Today's Major Market Move - Nasdaq Industrial Index Up 10% in Past 30 Days

It's no secret that US equities have done extremely well over the past few weeks. One of the best performing indexes in both the US and the world over the past 30 days has been the Nasdaq Industrial Index, posting a 10.2% gain.


The index has over 1000 components, so it's difficult to focus in on the companies that have given it the biggest boost. I perused the list and I found a lot of decidedly non-industrial oriented companies, such as Ebay, BJ'S Restaurants and Buffalo Wild Wings, so it isn't immediately apparent based off of the name of the index what criteria is being used to select the components.

It doesn't appear that the incredibly weak jobs data that came out on Friday will dampen positive expectations for U.S earnings season. If anything, it looks like it will strengthen expectations with the mindset being that companies are either able to boost earnings without adding new employees or they are adding employees in low cost areas outside of the U.S.

The index has eclipsed its high for the year and is also up 13.6% since the middle of January. With US GDP growth estimates continually being revised down, it will be interesting to see if U.S equities can sustain their fairly robust performance for the remainder of the year.



(Click on the images for a larger view.
Click here for the current performance of global equity indexes.
Click here for the current chart of the Nasdaq Industrial Index.)