Welcome back, everybody. Hope you had a nice weekend. I ran across a data nugget this morning I thought you might find interesting... the last week of August is - on average - the lowest-interest week for the market every year. And I use the word 'interest' in the traditional/literal sense, meaning nobody really cares about or is watching stocks as of today, and won't care again until after this coming Monday (which is Labor Day, by the way). Now, I don't know who judges the lull in interest, and I don't know how they judge it. But, I don't doubt it. Folks just have their attention elsewhere, like getting their kids back in the school groove, wrapping up vacations while the weather is still wonderful, and a half a dozen other things that take priority over trading. What's it mean to you? Well, mostly it means don't look for a lot of volume this week. It also means don't look for any hair-raising moves from the market. You know what though? I wouldn't necessarily assume this is a bad time to get into a new long-term trade. In fact, I think the lack of volatility is a great time to wade into a new long-term trade. Anyway, a couple of major news items to look at today. One of them is the huge plunge in durable orders. Most of the 7.3% plunge in orders of long-lasting goods stemmed from falling transportation demand. Even without the drag of weak transportation orders though, durable goods orders dipped 0.6% versus an expected growth rate of 0.4%. Stocks perked up a little - early on in the session anyway - and I can only assume it was because the weak durable orders figure led traders to assume the Fed is more apt to keep its QE efforts going a little longer than it had originally been planning on (though the end of the QE program is clearly a moving target at this point). The other economic data nugget worth a closer look is one I mentioned in Friday's newsletter ... July's new home sales. The pace fell from 455,000 units to 394,000 units, which is the weakest pace in about a year. A problem? No, not yet. Just a red flag. Remember, existing home sales surged to a multi-year high pace of 5.39 million last month, which makes for quite a mixed message. Honestly, I wouldn't do anything with the housing numbers just yet. Both were at extremes last month... just opposite extremes. It could take another month for the dust to settle and for the truth to appear. As for the durable orders dip, well, the odds of a prolonged QE effort just got a bit better. Checking In We don't have time to look at all five open trades we've suggested for you guys recently in the newsletter, but I want to take time to look at two of them. The first one I want to show you is Manitex International (MNTX). This is the small cap crane company that somehow is finding demand even when its bigger-brother peers like Joy Global (JOY) and Caterpillar (CAT) are struggling. We posted it as an official idea back on August 8th, based on the projected 22% increase in revenue for this year, and a forecasted 13% improvement in 2014's top line. The forward-looking P/E of 8.7 is a screaming value, and an unusual find these days compared to its growth rate (especially from the small cap realm). That's not to say MNTX shares are bulletproof though. We got in when Manitex was trading around $11.10, and the stock promptly proceeded to $10.00. Normally such a move would be a reason for me to shed a holding. Not this time though. This time, the $10.00 line quickly became a support level, and sure enough, the bulls used it as a springboard for a new rally effort. If you look closely you can see the convergence of several key moving average lines around $10.60 is still trying to hold the stock down. The undertow is still plenty bullish though, and I've got a feeling this one is still well worth the risk as a short-term trade. The other chart I wanted to show you was that of Northwest Pipe (NWPX). We got into this one back on June 28th when shares were valued at $27.90. They got off to a great start and then tanked in early August, but like Manitex, I knew the underpinnings for more bullishness were in place with Northwest. Sure enough, NWPX has been rallying ever since the early-August pullback, and cleared the annoying ceiling at $29.74 with today's pop. I've got a feeling there's more upside in store real soon for this name... a stock that has a history of surging every now and then. Anyway, we haven't had a chance to tell you yet, but Northwest Pipe reported earnings back on the 16th. They were solid. Per-share profits jumped from $0.38 a year earlier to $0.59 this time around despite the revenue tumble of about 11%. The company says to expect even more softness for the current quarter, but honestly, I think NWPX is just setting the bar low. The fact that the stock's actually rallied in the meantime says other investors agree another 'beat' is in the cards. It may not even matter to us, however, since there's a good chance we'll be out of the Northwest Pipe trade by the time it reports Q3 earnings in November. Yes, we're still in Commercial Metals (CMC), Xerox (XRX), and most-recently, Kearny Financial (KRNY). I'm always looking for more good suggestions to pass along, but as you probably know by now, we don't always have time to keep you flush with trading ideas. You know who does have time to do that? Yep, the guys over at the SmallCap Network Elite Opportunity. As of today they've got twelve open trades, which is way more than I'll ever likely get around to getting (and keeping) on my plate here in the free newsletter. If you're looking for more activity and bigger winners, the SCN EO is the way to go, especially as often as they knock them out of the park. Between the 70% gain on Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) earlier in the year and the current unrealized 75% gain on BioTelemetry (BEAT), it's pretty clear these guys know how to go whale hunting. If you like big winners too, you should go along for the ride. You can even take a free two-week test drive. Here's how. Or, copy and paste the following link in your browser: http://www.smallcapnetwork.com/?vmpd_ckstr[click_track]=SCN+Newsletter&vmpd_ckstr_redirect=/pages/SCNEO/v1/ Yes/No How long does it take the market to not only wipe away a solid gain but actually drag itself into the red? Good question. Today it took just a couple of hours. The nearby intraday chart of the S&P 500 really puts it in perspective. At 1:15 pm EST, everything was fine. By 3:15 pm EST, everything was unraveling. As alarming as that is, even more alarming is how nobody can really point to any news or event and say "That's the reason." I know the unrest is Syria is getting increasingly serious, but even the usual fear-mongers are shrugging off Syria right now. The government's fiscal-ceiling debate has surfaced again too; the Treasury should be hitting its debt limit sometime in October. Again though, the U.S. government has cried wolf before, only to fix its problems at the 11th hour. Nobody actually expects Washington to not fix it this time around too. No, today's big bearish turnaround appears to have happened mainly because traders simply decided they didn't want to be buyers anymore. Now they want to be sellers. The fact that stocks turned tail on something of a whim is scary in itself... scarier than a fiscal cliff or geopolitical turmoil are anyway. As a matter of fact, I think we have to assume the non-news-prompted move's clues are even more trustworthy than a news-based jolt would be. That's why today's sharp reversal is so bearish. Thanks to today, the S&P 500 is back under its 50-day moving average line, and the VIX is back above its 50-day moving average line. Given how volatile things have been lately, we really need to see one more losing day for stocks to renew the bearishness we were batting around a couple of weeks ago. But, knowing that August and September are usually losers for the market anyway, the tide looks like it's going to turn bearish again without ever actually getting back into bullish mode. Tomorrow's going to be a critical day for the bears if they really want to pull the rug out from underneath the market. Let's chat again then.