ONE-TWENTY TWO: Trading Financial Markets
Exploring the poetry in financial markets for students of money and economy since the year 2000.
The last Housing Market Review covered data reported in April, 2017 for March, 2017. At that time, the iShares US Home Construction (ITB) was at the high end of almost two months of churn which included a new 10-year high. ITB has not hit “escape velocity” from its price where the U.S. Federal Reserve last … Read more
The downtrend for the iPath Bloomberg Cocoa SubTR ETN (NIB) won out yet again. Source: FreeStockCharts.com The buyers looked particularly convincing for NIB’s latest 50DMA breakout. Yet, a 1-2 punch of a return of good weather results in Ivory Coast and a particularly aggressive crop production forecast from Rabobank killed the latest rally for NIB. … Read more
The latest CFTC data on the Commitments of Traders (CoT) shows some important moves in the positioning of speculators. Australian dollar (FXA) While the price of iron ore plunged, bullishness on the Australian dollar (FXA) remained surprisingly strong. I am almost equally surprised to see this bullishness now in full scale retreat as iron ore … Read more
Before the sell-off from Trump Turmoil, there was the sell-off ahead of the Easter weekend that looked weighty enough to deliver an extended breakdown below the 50-day moving average (DMA) for the S&P 500 (SPY). Buyers came storming back after that weekend. Out of curiosity, I used SwingTradeBot.com to identify the strongest stocks of the … Read more
AT40 = 42.8% of stocks are trading above their respective 40-day moving averages (DMAs) AT200 = 54.3% of stocks are trading above their respective 200DMAs VIX = 12.0 (volatility index) – a 17.9% decrease Short-term Trading Call: neutral (bullish only after the latest Trump Turmoil reverses OR oversold conditions, potentially bearish upon a retest of … Read more
Another Presidential-level scandal has engulfed Brazil. On the morning of Thursday, May 18th, news hit the wires that Brazilian President Michel Temer was accused of bribery. The crisis deepened after Brazil’s Supreme Court gave the go-ahead for an investigation into the bribery allegations From Reuters: “Brazil’s President Michel Temer on Thursday defiantly said he would … Read more
I may have flipped outright bearish on the U.S. dollar index (DXY0) just in time. My change in sentiment started with my increasing bullishness on the euro (FXE). With the euro constituting about 51% of the U.S. dollar index, I realized that it would be hard to remain bullish on the dollar overall while adopting … Read more
AT40 = 54.4% of stocks are trading above their respective 40-day moving averages (DMAs) AT200 = 59.4% of stocks are trading above their respective 200DMAs VIX = 10.6 (volatility index) Short-term Trading Call: bullish Commentary Two hallmarks of this current stock market have been the 1) consistent weakness of sellers and 2) the persistent ability … Read more
In recent weeks I have wondered aloud why silver speculators were so bullish. In the latest Commitment of Traders (CoT) data it appears speculators are finally asking themselves the same thing. Source: Oanda’s CFTC’s Commitments of Traders In just two weeks, the level of net long futures contracts on silver have gone from levels not … Read more
A little over six months ago, I made a bearish case for Acacia Communications (ACIA) and Twilio (TWLO) based on the way each company rolled out follow-on stock offerings and the market’s reactions to the selling. Since then, ACIA and TWLO have fully lived up to bearish expectations. ACIA is down 55.1% from its offering … Read more