In the ongoing bad-news-is-good-news saga, last week’s surprisingly weak jobs report led to speculation that the Fed would delay hiking interest rates, which is perceived as a positive for equity investors. So, bulls are getting a boost for the moment, although those previously hard-won round-number price levels for the major indexes are now serving as ominous overhead resistance that will likely require a strong new catalyst to break through. Whether stocks are destined for downside or upside from here, Q1 earnings season starts this week and will likely provide the catalyst.

Stocks have needed a reason to take a breather and pull back in this long-standing ultra-bullish climate, with strong economic data and seasonality providing impressive tailwinds -- and plummeting oil prices certainly have given it to them. But this minor pullback was fully expected and indeed desirable for market health. The future remains bright for the U.S.

With warmer weather arriving to melt the early snowfall across much of the country, investors seem to be catching a severe case of holiday fever and positioning themselves for the seasonally bullish time of the year. And to give an added boost, both Europe and Asia provided more fuel for the bull’s fire last week with stimulus announcements, particularly China’s interest rate cut. Yes, all systems are go for U.S. equities as there really is no other game in town.

Yes, the market showed significant weakness last week for the first time in quite a while. In fact, the Dow Jones Industrial Average moved triple digits each day. But it was all quite predictable, as I suggested in last week's article, and certainly nothing to worry about. Now the market appears to be poised for a modest technical rebound, and longer term, U.S. equities should be in good shape for a year-end rally. However, I still believe more downside is in order before any new highs are challenged.

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The sudden bearish turn last week in the market -- after hitting new highs the prior week -- has come fast and furious as selloffs are wont to do. And the pullback might have further still to go. But there are several reasons to expect a stabilization or bounce during this holiday-shortened week, and in any case I still expect that it eventually will turn out to be a great buying opportunity leading to higher prices later in the year.

Bulls continue to climb their wall of worry, as uncertainty from the latest “bricks in the wall” created by Russia in Crimea, slowing growth in China, and Fed tapering fades into the mosaic.

I suspect there is no greater example of “summer doldrums” than the week surrounding the Fourth of July, especially when the holiday falls mid-week. From my standpoint, I certainly have received my share of “out of office” auto-responses on emails. For bullish investors, this is usually a time for caution, as any apparently dominant psychology of the market can be misleading. For bearish traders, it’s hard to get much momentum going.

We come into the week riding a new five-year high for the S&P 500 and eight consecutive positive trading sessions.  But a busy week lies ahead with a bevy of economic reports and a boatload of Q4 earnings.  So far we’ve only had a peek at the first couple economic reports, and they were mixed with Durable Goods riding transportation to beat an expected 1.7% increase (after last month’s 0.7% increase) with a solid 4.6% gain.  However Pending Home Sales

Given the market’s performance over the last month, we feel that investors should consider reducing the more speculative portions of their portfolio.