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 This week brought a return of market calm across the stock market following a sharp but brief trade-induced shock. The episode began with President Trump’s threat of significant tariffs on Europe (and foreign-made iPhones), which rattled the market. However, that fear evaporated after Trump walked back his threats with a 90-day pause … Read more
Housing Market Intro and Summary What happened in the housing market in May, 2025? Tariff pressures and economic chaos subsided, yet the stocks of home builders did not benefit as spring failed to deliver sufficient demand to meet soaring inventories. Mortgage rates trended higher again and home prices continued higher. While new home sales reached … Read more
Stock Market Commentary Overhead resistance once prevailed over expanding market breadth, particularly over the past two trading sessions. The dominant headline was Federal Reserve Chair Powell’s warning about the difficult scenario facing the Fed due to tariffs. I interpreted his message as an intention to avoid responding as long as possible. For a market pricing … Read more
Stock Market Commentary The stock market suffered experienced a jarring selloff during the announcement of reciprocal tariffs from President Trump, a move that, despite ample telegraphing, shocked both investors and global trade partners. The Futures dropped sharply, with even oil down 2.4% and the S&P 500 plunging as much as 3% after-hours. This tariff crash … 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 A DeepSeek dive stole the headlines from the Federal Reserve. At the same time, tariff headlines refused to go away. Assuming you have already gotten your fill of DeepSeek headlines, I will just summarize the drama by saying a Chinese start-up has apparently completely up-ended the economics of the AI universe. DeepSeek’s … 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 The stock market poetically swung from the depths of despair with a seasonal September drawdown to a sharp rebound in giddy anticipation of rate cuts from the Federal Reserve on Wednesday. The highly anticipated meeting has the potential to set the market’s tone for the remainder of the year. If Chair Jerome … Read more
Stock Market Commentary The stock market’s bearish divergence is too strong to ignore. The S&P 500 and the NASDAQ achieved all-time highs while market breadth sunk again this week. Both short-term and long-term market breadth indicators are at key support levels. Even if market breadth somehow rebounds from current levels, I find myself getting yet … Read more
Stock Market Commentary April showers have arrived in the form of stockdrops instead of raindrops. After a near relentless push higher every month since November, the S&P 500 is down 4.4% month-to-date. Both the S&P 500 and the NASDAQ have confirmed bearish breakdowns and the ETF of small caps, IWM, is again in a bear … Read more