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The indexes continued the slippage that began last week, lowlighted by Thursday’s plunge that brought most major indexes below key support. As of mid-morning, the S&P 500 and Nasdaq are down about 4% on the week.

Alexion Pharmaceuticals (ALXN) reported positive results in a Phase 3 clinical study of ALXN1210 this morning, for treatment of Paroxysmal Nocturnal Hemoglobinuria (PNH).

The market’s strength last week and today’s calm action was enough to turn our Cabot Tides back to a positive stance, flipping the intermediate-term trend back to bullish. Given that the Model Portfolio isn’t holding a ton of cash, we’ll start slow with one new addition tonight.

Most of the stocks in our portfolio that are holding up well (and in many cases moving higher) are either rated buy or hold, and those that aren’t have already been sold, or are rated hold, and being watched extremely closely.

In light of all this week’s “Trump trade war” headlines, let’s review the U.S.-China trade news so that you can quickly grasp the facts of the situation. It’s also important to understand that as much as the media might try to portray announcements about trade problems as sudden, whimsical and dangerous, they are in fact long-studied, methodical, and inclusive of a huge variety of government, industry, academic and citizen input.

The market’s slide this week has put our Cabot Tides back on the fence. That said, most leading growth stocks continue to act very well. All together, we’re holding our strong, profitable stocks and looking at new buys, while honoring our stops and keeping a bit of cash on the sideline.

I noted last week that the outperformance in growth stocks was contributing to some underperformance in our portfolio. That situation has now been flipped on its head. Growth stocks started lagging in the middle of last week, and for the week, the S&P 500 lost 1.24%, the Dow dropped 1.54% and the Nasdaq fell by 1.04%. Utilities and REITs—year-to-date laggards—were the week’s best-performing sectors.

2018 banking regulatory reform will lead to 2019 earnings boosts, benefiting four of our stocks.

The recent rally has been enough to turn our Cabot Tides positive, as three of the five indexes we track are clearly above their 50-day lines. That’s certainly a positive and tells us to put some money back to work.

Jacob explains how insurance stocks’ behavior when a hurricane is approaching and after it has past is similar to how earnings or drug announcements can cause big moves in other stocks.

Put-Write is a strategy that many traders use if they are willing to buy a stock, though at a lower level than it’s currently trading at.

The selloff has put a fork in our brief Cabot Tides buy signal from earlier this week, telling us the correction that began in late January isn’t over. The recent bout of weakness isn’t totally surprising given the market’s V-shaped recovery.

The Boards of Directors of AXA and XL Group (XL) have unanimously agreed that AXA will purchase property & casualty insurer and reinsurer XL Group for $57.60 cash per share, a 33% premium to the March 2 closing price and a 59% premium to the XL share price when it joined the Buy Low Opportunities Portfolio on December 6, 2016.

It’s a very unique market environment right now. When looking at the overall market, the intermediate-term trend is basically neutral now, with most indexes a bit above their 50-day lines but firmly in the middle of their six-week ranges. That could change next week if the major indexes hold their recent gains.

The major indexes have traded lower this week—in fact, the S&P 500 is threatening to close lower all five days this week, which would be the first time it’s done that since before the November 2016 Presidential election. Even so, the losses have been modest, in the range of 1% or a bit more.

Given the mixed evidence, we think the Model Portfolio is in a proper stance, with about one-third in cash, but also holding onto a bunch of attractive stocks that could be leaders of the next upturn.

Small caps paused this week to digest a few wild weeks. The S&P 600 Small Cap Index is essentially unchanged since I last wrote, which I think is a victory at this point.

Our position hasn’t changed much since the start of the week. We’re relatively cautious (though not outright defensive) and stepping lightly as we wait for the market to confirm a new uptrend for leadership to take shape.

This feels like one of those markets that you’re not sure you should trust given how volatile it was in February. But the combination of revenue growth, earnings growth and decent charts, especially among growth stocks, suggests it’s best not to try to predict too far into the future. For now, the evidence in front of us favors the bulls.

The iShares EM Fund (EEM) bounced strongly in early March, which returns the Emerging Markets Timer to a positive reading. Granted, it’s not the strongest signal we’ve ever seen, but it counts. Quarterly reports are winding up, and we’ll take the Timer’s advice and return one stock to a Buy rating.