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 The trading week started with a powerful jolt to the market. The major catalyst was a rumor that President Trump was considering a 90-day delay on tariffs, triggering a nearly 30-minute, $2.5 trillion rally. While ultimately unfounded, the rumor represented the kind of response markets expect: when financial markets panic, policy-makers panic. … Read more
Stock Market Commentary A good friend of mine introduced me to the phrase – now we’re cooking with gas! In today’s context, this phrase refers to some startling developments in the rolling crash in the stock market. The technical damage was thorough, unrelenting, and nearly merciless. Chaos in economic policy chaos has fully transferred into … Read more
Stock Market Commentary Today was a brutal day in the stock market. The only good news I can report is that market breadth finally dropped into my official oversold territory. However, “so what?” sounds like an appropriate question to ask in the face of deepening market angst over tariffs. For example, a headline from Yahoo … Read more
Stock Market Commentary There is no support in a bear market. The market is extremely volatile, and conditions are changing daily. The market is showing clear signs of weakness, with all major trends pointing downward. The mixed messages from yesterday (Thursday) are converging more clearly on the messages of a bear market. The long-term, mid-term, … Read more
Stock Market Commentary Reality bites. And right now those bites are clamping down on rotten eggs in the form of a swift repricing of risk. Once high priced eggs are now eggs few shoppers want. Last week’s theme of bring the pain continued in force at this week’s open: more economic uncertainty, more economic fears, … Read more
Stock Market Commentary The current administration’s policy of long-term growth through short-term pain in the form of austerity came into clear focus last week. I earlier introduced this concept in “Growth Scare or Overreaction – An Oversold Market or Something Worse?“. Last week, U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent laid out the strategy in detailed economic … Read more
Stock Market Commentary Stock market angst reached a kind of crescendo last week. Poor economic data and bad news – including a plunge in consumer confidence, a 180 degree reversal in the Atlanta Fed’s Q1 GDP growth projection from +2.3% to -1.5%, risk-off trading in cryptocurrencies (apparently due to a massive hack of ByBit), and … Read more
Stock Market Commentary Two weeks ago I wrote how a “A DeepSeek Dive and A Tariff Toll” created the next shift in the market’s technical outlook. I stepped back from a bullish position on the market as a result. Now, a familiar theme has unfolded with the stock market looking ready to leave its latest … Read more
Stock Market Commentary The week opened with market breadth dropping to within five percentage points of the oversold threshold. This was the closest encounter with oversold since late October, 2023. The stock market never looked back from there. A favorable mid-week inflation report helped propel the stock market with the assistance of declining long-term bond … Read more
Stock Market Commentary Investopedia defines the Santa Rally very precisely: “A Santa Claus rally refers to the sustained increases found in the stock market during the last five trading days of December through the first two trading days of January.” Based on this definition, Santa is failing…and just as the stock market risks a January … Read more