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 Feds delivered on Sunday as Janet Yellen promised. The FDIC, the Treasury, and the Federal Reserve joined forces to offer emergency financial backing and reassurances for the banking system, a kind of “Project Calm” to project calm. The Federal Reserve even came up with a new acronym that looks like a … Read more
Stock Market Commentary: Unlike the prior week, last week was all about the fundamentals, and the fundamentals made a huge difference. After failing to break through picture-perfect resistance levels, especially the 20-day moving averages (DMAs) (the dotted lines in the charts below), the indices were left vulnerable to selling pressure. The pressure started with Federal … Read more
Housing Market Intro and Summary In my last Housing Market Review, I described a housing market that shows signs of stabilization. That stabilization continues despite a strong rebound in mortgage rates. Mortgage rates now look like a renewed risk to the housing market. However, the uptrend in most of the stocks of home builders are … Read more
Stock Market Commentary: Put all the headlines aside. Last week was all about the technicals. Picture-perfect support unfolded for the major indices and stopped bearish momentum dead in its tracks. Suddenly, the stock market went from the verge of confirming a short-term top from early February to looking ready to make a run at challenging … Read more
Stock Market Commentary: Was the second trading day of February the peak for the S&P 500? After a 1.4% gain nearly finished reversing the losses from last August’s Jackson Hole, the index lost momentum. While the index churned for the following 2 weeks, trashed stocks from 2022 continued to soar. Even that momentum seemed to … Read more
Stock Market Commentary: This stock market is one bullish bear market. A bear market perhaps cannot get more bullish than the current market. Since the October lows, the various indices have shown a general upside bias. As much time that I have spent the last several weeks looking for excuses to get bearish, the market … Read more
My idea for a trade on the U.S. CPI (Consumer Price Index) report seemed like a great idea last month. Up to that point, the market experienced sharp swings based on the directional gap between the actual inflation readings and expected inflation. I used the Cleveland Federal Reserve’s “nowcasting” to generate an approximate trading model. … Read more
Stock Market Commentary: Last week ended the overbought period with a relatively strong report on initial claims for unemployment. The stock market – still freshly stung with the memory of the previous week‘s exceptionally strong jobs report – sold off sharply in response to the good economic news. A stubbornly resilient labor market continues to … Read more
Stock Market Commentary: On cue, the stock market groaned at fresh signs of economic strength, this time from another strong jobs report. The recession Wall Street wants is on hold yet again. The bullish intent that charged out of the wake of the Federal Reserve’s last statement on monetary policy made a sharp u-turn. The … Read more
Stock Market Commentary: The stock market oozed with bullish intent as it pushed its way through the latest Federal Reserve statement on monetary policy. While Jerome Powell made sure to stick to the script and introduced no surprises to the market, he was surprisingly reluctant to underline the Fed’s hawkishness. The market made a mile … Read more