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 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 The stock market put an exclamation point on the end of the previous week’s statement performance. Market breadth made an important breakout to a 2-month high and almost looks ready to return to overbought conditions. Such a milestone would finally align my favorite technical indicator with the relentless strength in the stock … Read more
This year has been a surprisingly good year for speculating. The race to the end of 2023 looked like it priced in a lot of good news, but the good news (in price action) continues apace year-to-date. Thus, I decided to take a fresh look at last year’s claim: “Renaissance IPO ETF A Less Volatile … Read more
Sometimes it pays to be stubborn. In December, I asked whether Beyond Meat (BYND) would be the speculative trade of the new year. I presented a simple thesis that managed to work out. However, the path from A to B was totally unexpected, and I broke rules along the way. In response to earnings, BYND … Read more
I am a strong advocate for paying attention to the message in price action. In this blog, I recount example after example of how and why price action matters for both short-term trades and long-term investments. One of my favorite suspects is non-confirming price action, especially when negative price action betrays good news. When a … Read more
I have a good friend that comes up with interesting theories about relationships in the stock market. Recently, he claimed that “more often than not”, on a day where the big cap stocks gain and the iShares Russell 2000 ETF (IWM) does not gain, IWM will experience a daily gain on the next trading day. … Read more
Stock Market Commentary Instead of climbing a wall of worry, the market is climbing a wall of frustration (I stole that from a friend of mine). No matter what economic indicators bears stare at to declare impending doom, the jobs market just keeps coming in hot month-after-month. While a widening swath of stocks are breaking … Read more
Stock Market Commentary Signature stock market moments capped a remarkable year for the stock market. Two months of nearly relentless buying delivered a stunning 70% of the gains for the S&P 500 in 2023 after bulls exploded out of oversold trading conditions. Housing-related stocks soared even more as financial markets celebrate the presumed end of … Read more
Stock Market Commentary For traders like myself who follow market cycles from extreme fear to extreme euphoria, last week’s trading action was astonishing. The stock market was already well overbought and stretched going into Wednesday’s Federal Reserve meeting. Yet, buyers STILL managed to go into extreme stretch mode. The Federal Reserve essentially declared the death … Read more
Stock Market Commentary I have been a long-time skeptic of Beyond Meat (BYND) but a technical turn of events attracted me to a potential speculative trade in the stock. Combining a positive post-earnings reaction, a confirmed breakout, and today’s push higher above a consolidation period, BYND took on the look of a stock that can … Read more