Cocoa Records Strong 2018 Gains… Almost By An Accident of the Calendar

Almost three years ago, I seized on an opportunity to buy iPath Bloomberg Cocoa SubTR ETN (NIB) after it sold off steeply from a strong 2015. In that year, cocoa ripped ahead of the rest of the commodity space which declined 19% in 2015 while cocoa rallied 10%. In 2018, cocoa was another strong performer. CNBC … Read more

Above the 40 (January 2, 2019) – A Fighting Start for Stocks Gets Apple Pie in the Yen

AT40 = 11.9% of stocks are trading above their respective 40-day moving averages (DMAs) (oversold day #12)AT200 = 12.4% of stocks are trading above their respective 200DMAsVIX = 23.2Short-term Trading Call: bullish (with caveats all over again) Commentary $AUDJPY $AUDUSD $GBPJPY flash crashed. Could this ALL be #forex fallout from $AAPL revenue warning!?! pic.twitter.com/WZS10wj7D9 — … Read more

Fun With Numbers: Daily Trading Patterns for the S&P 500

Back in 2012 and 2013, I wrote pieces describing some interesting daily trading patterns in the S&P 500 (SPY). The effects looked big enough to matter. In particular, Mondays and Tuesdays showed outsized performance differences from other days in the week. The performance divergences were very large in the first 5 months of 2013 as … Read more

Above the 40 (December 28, 2018) – A Day of Relative Rest as the Stock Market Limps Away from 2018

AT40 = 8.8% of stocks are trading above their respective 40-day moving averages (DMAs) (oversold day #10)AT200 = 11.8% of stocks are trading above their respective 200DMAsVIX = 28.3Short-term Trading Call: bullish Commentary Trading is finally calming down a bit. From its high of the day to its low of the day, the S&P 500 … Read more

Housing Market Review (December, 2018) – Prices Are Still Too High

I saw a flicker of hope for home builders in the May Housing Market Review. Traders decided to snuff that flicker out very quickly afterward. When I wrote June’s housing market review and described a “struggling flicker,” the iShares US Home Construction ETF (ITB) was once again bouncing off the bottom of 2018’s trading range. … Read more