-Executive Summary-

• HIGHER! The very favorable earnings of select companies like Stock Market Companion holding Ford Motor Co. (Ticker: F $15.66) and 3M (Ticker: MMM $95.94) helped push the market higher.  Shares of Intel, SMC Holding Cisco Systems, Inc. (CSCO), and Dell, Inc. (DELL) also moved nicely higher.
• At the SMC, we added to our Ford Motor Co (F) holdings, only to see the shares get sold pretty hard in the afternoon.  We are attentive.  See more below. The Ford story is still intact and our overall entry is reasonable.  Owning a re-born market leader in a cyclical industry that is on the mend (auto industry) can lead to long term very strong gains.
• Intel Corp. (INTC $22.48) punched up through important resistance at $22.28.  It is very strong.  It’s up from $19 something in a hurry.  We want to own it, but not until it pulls back or builds a little bit of a lateral consolidation.
• Shares of other stocks like Netflix (NFLX) and Acme Packet (APKT) – which we mentioned yesterday – got pounded on earnings disappointments.
• The U.S. dollar moved through near term support to the DOWNSIDE today.   Gold and oil DID NOT move higher, and remained flat.  Hmmm.
  The U.S. dollar is approx. -15% lower than its highs 4 years ago against a basket of currencies represented by the euro, yen, pound…
• Here is a video interview of a father and son using the Stock Market Companion successfully together – as a teaching and investing tool.
  

– Stock Market Companion – Current Holdings –

Nr.	Co.	Ticker	Action	Entry Date	Current Gain (Loss)
1	Nexxus Lighting	NEXS	Miniscule Holding	3/18/2011	-20%
2	Dell Inc.	DELL	Holding	3/21/2011	+5%
3	Ford Motor Co.	F	Holding	4/1/2011	+/- 0%
4	Cisco Systems, Inc.	CSCO	Holding	4/25/2011	+3%

If the above “Current Holdings” table is empty it means that we are not holding ANY stocks at this time and that we are therefore 100% in cash.

– Markets “At a Glance” –

(Please scroll down to the end of the report to see your favorite benchmarks – Dollar, Oil, Gold … closing prices and daily direction.)

Market	Price (Today’s Close)	Unit of Measure	Today’s Direction
SP-500	1,347.24	Index	UP = +11.99 points
DOW-30	12,595.37	Index	UP = +115.49 points
NASDAQ	2,847.54	Index	UP =+21.66 points
NASDAQ 100	2,396.03	Index	UP = +12.31 points

– Market Trends –

Trend	SP-500	DJ-30	NASDAQ	NASDAQ 100
Short Term	Flat	Flat	Flat	Flat
Intermediate	UP	UP	UP	UP
Long Term	Lateral	Lateral	Lateral	Lateral

*Summary of terms from Trader Vic II-Principles of Professional Speculation (pg. 140-141)
*_________* Represents a change in trend rating.

– Market Perspectives –

For your added perspective, we’ve included this chart of the broader market (Successful stock investors develop and start with a minds-eye view of the broader market and keep it clear) –

1. SMC SP-500 ETF Daily Chart (Click to open helpful chart in a separate browser window).

– Today’s Highlights –

The biggest catalyst for the U.S. market’s favorable move today is favorable quarterly earnings.

3M Corporation (Ticker: MMM $95.94) popped into new, ALL-TIME HIGH territory today following its strong quarterly results.  That said, when you look at the 3M Corp. stock chart, the stock has shown lots of volatility for 8 years – ranging from $95/share to $42/share, but hasn’t produced any capital gains for buyers at the 2007 highs … until today.  In fact, the stock has been a poor choice for investors buying at highs from 2004 until today.  Investors who have been able to pick bottoms in the stock have done well.  Additionally, 3M Corp. does pay a dividend of 2.3%, based on today’s share price.  Therefore, investors who have had the courage to purchase the stock when the market has come apart have captured strong dividend yields and strong capital appreciation.

