Pros Say: Sell Any Rally — But Play NatGas

The way forward looked bumpier Wednesday, as ING Bank analyst Rob Carnell said that 1 million jobs might be lost "sooner than you might think"; bad news came from firms as diverse as Alcoa, Intel and Time Warner. Oppenheimer's Meredith Whitney predicted that U.S. banks will have to raise more capital this year. And President-elect Obama announced he's creating a new post, chief performance officer, to control waste and improve efficiency. Experts told CNBC that investors should sell into any rally that emerges — and perhaps play the Russia-Ukraine gas dispute.

January Rally: Sweet But Short

Jeoff Hall of Reuters IFR has seen forecasts of the Dow climbing as high as 14,000 this year. The notion, he said, is that there is so much stimulus in the pipeline that the market can certainly "pull itself up by the bootstraps."

• Bookmark The CNBC Stock Blog

D.A. Davidson's Fred Dickson likes that the hedge-fund selling pressure has begun to subside. On the minus side, a blizzard of unfavorable earnings could derail the rally. Still, there's a sense of hope that Wall Street hasn't seen in the last six months.

Stocks, Dollar, Oil: More Sorrow Before Recovery

Bob Iaccino of Reagan Global Capital is not putting a lot of trust in the rally. He quoted a colleague who's waiting for the sector that's going to lead the market comeback, but hasn't seen it yet. He thinks government money going into the private sector is a good thing. Joseph Trevisani of FX Solutions said the world situation is not good for the dollar — but it isn't good for anyone else's currency, either. 

• Oil, NatGas, Heating Oil Prices Now

The Schork Report's Stephen Schork acknowledges 2010 is a long way off, so Boone Pickens's prediction of $100 oil in 2010 could well be accurate. But for now, Schork thinks oil will move into a selling range when it reaches $53.

Playing the News as Risk Tolerance Re-Emerges

Cantor Fitzgerald's Marc Pado sees a re-emergence of risk tolerance among investors, an encouraging sign of improvement in the market climate. He sees the pipeline dispute between Ukraine and Russia as something for an investor to play: it could give natural gas prices the spike that the market has been seeking.

We'll Return to the Rally After This Brief Bear Message

The corporate scandal in India and Intel's downgraded expectations are going to lead the market lower for a while, according to Robert Harrington of UBS. Economic stimulus programs will be in a continuing tug o'war with weak earnings, but the rally will resume after a short pullback. Cuttone & Co.'s Bernard McSherry said that if he sees a little short-term pop, he'll be selling into it.

________________________________
CNBC's Companies in the News: 

Intel

Alcoa

Family Dollar

Berkshire Hathaway

Cisco Systems

________________________________

© 2009 CNBC.com