Well, I’ve been writing in this column that the market has been signaling that it wants to breakout to the upside, and it finally broke back above its 50-day moving average as we began the new month. Sabrient’s SectorCast-ETF rankings are mostly holding steady, with Financials, Energy, Healthcare, and InfoTech still showing the best fundamental valuations.

The market is flashing signs that it might want to breakout to the upside, and Sabrient’s SectorCast-ETF model seems to be projecting that it just might do it. This unbiased, value-oriented, quantitative model continues to favor sectors that are more dependent on economic growth, like Financials, InfoTech and Energy, which remain comfortably above the more defensive sectors like Utilities, Consumer Staples, and Telecom.

After selling into year-end market strength to close out the year, net weekly net insider trading transactions (the number of individual buyers minus sellers) has finished January on a slightly positive note, as many insiders appear to have taken advantage of the market weakness to increase their net holdings.

The defensive posture taken by Sabrient’s fundamentals-based SectorCast-ETF model has allowed the long/short model portfolio to prosper in the face of the market weakness we’ve seen over the past week. The formerly hot Materials sector had begun to show signs of cooling off last week even as the overall market was hitting new highs, and over the past week it fell hard.

Two exchange-traded funds that track Sabrient quantitative indexes passed their 3-year anniversaries in late 2009 and received prestigious 4-STAR Morningstar ratings.

The Claymore/Sabrient Insider ETF (NYSE Arca: NFO) and the Claymore/Sabrient Defensive Equity ETF (NYSE Arca: DEF) track the Sabrient Insider Sentiment Index (SBRIN) and Sabrient Defensive Equity Index (SBRDE), respectively.