Tomorrow afternoon, the Federal Reserve Open Market will make its decision about lending rates and will most likely make a statement about the current status of the “Quantitative Easing” which is taking place – where the Federal Reserve has been the lead purchaser of U.S. Treasuries; a controversial program that is scheduled to be completed by the end of June.  This event will have significant market moving potential.  We can speculate, but no one knows what the ultimate outcome will be – or – how the markets will respond

– Story-Stock Investing –

Our re-purchase of Cisco Systems, Inc. shares yesterday – as the stock appeared to be bracing for an upside extension from recent lows – has proven in the short term to be a wise choice.  Of course, on this one we are still recovering from our previous entry at $17.87 on April 6th and our subsequent exit on April 18th at $16.7, resulting in a -6.5% LOSS.  Today’s move in the stock has cut our loss to -3% and has placed us back on board the stock of a powerful company where management has announced that it plans to shake things up and reward shareholders.  We hope that we have timed our entry a bit better this time.

One of the hardest things for an individual stock investor to do is to admit that he / she is wrong.  This is why the portfolios of millions of investors are littered with severely under performing stocks and under performing mutual funds (that we sometimes call “dogs”) that they simply didn’t have the courage to sell.  There are a lot of people who over the years have asked us about what they should do with stocks like Blockbuster Video (now extinct), Hollywood Video (now extinct), Krispy Kreme Doughnuts (KKD), General Motors Corp. (now out of bankruptcy) – and others – in hope that we would mention something favorable.  Giving an honest answer with empathy has been our objective in those difficult situations.

Look, it’s not easy to take a loss.  It’s even harder to take the loss and then turn around and get back on the same horse.  Some would call it foolish.  Unfortunately there isn’t a better way.  We’ve mentioned that we don’t buy stocks based on price alone – and we mean it.  That doesn’t mean however that we always get the entry right.  Sometimes it takes a little bit of trial and error.  We hold ourselves to relatively tight stops (for many people our stop limits are extremely tight), because we have seen time and time again how shares of stocks that looked like they were going to continue higher have turned around and sank -50% or more in value in a short period of time.

Sometimes we get hood-winked too.  A little over a year ago we were very interested in the stock of Rino, Inc. (Ticker: RINO) – a Chinese company that produced environmental systems for steel producers in China.  The stock was on a tear and their earnings were excellent.  The story was very good – Environmental systems, China, AND selling their systems in China itself, where environmental issues related to heavy industries are significant.  We purchased the stock on a high reaching flag formation that can often lead to an explosive move higher in a stock like this (+50% or more).  We paid $31.51/share on Jan. 8, 2010.  We sold it 4 days later at $29.90/share for a -5.1% loss, when the stock pressed higher, but then began to reverse down – on volume.  Friends, the RINO stock is now listed on pink sheets only and trades today for $0.93/share!

Successful investors in individual stocks understand that you cannot have the multiplication that is possible to the upside, without the same forces operating to the downside – when the market is in peril or the individual company is being mismanaged or earnings are contracting.  In the case of Rino, news was released a few weeks AFTER we sold that the company had mis-represented its earnings!

Many can say – “For a high flying stock like Rino, that’s understandable, but a stock like Cisco Systems, Inc. isn’t going to go away.”  Well – many thought that too about – Enron, Kmart, United Airlines, Washington Mutual, Wachovia, Citigroup, General Motors, … etc …

We like how Stock Market Companion holdings Dell, Inc. (Dell $15.75), Cisco Systems, Inc. (CSCO $17.52), and Ford Motor Co. (F $15.66) performed today.  We added to our holdings of Ford Motor Co. today, only to have the company sink down pretty hard this afternoon on volume.  Phooey.  Ford’s earnings are great, their expectations for above 13 million in U.S. car and truck sales for 2011 is higher than expected, their paying down of debt is very impressive, their product line-up is excellent, their attention to quality and price is good…  We’ll see what tomorrow brings.  This early afternoon the stock was back up towards $16, but a seller emerged in the later afternoon to take their money in the stock.   We’re cautious.  At the same time, we don’t want to get whipped around on this one.  Stories like this one, in a cyclical industry turn-around can really move higher – big time.  We’ll see.  The problem is simply how much are near term earnings going to be impacted by the parts shortages out of Japan.  We don’t have any trouble seeing a stock like this move into the $20’s and $30’s, we simply don’t want it to go down to $13.50 on the way and be disappointed that our average entry is $15.70/share (approx.).

