With all the noise surrounding U.S. elections this month, we have seen very little coverage about the recent surge in base metal prices. Sure, everyone is talking about gold hitting a monthly high, but don’t let the shiny metal blind you to what is happening with such base metals as aluminum, nickel and tin. You don’t have to travel too far back in history to see what has happened to U.S. stocks when those base metals start making some noise.
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November's Strategy Session will be held on Wednesday, November 3rd at 7 PM IST. As always, if you cannot make the call live, the video and slides will be archived and published here along with all of our past conference calls.
You guys know that I consider the S&P500 to be just one index in just one country in just one asset class in the entire world. There is a lot more out there. And while this might be true, I would also argue that this one index is one of the more important ones that we need to be watching. It is a good representation of U.S. Stocks, since the Dow Jones Industrial Average is just 30 names, the Nasdaq is tech-heavy and the NYSE Composite has a lot of international exposure. One can argue that the Russell3000 is the best representation of the U.S. since it represents over 98% of all investable assets in U.S. equities, but there is no liquid asset to gain exposure to it.
So today we are breaking down the S&P500, setting price targets and defining our risk management levels:
It's important to recognize what type of environment we're in for the market. During different times of the year, traders and investors tend to behave in certain ways. When you smooth out the data over many years, their patterns become clear. We all hear about, "Sell in May and Go Away", but what about, "Remember to Buy In November"?
Today we're focusing in on the end of what is historically the worst seasonal period of the year for the Dow Jones Industrial Average. So what happens next?
Every month I host a conference call for All Star Charts Members where we discuss ongoing themes throughout the global marketplace as well as changes in trends where new positions would be most appropriate. This includes U.S. Stocks & Sectors, International Stock Indexes, Commodities, Currencies and Interest Rate Markets. We have been bullish towards both U.S. and International stocks since early July and are seeing money rotate into new sectors and countries showing leadership. We will be discussing this in detail on Tuesday.
We will also be focusing particular attention to the recent sell-off in precious metals and rally in US Interest Rates.
This month's Conference Call will be held on Tuesday October 18, 2016 at 7PM ET. Here are the Registration Details:
With volatility spike in British Pounds, the more interesting story to me is how stocks are pushing up against the former all-time highs in 1999. Since that historic era in the stock market, British stocks have continuously attempted, and then failed to break through and finally make a new all-time high. The London FTSE 100 has been trying to stay above that historic market peak for almost 17 years.
Here is a chart of the London FTSE 100 going back to the late 1990s. The more times that a level is tested the higher the likelihood that it breaks. The reason is that there comes a point where anyone willing to sell at those levels will have already sold, ultimately leaving fewer sellers than buyers. This is when you get a "breakout":
This week high beta stocks are hitting fresh year-to-date highs relative to stocks with low volatility. This is a new trend, as lower volatility stocks did better than their higher beta counterparts in both 2014 and 2015. But this year has been a completely different story and it does not appear to be stopping.
Here you can see that while the S&P 500 was putting in new highs into May of last year, the ratio between high beta stocks and low volatility stocks had already peaked and was putting in a lower high. We are using the Powershares S&P 500 High Beta ETF $SPHB and the Powershares S&P 500 Low Volatility ETF $SPLV for the chart below.
The headline writers do their best to make you think that Gold is a US Dollar story. But in the real world, the one we're all forced to live in, Gold is a Gold story. It really has nothing to do with the US Dollar, and if you price gold in the other currencies, you'll see that very quickly. While gold might be struggling when priced in US Dollars, if you look at it priced in a weaker currency, say emerging markets, you'll see a completely different picture.
Today we are looking at Gold priced in an equal-weight basket of Emerging Market Currencies, specifically the BRICS:
Have you guys noticed that the prices of Gold and Silver have gone nowhere for 3 months? There's a reason why we've wanted to stay out of this market since early July and let them digest their impressive gains since the January lows. Knowing when to stay out of a market is just as important as knowing when to be in it. Opportunity cost should also be considered in the risk calculation.
Today we are taking a deep dive into Gold and we're going to look at things from all angles, all currencies and all time frames.
We take a weight of the evidence approach here at All Star Charts. There is no one data point that will suggest buying is more advantageous than selling, or vice versa. In addition, the process of collecting and reviewing that data, to me, is really the most important thing I do. There are no short cuts in this business. You have to put in the work and I share the results of that homework with you daily so you don't have to.
