June 16, 2021

Today’s action after the Fed meeting nicely encapsulated the hot mess that this market has become. The Fed apparently had nothing encouraging to say to the markets today when they released their latest policy announcement. In classic Orwellian fashion, Fed Chairman Jay Powell did try to strike a positive tone with, “The Fed is making progress toward its inflation goals.” Translation:... Read More

June 13, 2021

CPI inflation came in at a 13-year annualized high of 5% on Thursday morning, but as I discussed might occur, the market rallied on the belief that inflation will now begin to cool down. This view was also aided by the fact that 1/3rd of the CPI gain was due to rising used car and truck prices. Stuff stocks, homebuilders, and financials were slammed while buyers piled into NASDAQ... Read More

June 9, 2021

All eyes will allegedly be on the latest Consumer Price Index report slated to be released tomorrow morning, exactly one hour before the opening bell. Expectations are for a hot 0.4% to 0.5% monthly number which, for those able to multiply, figures out to 4.8 to 6% annualized inflation. How the government calculates inflation, however, has been a sleight-of-hand trick since the Reagan years... Read More

June 6, 2021

The Fed announced on Wednesday evening that it would begin selling the corporate bonds and bond ETFs it bought last year to allegedly keep the corporate bond market functioning. That was taken as a sign that the Fed was doing just a little bit more than thinking about thinking about tapering, and high-PE NASDAQ names were pummeled in response, sending the NASDAQ Composite Index gapping below its... Read More

June 2, 2021

This week has so far seen the market stall and churn, with perhaps the best strategy being long oil stocks after buying them last week as they all mostly gapped higher yesterday on a positive OPEC report. Most of the patterns weren’t screaming buy at that time, however. The only way to play the move yesterday would have been to buy them Friday or jump on them early in the day yesterday... Read More

May 30, 2021

The venerable investment firm Goldman Sachs (GS), which others may pejoratively refer to as being actually more of a bankster, released small-lot trading data this week indicating that retail investors had come flying back into the market. Previously, this smart money area of the market (yes, I’m being facetious) was nowhere to be found, and their absence perhaps... Read More

May 26, 2021

This market strikes me as the proverbial hot mess. Inflation hopes and fears have dominated the headlines, resulting in some choppy rotation among individual stocks and groups seen as benefiting or not benefiting from inflation. This has meanwhile done little to change the fact that the NASDAQ Composite Index remains in a wide sideways range extending back to February without... Read More

May 23, 2021

The market remains in the soup, as I noted in my last report, as it chops around and looks set to move lower. In my view there is no reason to be long this market currently. If we take a step back and look at the NASDAQ Composite Index chart, we can see the clear double-top breakdown three weeks ago that led to a roughly 8% correction. That was good enough for an intermediate-term... Read More

May 19, 2021

The short-term, but logical, bounce off the 50-day moving average by the S&P 500 Index set the stage for a short rally that began to stall out on Monday. The index then tried to move higher yesterday before reversing sharply and then gapping lower today in an even sharper price break. By the close, however, it was able to maintain support at the 50-day line on what appears to... Read More

May 16, 2021

The market took a beating early in the week and the rebound over the past two days keeps the indexes in no-man’s land. For those of you following me on the Live Blog, and for those of you attuned to the short side in general, it was a very good week for the shorts. By Wednesday things were looking oversold, and the S&P 500 Index was testing its 50-day moving average, which... Read More