ONE-TWENTY TWO: Trading Financial Markets
Exploring the poetry in financial markets for students of money and economy since the year 2000.
The bearish to bullish reversal ended for home builder stocks with a return to bear market territory. Today, October 9, 2025, the iShares U.S. Home Construction ETF (ITB) dropped under the threshold that defines a bear market: 20% below the all-time high (see chart below). The 2.6% slide on the day is part of a … Read more
Housing Market Intro and Summary What happened in the housing market for September, 2025? A rate cut fail unfolded as a resumption of rate cuts by the Federal Reserve failed to revive the stocks of homebuilders. This market reaction suggests that housing market data will remain soft for some time to come. Here is a … Read more
Stock Market Commentary In a flashback to August’s opening trading salvo, September trading started with a sharp pullback. The decline fit the standard theme of “professional” traders and investors returning from summer vacations to take profits from a market levitating on low volume vapors. However, sensing redux price action, the market’s persistent buyers jumped right … Read more
Housing Market Intro and Summary What happened in the housing market for August, 2025? The housing data remained stuck in slowdown territory, but the stock market followed through as expected on a bearish to bullish turn in the prices of the stocks of home builders. Financial markets are largely anticipating lower mortgage rates as a … Read more
Stock Market Commentary Last week delivered one of the most bullish one-day expansions of market breadth I have ever seen. On Friday, August 22nd, Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell spoke at the Jackson Hole confab and gave financial markets sufficiently dovish signals to reignite a rally that had waned most of the week. Big cap … Read more