The market surprised us this morning with a strong performance. It could be supported by confidence in Housing, as existing sales were better-than-expected and downright positive (stay tuned for more numbers from housing sector tomorrow). Or it could be a technical move off of support at 1343 for S&P 500, which would be nice if the market recognized at healthy 10% sell-off and is now moving forward.

An inordinately contentious and dispiriting election season left virtually everyone who was paying attention with a bitter taste in their mouth about the say-whatever-it-takes politicians that so desperately seek the honor of representing us. But never fear, at least we can still look to the top brass in our military for leaders with the utmost in discipline and integrity, right?

SANTA BARBARA, CA – Nov. 13, 2012 – Sabrient Systems, LLC, an independent equity research firm that specializes in alpha extraction through quantitative and qualitative analysis, announced today that its next generation stock screen tool, Equity Valuation and Ranking (EVR), is available via the Bloomberg Professional service, as a new feature called the Bloomberg App Portal.

Bloomberg Professional service subscribers globally can instantly access the Bloomberg App Portal at {APPS<GO>} to where they can search for dozens of applications that help users accomplish specific tasks, such as value and price securities, visualize and analyze data or leverage new charting techniques. Applications can be licensed and operated from within the Bloomberg Professional service environment - without disrupting or interrupting workflow.

Lately we’ve been able to reduce the one thing the market does not want: uncertainty. With all due respect President Obama and Governor Romney, “the devil you know is better than the devil you don’t know.” Check off one big uncertainty. 

Third quarter earnings can be just about checked off.  Not quite as good as the first two quarters, especially on the revenue side, but definitely better than most expected. 

U.S. stocks rallied on Election Day Tuesday, ostensibly in anticipation of a “surprise” Romney win. But on Wednesday, after huge dollars were spent on rancorous campaigns and attack ads that only further deepened the divide in our country, we woke up to find ourselves with the same President and divided Congress that previously failed to address the looming Fiscal Cliff.

The market remains sensitive to weak forward outlooks and continues to punish those stocks that miss on revenues and beat on earnings. Today, ESRX, Z, and BSFT bore the brunt of that attitude, down -14%, -21%, and -11% respectively after-hours.

But not all is morose. EOG and CVI delivered great earnings reports and raised their forward outlooks, and the market responded positively, though not in as dramatic a fashion as the disappointers.

I was supposed to be in New York City this week, but Sandy the super storm had other ideas. Some writers are suggesting that since the storm has passed, we can all start getting back to business. But of course, some densely-populated areas In New York and New Jersey have been so devastated that normalcy is a long ways off.

This could prove to be one the most interesting market weeks of the year, assuming the market ever opens.  Talk about uncertainty!  We can add “Frankenstorm” to the litany of other uncertainties such as the election and its impact on a functional Congress and the ongoing concerns in Europe, Middle East, China, and Japan.

This could prove to be one the most interesting market weeks of the year, assuming the market ever opens.  Talk about uncertainty!  Add Frankenstorm to the litany of other uncertainties such as the election and its impact on a functional Congress, Europe, Middle East, China, and Japan.

Whoa, big fella. That’s what the newly vocal bears had to say to the overly aggressive bulls, as a slew of weak earnings reports put a damper on the party. Last week, it seemed that stocks were determined to rally even without traditional leadership from the Technology sector.