Palo Alto Networks, Inc. (PANW)

The stock market raced higher on the last day of March, cutting into both monthly and quarterly losses that were quite ugly just a day earlier. It seems like President Trump may have had enough of low stock prices, high energy costs, and the possible political cost from the war in Iran. Interpreting his position is an increasingly interesting task -- but for at least a day, stocks rallied based on what appeared to be a goal to end the war sooner than later, even if there is not a full opening of the Strait of Hormuz. Despite the huge one-day gains, the intermediate-term technical trend for stocks remains difficult. Positioning has become, at times, the most important dynamic to monitor on Wall Street. Indeed, going into month end, we saw quite a few reports that hedge funds have been huge sellers of late. And when everyone is on one side of the fence, all you need is a spark for trigger-happy traders and algorithms to not only cover their shorts, but often buy into price strength. The S&P 500 (SPX) blasted higher by almost 3% on Tuesday, the Nasdaq popped 3.8%, and the Nasdaq 100 reclaimed 3.4%. Those are the largest one-day moonshots since May 12, 2025 (which was about five weeks after the tariff plunge). There is a lot of resistance overhead. So if this is the start of a bullish reversal, it's difficult to pick one level that could make or break the attempted rally. SPX chart resistance starts at 6,540 (intraday high) with the next stop at 6,720. The 21-day exponential and 200-day simple averages lie between 6,613 and 6,639. (Mark Arbeter, CMT)

The Vickers Top Buyers & Sellers is a daily report that identifies the five companies the largest insider purchase transactions based on the dollar value of the transactions as well as the five companies the largest insider sales transactions based on the dollar value of the transactions.

Palo Alto Networks is a platform-based cybersecurity vendor with product offerings covering network security, cloud security, and security operations. The California-based firm has more than 80,000 enterprise customers across the world, including more than three-fourths of the Global 2000.

On Monday, stocks finally got some relief from the oil markets, as WTI declined 4.6% to $94/barrel and Brent dropped 2.6% to $100.50/barrel. The S&P 500, S&P 100, Nasdaq, and Nasdaq 100 all bounced 1% to 1.2% on broad sector strength. Information Technology led, rising 1.5%, Consumer Discretionary rose 1.2%, Industrials added 0.9%, and Financial, Healthcare, Real Estate, and Communication Services all gained 0.8%. While the overall technicals remain questionable for the major indices, we are seeing some clear washouts in sentiment and market breadth. According to Goldman Sachs, short exposure across macro products -- index futures and ETFs combined -- has climbed to the highest level since September 2022, an extreme positioning that could easily set the stage for an explosive short squeeze. As well, during the week of March 3 to 10, asset managers dumped $36.2 billion of S&P futures according to the Commitment of Traders (COT) data, the largest notional liquidation in more than a decade. In other words, the institutional crowd did not just trim sails -- they hauled down the canvas and ran for the lifeboats, marking the biggest retreat in futures exposure in over 10 years. Last Thursday, the SPX's McClellan Oscillator declined to an extreme oversold condition of -95, the most oversold since December 2024 and April 2024 and more oversold than April 2025 during the tariff tantrum. The NYSE McClellan Oscillator has dropped to -88, the lowest reading since April 2025. The oscillator measures breadth using the difference between the 19-day and 39-day exponential moving averages of net advances. (Mark Arbeter, CMT)