Today I want to point you to a chart that I've kept for a while, but have never really shared because I don't want to overwhelm you with too much data. But since we're at a critical point, I think it's worth adding to the Chartbook this week:
One of the things that impresses me the most about Technology is the fact that Amazon, a stock up over 70% since February, isn't even a tech stock. While some people like to argue that Amazon is a Technology company, and that may be true, it is not a Technology stock. In fact, $AMZN represents a 0% weighting in the S&P Technology Sector Index or in the ETF. Instead, it spends its days holding up the serial underperforming Consumer Discretionary Sector with a 13% weighting.
We trade and invest in stocks, not companies. So we'll focus on the supply and demand dynamics of stocks, and ignore the noise surrounding "companies". The big question I want to ask is, what would the Tech sector look like if Amazon was included?
You guys who have followed my work over the years know how many charts I look at on a daily and weekly basis. Believe it or not, it's probably even more than you think. Some things pique my interest more than others, of course, but it's the collective weight of the evidence that allows me to formulate a thesis given all of the available information. The specifics include price and sentiment data from stock, bond, commodity and forex markets around the world, most represented visually in chart form.
Sometimes there is a specific scenario in a given market that can impact the direction of the price of a lot of different assets around the world. Today, what I see in US Treasury Bonds is what I find to be the most interesting trade in the world. What is happening in this market? Is this a top in bonds and bottom in rates? Is this multi-decade uptrend in bonds finally coming to an end? It's hard to imagine considering you need to be older than 60 to remember a structural bear market in bonds during your wall street career.
One of the benefits of it being 2016 is that global markets are more interrelated than ever before. We can take price data from the other side of the world and use it to take advantage of domestic markets in the United States as well as many other countries and asset classes. To purposely ignore what is taking place in markets around the world seems irresponsible at this point.
Today we are watching what Latin American stocks are suggesting for the next direction in Crude Oil prices:
Earlier today I was on the Benzinga morning radio chatting with Joel and Dennis about the current market environment. We've been pounding the table bullish U.S. stocks for almost 3 months now and fortunately the market has cooperated with us. Technology has been the big leader along the way and I think this theme continues. Meanwhile, money has rotated out of bonds as interest rates have risen with stocks over the past few months.
We discuss this rotation and some of my favorite names in the tech space. Here is the interview in full:
Summer is seasonally a low volume time for the market, the big traders are on vacation with their families, playing golf with their buddies and attending various charity events in beautiful locations. Meanwhile, the rookies are at the desks with their hands tied behind their backs.
Now that Labor Day has come and gone, volume starts to pick up and the rookies are back to fetching coffee for the big boys. This year has certainly not been immune to this traditional September adjustment
As always I use my top down approach to first identify
Over the last few years, all we've heard from the financial media and economists are how we're in a "rising rate environment" and interest rates are going up. They keep averaging down on their irresponsible calls because they can. They have no skin in the game. They don't care about making money in the market. The media wants to sell ads and who knows what economists are thinking. As the great Warren Buffett said last year, "Any company who has an economist has one employee too many".
Meanwhile U.S. 30-year yields hit new lows in July proving all of their forecasts to be incorrect (shocking I know). And there is probably a good reason for that. They obsess over what the federal reserve people are saying, and blatantly ignore price action. Rather than focusing on what pays, they instead choose to focus on gossip from a group of people who never stop talking, literally.
U.S. Treasury Bonds have been a short for months (see here), but do we press these shorts or take profits? Today we're looking at what I think is an extremely powerful development over the past week:
Every month I host a conference call for All Star Charts Members where we discuss ongoing themes throughout the global marketplace as well as changes in trends where new positions would be most appropriate. This includes U.S. Stocks & Sectors, International Stock Indexes, Commodities, Currencies and Interest Rate Markets. We have been bullish towards both U.S. and International stocks since early July and are seeing money rotate into new sectors and countries showing leadership. We will be discussing this in detail Wednesday.
We will also be focusing particular attention to the follow through, or lack thereof, after Friday's sell-off in U.S. Stocks and the spike in volatility. Bonds have continued lower and will be a major topic as well.
This month's Conference Call will be held on Wednesday September 14, 2016 at 7PM ET. Here are the Registration Details: