ONE-TWENTY TWO: Trading Financial Markets
Exploring the poetry in financial markets for students of money and economy since the year 2000.
Stock Market Commentary Instead of climbing a wall of worry, the market is climbing a wall of frustration (I stole that from a friend of mine). No matter what economic indicators bears stare at to declare impending doom, the jobs market just keeps coming in hot month-after-month. While a widening swath of stocks are breaking … Read more
Stock Market Commentary A decisive end to the extended overbought period signaled the arrival of bearish conditions last week. Bears boldly sold for one more day before a “stock bulls taunt” forced suddenly hesitant bears into a partial retreat. A sharp market divergence is now taking hold. While the major indices rallied off support and … Read more
Stock Market Commentary Last month, the stock market seemed to conclude that the threat of inflation had all but disappeared. Given the resulting celebration is one of the key drivers of the current extended overbought rally, today’s report on December’s CPI (Consumer Price Index) took on some significance. So when CPI missed “expectations” on the … Read more
Stock Market Commentary Signature stock market moments capped a remarkable year for the stock market. Two months of nearly relentless buying delivered a stunning 70% of the gains for the S&P 500 in 2023 after bulls exploded out of oversold trading conditions. Housing-related stocks soared even more as financial markets celebrate the presumed end of … Read more
Stock Market Commentary After the stock market rally suffered strike one and strike two, Wednesday’s sudden pullback had all the signatures of a third strike to start the end of the extended overbought rally. Sellers surged in the final 90 minutes of trading that day. However, they failed to sustain the stampede for the exits. … Read more
Stock Market Commentary Downtrends are over. Bullish breakouts abound. Sellers got one chance last week to try to keep the cork in the bottle of the oversold bounce, but they failed. The stock market insisted on pushing right through. With little time to rest, the S&P 500 and the NASDAQ ended the week with major … Read more
Stock Market Commentary A bear market intrusion upset the dynamics of this oversold period. The NASDAQ is back in bear market territory. Both the NASDAQ and the S&P 500 broke down below their respective 200-day moving averages (DMAs) (the blue line in the charts below) and entered “correction” territory which is 10% below the 52-week … Read more
Stock Market Commentary “This may be the most dangerous time the world has seen in decades.” This statement from Jamie Dimon, CEO of JPMorgan Chase (JPM), concluded his commentary on the bank’s Q3 earnings report. These words on Friday morning fittingly concluded a sobering week that started with tragedy and war raging in Gaza and … Read more
Introduction I recorded a quick video to summarize my thoughts on today’s flip from bearish to bullish sentiment thanks to a bad news is good news kind of day. You can watch the video or read the transcript below curated, corrected, and organized by ChatGPT4 and then edited further by me. I am using this … Read more
Stock Market Commentary Stocks stumbled their way through a week fraught with hopes and fears for Fed Chair Jerome Powell’s speech at Jackson Hole. With looming oversold conditions, the most significant technical event occurred with a bearish engulfing right under important resistance levels for both the S&P 500 and the NASDAQ. The relief buying that … Read more