Santa Failed, Bulls Winning and Silver Warning
Sorry I did not publish on Wednesday. Between reconciling December, Q4 and 2025 along with being in IT hell with Microsoft Outlook and trying to serve clients which is my mission, things got crazy. If you happen to be an Outlook savant, please, please email me. FYI, I am traveling south next week so my publishing may be off, especially on Monday with a 6:30am flight. Migraine, here we come!
Rumor has it that the Supreme Court is going to release its ruling on the legality of Trump’s tariffs today. Even if I knew the ruling, which I do not, I couldn’t even speculate on market reaction. Yes, I do know. Less money into the treasury. Surtax removed which would lower prices one time. Let’s see what happens.
The Santa Claus Rally ended and, as expected, few pundits are discussing it when it actually is supposed to matter. Here is what is fact. The Dow, S&P 400 and Russell 2000 were all up over the 7-day period. The NASDAQ 100 was down. The S&P 500 which is what the SCR is based on was -0.03%. By the letter of the system, Santa did not call and something negative is brewing for Q1 or the first half of 2026. Now, common sense dictates that we have at least a little skepticism on -0.03%. I mean, the S&P could have slightly ticked higher and it would not have been negative.
My thesis on the stock market remains the same. Buy weakness. Stocks are on the next leg higher. January should be a good month. Of course, we will have bouts of volatility and even, heaven forbid, a mild pullback. Leadership remains very strong with semis, banks, discretionary and transports all in sync. Junk bonds made a new high. This is not the type of behavior seen before bear markets, crashes or large declines.
The last time I warned about silver, it immediately dumped 15% in October. I am warning again. It’s frothy. People are greedy and giddy. Smart money is selling.
Sometimes my schedule is nice and quiet with relaxing evenings at home. And then there’s now. January, especially the first half, is our busiest month. UCONN basketball games. Board meetings. And now I think I bit off a little more than I can chew by co-chairing our search committee to hire a new rabbi. We have had interviews every day from roughly 4:30 to whenever over Zoom all week. This weekend, the middle guy moves to New Hampshire to begin a 6-month job through his college in software engineering. His parents will be moving him. His father which would be me is planning on driving to Vermont Saturday night to ski Sunday morning before racing back for a rabbinic interview on Sunday afternoon. Then travel starts Monday morning. As I have said for decades, I can sleep when I am dead.
On Monday we bought RSPS, more IYR and more QQQ. We sold SSO, EMB and some XLU. On Tuesday we bought more QQQ, QLD, MQQQ, JNK, RSPS and TDAQ. On Wednesday we bought SSO and more EPU. We sold VNM, some XLU and some IYT. On Thursday we bought more IYR and RSPS. We sold VGK.
