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 case for a sustainable low—but not necessarily a bottom—continues to develop. Today’s catalyst came from Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell, who breathed more life into market breadth. Market breadth continued its steady expansion. Over the past three of four trading days, there has been clear expansion in breadth, now reaching a … Read more
Stock Market Commentary After weeks of persistent selling, the stock market finally delivered bear market relief, with all major indices posting solid gains to end the week. Market breadth notably improved, signaling a shift in buying power that could indicate the start of a sustainable low. Note well that a sustainable low is NOT the … 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 A week ago, I concluded that the stock market had reached “oversold enough” trading conditions. Last week confirmed an oversold low as market breadth rapidly broadened and supported an all-time high redux for the S&P 500. Yet, this revival comes with important caveats. Uncertainty looms over the Federal Reserve’s next moves even … Read more
Stock Market Commentary The new year of 2025 got off to a rocky start with the weight of the last Federal Reserve decision on monetary policy pushing fresh losses across the indices. I assumed this price action signaled the market’s readiness to cash in on the capital gains that it did not want to register … 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
Stock Market Commentary The Federal Reserve took the stage right after the U.S. presidential election. The Federal Reserve and Fed Chair Jerome Powell delivered as expected. The unrelenting bulls had no reason to stop the momentum from the post-election rally. Powell stuck to the Fed’s script and unrelenting bulls kept charging. The uneventful meeting had … Read more
Stock Market Commentary Bearish engulfing patterns flag potential tops at the end of uptrends. They represent the potential exhaustion of buying power as price first opens above the previous day’s high and then closes below the previous day’s close. Thus, the latest round of bearish engulfing patterns in major indices and major stocks should be … Read more
Stock Market Commentary October is the third of the stock market’s three most dangerous months. October, 2024 started with a convergence of bad news tailor-made to fulfill October’s seasonal destiny: intensifying war and geo-political tensions, two intense hurricanes, the looming contentiousness of the U.S. presidential election, another failure from the overbought threshold (bearish according to … Read more
Stock Market Commentary In announcing the official end of monetary tightening, Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell mentioned some form of the word “recalibration” nine times from his introductory statement to the Q&A portion of the press conference. Specifically, “….it’s a process of recalibrating our policy stance away from where we had it a year ago, … Read more