ONE-TWENTY TWO: Trading Financial Markets
Exploring the poetry in financial markets for students of money and economy since the year 2000.
A Breakout and Reversal The price of cocoa has had a wild two months. Last month’s breakout quickly turned into a fade and an outright sell-off in December. The result for the iPath Bloomberg Cocoa SubTR ETN (NIB) is a complete reversal of the breakout, a return to the bottom of the previous consolidation range, … Read more
I believe there is an old Wall Street adage that describes the inevitability of a stock hitting $100 once it gets “close enough” to that price level. One hundred is a nice round number, and it looks like a major (psychological) milestone. So when both Nike (NKE) and Carmax (KMX) suffered post-earnings pullbacks from around … Read more
AT40 = 56.9% of stocks are trading above their respective 40-day moving averages (DMAs)AT200 = 55.7% of stocks are trading above their respective 200DMAsVIX = 12.6Short-term Trading Call: neutral Stock Market Commentary It appears China and the U.S. finally agreed on a Partial, Phase One Trade Deal. The bare bones basics on the deal consist … Read more
During its earnings call, LGI Homes (LGIH) projected strong performance ahead. The company’s December home closings report delivered. LGI Homes closed 748 homes last month. The 49.6% year-over-year growth contributed to an 18.0% year-over-year overall growth rate in home closings for the first eleven months of 2019. The stock market responded positively by sending LGIH … Read more
AT40 = 48.5% of stocks are trading above their respective 40-day moving averages (DMAs)AT200 = 50.2% of stocks are trading above their respective 200DMAsVIX = 16.0 (up 7.0% and went as high as 18.0)Short-term Trading Call: neutral Stock Market Commentary It was fun for the short time it lasted. The speculative turn in the stock … Read more
AT40 = 58.7% of stocks are trading above their respective 40-day moving averages (DMAs)AT200 = 55.4% of stocks are trading above their respective 200DMAsVIX = 11.9Short-term Trading Call: neutral Stock Market Commentary If “cautiously neutral” made sense, I would make that description my short-term trading call. Last week’s trading action motivated me to observe that … Read more
The Breakdown Big events can create distinct trading goalposts. Elon Musk’s big reveal for the Cybertruck created the next big goalpost for Tesla (TSLA). The event delivered a bonus with the amount of derision and scorn heaped upon the stark and sharp ugliness of the truck and the big double fail on the test of … Read more
The Timing and the Stock Charts During the analyst conference call explaining the deal to buy William Lyon Homes (WLH), CEO Sheryl Palmer revealed that Taylor Morrison Home Company (TMHC) began buy-out talks several months ago. That was a time of rising optimism for home builders. The announcement of the deal came shortly after investors … Read more
Housing Market Intro/Summary The stocks of home builders are starting to fail their moment of truth. A Moment of Truth Looming Ever Larger On October 25th, the iShares Dow Jones Home Construction ETF (ITB) hit a 21-month high that coincided exactly with a major multi-year peak and post-recession high from January, 2018. The sellers showed … Read more
In late August, I wrote about a bad turn for the Turkish lira. Over two months later, the lira is around the same price levels in USD/TRY and EUR/TRY – two key pairs for the lira – but the path to this point has featured plenty of volatility. From a technical perspective, USD/TRY is testing … Read more