ONE-TWENTY TWO: Trading Financial Markets
Exploring the poetry in financial markets for students of money and economy since the year 2000.
Housing Market Intro and Summary This edition of “What Happened in the Housing Market” is truncated again because the shutdown of the Federal government. Yet, the shutdown did not prevent the stocks of home builders from outperforming the rest of the stock market for the month. Optimism over lower interest rates, improved affordability metrics, and … Read more
Housing Market Intro and Summary This edition of “What Happened in the Housing Market” is truncated because the shutdown of the Federal government prevented the release of data from the U.S. Census Bureau. The Census Bureau is responsible for reports on housing starts and new home sales. The remaining data in this month’s post depicts … Read more
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
Stock Market Commentary If you followed December’s deterioration in market breadth and/or paid attention to the inflation numbers and the smoke signals from the Federal Reserve, today’s market sell-off does not surprise you. What surprises me at the time of writing is the complete collapse in market breadth. The stock market essentially plunged from euphoria … Read more
Stock Market Commentary The stock market poetically swung from the depths of despair with a seasonal September drawdown to a sharp rebound in giddy anticipation of rate cuts from the Federal Reserve on Wednesday. The highly anticipated meeting has the potential to set the market’s tone for the remainder of the year. If Chair Jerome … Read more