Stocks closed mixed yesterday with the Dow in the green while the S&P and the Nasdaq were in the red.

With the markets closed tomorrow for Good Friday, today is the last trading day of the week. It's also the last trading day before tomorrow's Employment Situation report.

At the moment, the consensus is calling for 240,000 new jobs in March (215K in the private sector and 25K in the public), while the unemployment rate stays the same at 3.6%.

Yesterday's ADP Employment Report, however, may have provided a bit of foreshadowing as they estimated 'just' 145,000 new private payroll jobs were created in March vs. the consensus for 200K. The ADP report does have a spotty track record when it comes to forecasting what the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) will say in their Employment report. But it is worth noting that ADP is expecting a drop from February's 261K.

It's unclear how a better than expected, or worse than expected employment report will be received by investors.

But we'll find out tomorrow at 8:30 AM ET.

In other news, MBA Mortgage Applications were down -4.1% w/w, with purchases down -3.5% while refi's were down -5.4%.

The PMI Composite report showed the composite index coming in at 52.3 for March, while the services index came in at 52.6. This was an improvement vs. February's composite of 50.1 and services at 50.6.

The ISM Services Index, however, slipped to 51.2 in March vs. February's 55.1.

Today we'll get Weekly Jobless Claims, and the Challenger Job-Cut Report.

Going into the end of the trading week, stocks are mixed with the Dow poised for a higher weekly close, while the S&P and Nasdaq are poised for a lower weekly close.

For perspective, we just came off of a strong up week last week with all of the indexes up by 3% or more. We saw a strong month as well. And a strong quarter. And since last October's key upside reversal (just 5½ months ago), all of the indexes are up by double-digits with the Dow up by 16.6%, the S&P up by 14.4%, and the Nasdaq up by 17.5%.

In spite of this year's recent volatility, we're off to a great start.

Quite frankly, the favorable seasonals had forecasted as much. In fact, the 4-year Presidential Cycle shows that year 3 (that's 2023), is the best year of all 4 years. Since 1950, stocks have always gone up in the year after midterms.

Additionally, history shows a high probability of outsized gains following a down year for the market. The S&P was down by -19.4% last year. It was the first down year since 2018, and the worst down year since 2008, when it closed lower by -38.5%. The following year in 2009, however, it was up 23.5%. And there's plenty of reason to believe we could see something like that again this year.

So you want to make the most of it.

That means getting into the right stocks and staying out of the wrong ones.

Making money in the market is easier than you think.

You don't have to reinvent the wheel. But there are a few tips you can use immediately on your very next trade to help you beat the market. And there's one in particular that can transform your portfolio. You can read all about it in my latest commentary...

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Best,