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 year’s Jackson Hole confab hosted by the Kansas City Federal Reserve delivered for financial markets. In his prepared speech, Fed Chair Jerome Powell issued an historic and classic sound bite for all of the history of monetary policy (emphasis mine): “The time has come for policy to adjust. The direction of … Read more
Just over two months ago, I aggressively bought ahead of an official trigger of the 20% rule for buying iShares MSCI Brazil ETF (EWZ). At the time, I explained my decision with three key reasons: I was also well aware that buying early subjected me to additional risks for the trading rule. Thus, I insisted … Read more
Stock Market Commentary Last week started with a calamity and ended with a restless calm. Critical trendlines held as support as buyers and bulls ground their way to a near full reversal of Monday’s loss. Ironically, the market even found relief in a “better than expected” weekly unemployment claims report. Claims fell 17,000 from the … Read more
Stock Market Commentary Be ready so that you don’t have to get ready. A perfect storm of fears converged upon the market at today’s open. Recession fears, deleveraging from the end of the carry trade, and perhaps even fresh geopolitical fears from the Middle East, spun the market even further off the road. Retail brokerage … Read more
Stock Market Commentary Welcome to the start of the stock market’s three most dangerous months of the year. A weak jobs report for July helped to send market sentiment into a sharp reversal. The bad economic news suddenly turned the prospect of rate cuts into something to fear. These rate cut fears spun the market … Read more
Stock Market Commentary Bears still look ready to bow out, but they still have their paws firmly planted on high-tech stocks, especially semiconductors. The market rotations out of tech are nudging enough stocks higher, especially small caps, to rechallenge the threshold defining overbought conditions for market breadth. The stark divergence in stocks greatly reduces the … Read more
Stock Market Commentary The week’s trading was punctuated by a single day with an all-time high on the S&P 500 and the NASDAQ in the wake of strong readings on the May S&P Global US Services PMI and the May ISM Non-Manufacturing Index. Unfortunately, that price milestone failed to change the contour of market breath … Read more
Earlier this week, the iShares MSCI Brazil ETF (EWZ) tested its October, 2023 low. This test of support stopped just short of a 20% correction from the last high set on December 19, 2023. At the closing low, EWZ reached an 18.3% pullback from that last high. I decided to pull an early trigger on … Read more
Stock Market Commentary A plunge in market breadth on Wednesday made me expect a more bearish take on the markets for my next blog post. A sharp rebound led by strong earnings from various retail companies, quickly changed the narrative from a continued NVDA hangover to a bullish divergence and then a bullish setup. Friday’s … Read more
Stock Market Commentary I looked to last week’s earnings from NVIDIA Corporation (NVDA) with great anticipation. The indices gathered momentum with all-time highs and seemed to point to a big moment for NVDA. NVDA did indeed have a big moment, but it helped precious few. In fact, NVDA’s gain looked like a net loss. Buyer’s … Read more