Recovery
Industrials	Recovery
Materials	Recovery
Consumer Discretionary	Recovery

Source: Telechart