The market has done a lot of backing and filling today after a 4.0% Santa Claus rally underscored there are buyers out there.  In fact, Citi is saying buy the dip now.

The question for 2019 is what will lead the way?

Consumer Discretionary is by far the biggest S&P sector winner, led by Mattel (MAT), which debuted a new line of dolls based on a hot Korean boy band.  At least that’s what the headlines say, but this stock popped periodically last year on takeover rumors.

Not sure that happens or not, but its clear buyers are flocking to much oversold names that lost their way guessing the worst is over.  General Electric (GE) appears to be the name getting the biggest bets on a big bounce.

Another reason Consumer Discretionary is rocking this morning is the bounce in Amazon (AMZN), which caught an upgrade to Buy at Pivotal Research.

The upgrade dovetails the upgrades last week on other momentum darlings:

• Netflix (NFLX) to “conviction buy list” at Goldman and positive scuttlebutt from Piper Jaffrey today
• Intel (INTC) to buy at Bank of America

Another potential leadership group could be value names that outperformed significantly last year.  Check out the total return these household names delivered last year.  While so many investors were chasing the hot new tech name, including several failed IPO’s, companies in business more than 100 years were still lining shareholder’s pockets.

I think 2019 will see more balanced leadership in a market that will otherwise remain very selective.

Technical View

Major indices sold off so dramatically, there is plenty of room to the upside before testing key technical hurdles.  For the Dow Jones Industrial Average, the key resistance point is 24,423 held on several pullbacks until it couldn’t hold anymore, which triggered the market to shift into freefall.   It just so happens that it is also the 50-day moving average, making it all that more important.

Dow Jones Industrial Average