Fed Trend Says UP, But They are Nuts to Raise Rates
Today ends the Federal Reserve Open Market Committee’s two day meeting where no action is expected to take place. Computer algorithms will be set to trade on any non-mention of the word “patience” or actual mention of the same word. Isn’t technology great?!?! As you know, I have done a fair amount of research of Fed statement days and the trend for today is plus or minus -.50% in the S&P 500 until 2 pm and then a rally into […]
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Date: March 18, 2015
NASDAQ 5000. Bubble or is This Time Different?
Almost 15 years to the day after the NASDAQ last closed above 5000, the index finally breached that level again, albeit for only one close, so far. That means that if you invested in the NASDAQ in March 2000, it took you 15 years just to get back to break even, which doesn’t sound like such a great investment. Between then and now, the NASDAQ lost 78% to its October 2002 bottom and rallied 351% to its recent high. That’s […]
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Date: March 17, 2015
Cash at “Alarmingly” Low Levels
As I mentioned in my 2015 Fearless Forecast, I view the bull market as being in the fourth quarter if this was a football game. While there is still a lot of game to be played, energy levels aren’t what they were in the first quarter and a few players have some injuries. And, the game could go overtime. It takes months and quarters and sometimes years for a bull market to peter out. The warning signs don’t all come […]
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Date: March 12, 2015
Is it Crash Helmet Time???
For the past three weeks, my message has been one of a little short-term concern against the backdrop of much higher prices to follow. That remains unchanged. Market sentiment had become frothy, meaning that too many people had become too confident in the stock market. We saw that in both the individual investor and newsletter writer sentiment surveys. Options traders were betting overwhelmingly on higher prices over the short-term. Corporate insiders were selling much more than they were buying. Traders […]
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Date: March 11, 2015
Sector Canaries Singing but Quietly
With the major stock market indices all in good shape beyond the short-term pullback, let’s take a look at the key sectors and two other important canaries. The banks are first and they remain mired in a trading range for the past year. Before the last bear market, banks peaked a good nine months before the major indices did. In the Dotcom bear market, banks topped a full 18 months before the overall market did. As a bull, it would […]
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Date: March 10, 2015
Canaries in the Major Indices Singing Loudly
With stocks scoring new highs lately, it’s a good time to pay a visit to the canaries in the coal mine and see if we have any dead ones. For newer readers, Canaries in the Coal Mine is a semi-regular piece when stocks are near fresh highs or lows to signal a potential major trend change or warning sign. This analysis is not good at identifying routine and regular corrections or intermediate-term rallies. In this first piece, we are going […]
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Date: March 9, 2015
Blue Skies
Another day, more blue skies for the major stock market indices. The pain for the bears has to be strong and growing, but I have yet to see evidence that they are throwing in the towel en mass. And price action has done absolutely wrong to suggest anything more than a trading pullback. As I mentioned the other day, I think it pays to be a little more vigilant here, not that I think we are going to see a […]
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Date: February 23, 2015
Time to Be Careful
Before I dive in, let me be very clear, I remain bullish over most time frames. Nothing has changed. Five straight closes above 18,000 as I spelled out on CNBC last week and many times over the past six months may create a slingshot to 20,000 this year. The bull market is old and wrinkly but not dead. Same old lines from me. The headline about being “careful” is more about the short-term and because stocks just broke out to […]
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Date: February 18, 2015
Lines in the Sand
The bulls are back to pressing against the upper end of the short-term trading range and should attempt to close above those lines in the sand. On the Dow, the level is 17975 on a closing basis while it’s 2073 on the S&P 500. Both are just a one day rally away. The S&P 400 already saw all time highs last week while the Russell 2000, long left for dead by the market, has a line in the sand at […]
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Date: February 11, 2015
Bulls Trying to Step on Bears’ Throats
Earlier this week, I spelled out three possible scenarios for stocks with one very bullish, one mildly bullish and one bearish. I gave most weight to the mildly bullish one and least weight to the bearish one. Right now, stocks are marching more towards the very bullish scenario although the Dow breached the lows I had discussed in the mildly bullish scenario. Looking at the five major indices, the Dow needs to close above 17,850 to set up a run […]
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Date: February 5, 2015
Bears Pulling a Pete Carroll?