At the Stock Market Companion we do not and cannot give individual investment advice. According to the State of Washington RCW 21.20.005 the Stock Market Companion is not a Registered Financial Advisor and we do not render any advice on the basis of the specific investment situation of a particular individual. This information is for a wide readership and is not intended for any particular individual,  and under no circumstances should our Market Update or Watchlist be considered an investment recommendation or plan for any specific individual.  By accessing this material, you agree that the Stock Market Companion will not be held liable for any actions taken by a subscriber or other parties.  Please seek the council of a broker or other licensed investment professional for accurate pricing and concerning the suitability of all investments that you may be considering. Disclosure : You understand that the Stock Market Companion holds positions in the above mentioned securities.  Based on market related or personal events these positions may change without notice.

– Stock Market Companion – Performance –

Please click on this chart to see the Stock Market Companion 15MinuteStocks stock performance versus the SP-500.  It will open in a separate browser window.
* Gains (losses) do not include brokerage fees.   Our returns are very strong … BUT …  WE have to remind everyone just like all other financial sites in America – Past Performance is No Guarantee of Future Returns.  Unlike others however, our objective is to teach you to be able to make these types of strong returns On Your Own.

All of the investments – stocks, entries, and exits are listed on our Stock Market Companion Watchlist at the bottom of the spreadsheet, in the section labelled Former Holdings.

– Benchmarks “At a Glance” –

US Dollar	1.4685 USD = 1 Euro	USD / EUR	Dollar = Lower … at multi-year lows.  The dollar is -15% lower than in 2007 against the Euro / Yen …
Gold	$1,509.00	Ounce	Gold = Sitting at highs.
Oil	$112.20	Barrel (West Texas Crude)	Oil = Flat
30 Yr. Fixed Mortgage	4.85%	Percent	Flat
10 Yr. Bond Yield	3.36	Percent	Flat
1 Yr. CD	1.16	Percent	Flat

Data Source : Financial Visualizations Inc.

Signing-Off for Today,

Your -Stock Market Companion

** Stock Market Companion Disclaimer **

The Stock Market Companion (SMC) Market Update and Watchlist are published documents to subscribers that show how we (SMC) are viewing the markets and what we are watching, investing in or selling today.  This information is for a wide readership and is not intended for any particular individual,  and under no circumstances should this Market Update or Watchlist be considered an investment recommendation or plan for any specific individual.  By accessing this material, you agree that the Stock Market Companion will not be held liable for any actions taken by a subscriber or other parties.  You understand that the Stock Market Companion holds positions in the above mentioned securities.  Based on market related or personal events these positions may change without notice.

Furthermore, the Stock Market Companion, Inc. is a content provider and publisher and not a registered broker-dealer or licensed investment professional.  Our intent is to publish very accurate market information for an audience of subscribers (1000+ subscribers).  By accessing the Stock Market Companion website and/or using the Stock Market Companion products and services such as this Market Update and accompanying Watchlist, you understand and agree that the material provided in the Stock Market Companion products and services is for informational and educational purposes only, and that no mention of a particular security in a Stock Market Companion product or service constitutes a recommendation to buy, sell, or hold that or any other security, or that any particular security, portfolio of securities, transaction or investment strategy is suitable for any specific person.  To the extent any of the information contained in any Stock Market Companion product or service may be deemed to be investment advice, such information is impersonal and not tailored to the investment needs of any specific person.  Before selling or buying any stock or other investment you should consult with a qualified broker or other financial professional to verify pricing information and to solicit advice as to the appropriateness of a given transaction or investment.