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 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 The S&P 500 (SPY) is up 3.0% since summer trading began the day after the Memorial Day weekend. If not for the poor market breadth, the rally would look like a repeat of last year’s summer of loving stocks (sorry sell in May and go away folks). Semiconductor stocks, particularly NVIDIA Corporation … 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: A little over a month ago, the prospects of a bottom for this bear market got me a little more interested in individual stocks. Unfortunately, the bear market rubble expanded shortly after that. Amid the rubble are crushed gems and false hopes. These stock charts follow up on my initial reads and … Read more
Stock Market Commentary: With the prospects of a bottom for this bear market, I am getting a little more interested in individual stock narratives. The bear market rubble is extensive. The gems are dispersed across a wide area. These stock charts provide one framework for sifting through the trash and the opportunity. {note: in this … Read more
Stock Market Commentary Waning market breadth weighed on a broad swatch of stocks last week. I was compelled to let go of some of my worst losing stocks. I feature a few of them in this inaugural Stock Chart Reviews series. My pace of trades will likely slow for the rest of the year unless … Read more
Stock Market Commentary The first trading week of November was action-packed. At the start of the week I looked ahead to monetary policy from the Federal Reserve and the October jobs report as key catalysts. While those events were indeed important, the stock market was treated to an overlay of at least two other important … Read more
The Bullish Engulfing Pattern A bullish engulfing pattern is a candlestick chart pattern used in technical analysis. According to SwingTradeBot, the chart pattern “forms when a small black candlestick is followed by a large white candlestick that completely eclipses or engulfs the previous candlestick’s real body.” Most importantly, the pattern can signal the end of … Read more
Stock Market Commentary The stock market is a cauldron of contradictions and divergences. Breakdowns below key support levels abound. Stocks suffer post-earnings fades even after companies report strong results, especially in both beaten up growth stocks and resilient big cap tech. Yet, the S&P 500 just rises above the steady erosion of market breadth with … Read more
Stock Market Statistics AT40 = 48.2% of stocks are trading above their respective 40-day moving averages (DMAs) AT200 = 51.5% of stocks are trading above their respective 200DMAs (8-month high) VIX = 29.6. (a plunge of 16.8%) Short-term Trading Call: neutral (downgrade from cautiously bullish) Stock Market Commentary At the time of writing, the U.S. … Read more