The bears began Monday’s trading with the ball, seemingly just needing to breach the lows to force a wave of technical selling. It shouldn’t have been that difficult. After multiple intra-day reversals by the bulls stocks ended sharply higher on decent internals. While that all looks very nice and neat on a chart, I would have still preferred to see a clear breach of all recent key lows by at least the majority of the major indices. All we saw […]
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Date: February 3, 2015
Bears Trying to Run It In
Congratulations to the New England Patriots! I didn’t root for you, but a win is a win, even in the face of the single worst offensive play called in the history of big game sports. Stocks begin the week with the bears in mild control even following Thursday’s reversal. Early this week should be very key to see which way the short-term winds blow. On the S&P 500 and its weaker cousin, the Dow, price has declined to the same […]
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Date: February 2, 2015
Heading into the Weekend
Some of the pop in volatility this week is starting to be wrung out as the markets close the week. On Thursday we saw a nice reversal across the board, however the internal numbers were nothing to write home about. Additionally, I would have much preferred to see the lows from at 2015, if not December 2014 breached before the reversal took hold. That would have given a good flush to weak handed holders. For now, the major indices remain […]
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Date: January 30, 2015
Fed Day Model and Trend
The FOMC concludes their two day meeting today, surviving the “epic” and “historic” blizzard. The model for the trading day is to see stocks in a plus or minus range of 0.50%, but generally we see mildly rising prices until 2pm and then increased volatility with an upward bias to the close. The Fed trend is to be long the stock market from yesterday’s close to today’s close based on a variety of historical factors. That trend has an accuracy […]
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Date: January 28, 2015
Bears to Pounce at the Open
Stocks look to open sharply lower this morning on a variety of news events, although none that are singularly that bad. Greece is in the headlines yet again and frankly, if they are going to exit, let’s just get it over with. Their economy and market is not even a rounding error in the grand scheme of things, but a Grexit will open the door to the southern European countries saber rattling about an exit if they are not bailed […]
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Date: January 27, 2015
Lots of News This Week
While last week was certainly news filled, this week will be even busier as the northeast plans for another snowmageddon. At the bus stop this morning, our new neighbors who are from Dublin talked about the more than 10 cases of water they bought. When I stopped laughing, I asked them what they planned to do with all that water. And while they were at it, I asked them if they also bought canned goods and ammo! That conversation gave […]
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Date: January 27, 2015
Draghi & ECB Deliver
It’s a very busy week for the markets and economy coming off the ECB’s long anticipated announcement of Euro QE last week. On the one hand I thought it was smart to leak the $50B euros per month plan so that markets could digest it ahead of the official statement. It was also a great move to then exceed the number that was leaked by $10B euros. On the other hand, I am not in favor of this piecemeal approach […]
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Date: January 26, 2015
7 Years Ago
As I drove home from Vermont today on Martin Luther King Day, I thought about past MLK Days, which is something I would normally do to pass the time away. My two boys were in the back seat napping and listening to music and I had Sirius on in the background. I vividly recall MLK Day 1994 as it was the single coldest day I have ever skied at Mount Snow, -25F with 20 mph winds that made it feel […]
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Date: January 20, 2015
Early Warning System & January Barometer
With the first five days of January officially in the books, the Early Warning System (EWS) pioneered by Yale Hirsch is flashing a positive sign for the rest of January as well as 2015. The theory says that as go the first five trading days of the new year, so goes January. And as goes January, so goes the year. With help from my friend Carter Worth of Stern Agee (Carter did the heavy lifting and I peppered him with […]
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Date: January 12, 2015
Another “V” for the Bulls… Must Run from Here
As I have written before, since mid 2012 the stock market has seen more “V” bottoms than in all previous years combined. “V” bottoms went from being very rare to becoming the norm. With each successive low, investors are changing their buying behavior to accept the “new” behavior as the norm. In my view, this is setting up the masses for yet another 2000-2002 or 2008 style wealth decimation. So now that we have yet another confirmed “V” bottom, which […]
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Date: January 9, 2015
