3 Charts For Investors to Watch Friday: Lucid, Foot Locker, QYLD ETF

Here's our daily look at three charts tied to recent news-driven price moves, with key technical levels to monitor.

Lucid Group, Inc.

Shares in EV maker Lucid Group (LCID) surged 14.5% on Thursday after the company said that it has assembled almost 800 cars at its Saudi Arabian factory, which opened in September, Reuters reported. The California-based company’s Saudi plant has an initial capacity to produce 5,000 vehicles a year, with plans to open a manufacturing-capable factory in 2026. Currently the automaker manufactures cars destined for the Middle East in Arizona before disassembling them to ship and reassemble in Saudi Arabia. The country’s sovereign wealth fund has a 60% stake in the company, with the Saudi government agreeing to purchase 100,000 vehicles from Lucid over the next decade.

This has been a weird week for Lucid with shares moving down on a number of big news events such as exclusion from the Nasdaq 100 index and the departure of its chief financial officer.

LCID shares broke above a key downtrend line in early December before retesting the initial breakout level. Thursday’s price action saw a resumption of the short-term bullish momentum, with the stock gapping above the 50-day moving average on the highest single-day share turnover since mid July. Looking ahead, it’s worth keeping an eye the 200-day moving average, which may act as a line of resistance.

Foot Locker, Inc.

Foot Locker (FL) hit the ground running yesterday, climbing 10%, after the athletic footwear retailer received an upgrade from investment bank Piper Sandler. Analysts at the bank see the company benefiting from leaner year-end inventories, leaving ample room to launch trending 2024 athleticwear merchandise, Reuters reported. They also pointed to the footwear chain’s increasing line of non-Nike products, noting that it reduces the company’s exposure to Nike’s (NKE) direct-to-consumer model, which has seen the sneaker maker move away from wholesale relationships.

The FL share price appears to have formed an inverse head and shoulders pattern, a chart formation that investors typically interpret as a market bottom. The stock indicated an upward bias yesterday by closing above a pennant that had formed around the 200-day moving average. Key areas on the chart to monitor include overhead resistance around $40 and a potential refill of two prominent gaps that have formed over the past month.

Global X NASDAQ 100 Covered Call ETF

Although the Global X NASDAQ 100 Covered Call ETF (QYLD) didn’t make a significant chart move on Thursday, it’s worth watching in today's triple witching session. Triple witching simply refers to the simultaneous expiration of stock index futures, stock index options, and stock options, which occurs four times a year on the third Friday of March, June, September, and December.

The event typically leads to higher trading volumes and volatility, which may suit this fund as it’s designed to benefit from increased market fluctuations by holding Nasdaq 100 stocks and selling calls on those holdings to collect premiums. Moreover, today’s triple witching coincides with the Nasdaq 100 index rebalancing, which may add further intraday swings near Friday’s close.

The ETF’s share price has failed to gain momentum after breaking above the top trendline of a descending channel but remains comfortably above the pattern. Investors should watch for possible triple witching/rebalancing-related spikes through the 200-day or 50-day moving averages that could turn out to be short-lived and potentially offer attractive entry opportunities.

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As of the date this article was written, the author does not own any of the above securities.