Although the market is flashing signs of a strong breakout for the New Year, Sabrient’s SectorCast-ETF model continues to flash defensive signals. Given the quantitative model’s reliance on value-based fundamentals, this shouldn’t be surprising after such a lengthy and sustained rally. This week, there are few changes to the sector rankings. Most notable is the continued rise in Energy, which now scores a 62 but hasn’t yet cracked the Top 2.

As the stock market continues to trade at 15-month highs, Sabrient’s SectorCast-ETF model is getting even more defensive, even though we are in a historically bullish time of year. The fundamentals-based quantitative model has a GARP (growth at reasonable price) focus, and this week there are significant changes to the sector rankings.

Just a quick update while I'm on vacation this week.

I’ve been reading prominent market pundits predicting everything from the “Crash of 2010 coming” to “Major surge ahead.” With such divergence of predictions, it seems like a good time to remain conservatively long/short in accordance with Sabrient’s SectorCast-ETF value-oriented model.

Given the recent market weakness, it’s no surprise that Sector Detector’s long/short portfolios have outperformed. This week, Sabrient’s SectorCast-ETF model remains defensive. Of course, the underlying quantitative model isn’t aware that we are entering a time of year that is traditionally bullish. It simply reads the data and tells us which sectors appear to be relatively overvalued.

As the stock market continues to trade near its highs, Sabrient’s SectorCast-ETF model remains defensive, given its GARP (growth at reasonable price) focus. The top and bottom ranked sectors remain the same this week, but there was noticeable movement in the middle. In particular, Information Technology is dropping while Telecommunications rises.

Sabrient’s SectorCast ETF rankings solidified its defensive bent this week. Healthcare continues to lead, but Consumer Staples moved ahead of InfoTech into the second spot. On the bottom, Materials remains in the basement as the fundamentally most overvalued sector, but Industrials dropped quite a bit in the wake of its recent price momentum, which added to its already overvalued levels.

We are seeing only slight movement to Sabrient’s Sector Detector ETF rankings, as Healthcare, InfoTech, and Consumer Staples continue to lead, while Materials sinks further into the cellar and remains the fundamentally most overvalued sector. 

Latest rankings: This week, SectorCast-ETF indicates that Healthcare (XLV) remains solidly in front on a forward-looking basis, with the highest score of 93.

You’ve heard it before: trading today’s stock market can be hazardous to both your wealth and health. The market can go up fast…and it can fall even faster. In such an environment, many sophisticated investors and portfolio managers turn to “absolute return” strategies that seek to make money no matter where the market goes.