President of the European Central Bank, ECB, Mario Draghi, today warned about continued risks to the European situation. Tax hikes and upward pricing pressures on oil are just the beginning, because the data, according to Draghi, may be signaling economic weakness in early 2013. Considering the SPX is near all time highs, a pullback may be warranted if the European situation escalates…not to mention if CDS start to be mentioned in the headlines too.

Moreover, Draghi also warned that Euro area risks continue to be skewed to the downside. Basically, should there be an adverse shock to their economic situation, it would probably result in negative growth and ever feared deflation. Traders will definitely keep their eye on the EUR/USD to monitor the Euro situation.

The technical picture for the EUR/USD seems to be rather bearish.  EUR/USD is roughly 1% away from its 50-day moving average. This level should provide a short-term support, for there is also slight trend line support there, but it will probably be short lived as momentum and fear gain traction.

Italian 5yr CDS are up 0.37% today.

Spanish 5yr CDS are up 0.16% today. 

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The earnings whisper is currently listed at $0.71 with the street consensus only at $0.65, so many people are not convinced and hopping on the GMCR bandwagon. Think about this fact however, the only major threat to the GMCR produced Keurig coffee maker is the Strabucks Verismo, which has had soft sales at best. Since the debut of the Starbucks machine only 150,000 units have been sold, compared to that of 2.15 million average quarterly units sold of the Keurig. Currently 25 percent of the companies stock has been sold short, but with good earnings a short squeeze could be in effect as bears try and cover their positions before getting hung out to dry.

The stock has also rallied six of the last eight times from earnings and more importantly, three out of four in 2012. The one trend that I have noticed on earnings, is that it either rallies hard to the upside or sells off hard and with that in mind, I can execute a trade that I believe will be profitable. I believe the stock is weighted more to the bullish side, however I always want to define and have proper risk versus reward.

HAS opened at 37.80 and has seen continued bullish activity throughout the day pushing it even farther above the moving averages that range from the 50 day to the 200 day. The earnings whisper is slotted at $1.21 currently, which is a penny higher than the overall street consensus, as investors are concerned with last quarter’s productivity. HAS suffered from lower-than-expected holiday demand and noticeably lower operating margin and return on equity. Revenue estimate of $1.28 billion were released earlier in the year, well below what analysts had expected and earnings estimates were also well below expectations, which sent the stock on a 5% downswing since late January. Other toy companies that have reported already, such as Mattel (MAT), missed the streets expectations and failed to provide sufficient evidence as to growth potential in 2013.

The only “bright spot” for HAS, was the release of a new Monopoly token, the cat, which drew attention to the product and increased chatter on Facebook. Is this really enough to help the stock rebound though? Seeing as how the release of the new Monopoly game with new token, is not set to release until later this year, what conclusions can I draw to make this stock a buy? Going into earnings I feel that the stock will miss its earnings estimates and am looking to position myself to the downside. At this time I DO NOT have a position on in HAS.