Technical Tuesday: Pfizer Inc.

Quarterly

Resistance of $36 is the line in the sand for this stock with a slow yearly build up to the level that was reached for the first time in the second quarter of 2015 after last touching those prices in 2004!!! The stock had been contained underneath its 13 simple moving average for some time after it had failed to poke above the $36 mark again during the early years of 2000 leading it into the crash of 2008 with bad sentiment attached to it. That served as a catalyst to drag the price lower which it did to just under $12 but subsequently marked the end of its negative spell.  

Since then we've seen a resurgence of price with an magnificent rally that trebled the company's value from lows to highs. The price has made steady progress with a firm uptrend that has held up well until hitting the resistance highlighted with a red horizontal line. The level identifies polarity between bullish and bearish sentiment as cited in the previous paragraph. 

A pullback away from resistance together with a strong bounce off the 13 SMA indicates good buoyancy remaining in the price. 

The 13 SMA provides a good measure of momentum with the recent quarterly retest a good indicator of whether buyers are sticking around in this stock which seems to be the case. Coupled with the MACD as well as the RSI, all signs point to the uptrend starting up again and possibly find the strength to break through the all important $36 level.    

Monthly

Looking closer at the monthly charts we see the strong uptrend seen briefly in the quarterly that's given bounce to the price in the last four months. This is an important factor since a healthy uptrend should be able to bounce back as strongly if not more so than the pullback. The MACD has remained above the zero line for some time indicating a good amount of bullishness involved in the stock. 

The yellow line which indicated the 13 SMA now represents the 50 SMA and in saying this the biggest clue to the direction of the trend. Price tested the moving average and spontaneously found vigour in the pathway upwards highlighting the buyer's willingness to snap up more stock at lower levels.

Besides this aspect, the placement of both horizontal and uptrend support congregated in the same area with the identical result suggests a number of trading systems had been anticipating the move which explains the hasty move we've witnessed.  

My expectation is we should begin to see a good fight for territory take place in weeks to come given the price isn't far away from $36. It'll be interesting to see how well it responds to levels above and on that price to ascertain whether we'll have a further up move on our hands. Considering the sector the stock resides in and the overall global economic outlook, it does seem poised to outperform.