Cardano was the talk of the town last week.

Even though our initial target of 2.20 was hit within a matter of days, let's not underestimate the implications of this base:

With a breakout of this magnitude, this thing could be at $10 in no time.

It's no joke.

But it's not just Cardano showing incredible leadership right now.

If you're solely focused on Ethereum and Bitcoin, you're not seeing the whole picture.

We retired our "Five Bull Market Barometers" in mid-July last year to make room for a new weekly post that's focused on the three most important charts for the week ahead.

This is that post, so let's jump into this week's edition.

"Technician" vs "Chartist"

These are two terms that are often used interchangeably: Technician and Chartist. But many times it’s wrong to do so. You see, all chartists are technicians by definition, but not all technicians are chartists.

What is a chart?

For me, a chart is just a visual representation of the changes in equilibrium between supply and demand.

That's all it is.

We don't have to pretend it's something that it's not.

How the chartist interprets the data on the charts is where the skill and experience comes in. The chart alone won't do much for you, in the same way that a carpenter is way better at using his tools than I could ever be.

What is Technical Analysis?

These are the registration details for our live monthly conference call for Premium Members of All Star Charts.

This month’s Conference Call will be held on Monday August 16th at 6PM ET. As always, if you cannot make the call live, the video and slides will be archived and published here along with every other live call since 2015.

Here are the details for Monday night:

It's Saturday Morning Chartoons time. 

This is the weekly post that aggregates all the charts we put together throughout the week and organizes them all into one, easy to flip through deck.

We came into last week wondering if we'd get follow through from Bank stocks.

I think we can all agree that we did. And not just in the U.S. but around the world.

Here are Regional Banks above those key 2018 highs:

There are few things as bullish as Regional Bank stocks acting well.

We went over all things Financials including new long positions in yesterday's note.

These look like uptrends to me:

How bad could things be if these European Banks are above key support?

...

You guys know that I use Fibonacci levels to help us identify targets and manage risk.

And you've all seen it work, with your own eyes, for many years. I have too, of course, as one of the gang here calculating these levels every day.

But I've never quite understood WHY it works. How come these numbers keep showing up all over Nature. Why do the prices of stocks and other assets keep respecting these levels?

When I get asked, I don't have an answer.

But if there's anyone I'm going to ask, it's gonna be Bart. So that's what I did.

And figured why not share this with all of you?

This was a lot of fun!

From the desk of Steve Strazza @Sstrazza and Ian Culley @Ianculley    

Rotation is the lifeblood of any bull market.

If a sustained uptrend is going to persist, then we need to have broadening participation... or at least some healthy rotation.

And that’s exactly what we're seeing within commodities right now. 

As the energy group chops sideways and base metals hang tough, we’re starting to see signs of strength from one of the worst-performing areas over the past year.

Softs.

Like livestock last week, it appears this group of commodities are ready to play catch-up as they turn the corner and head higher. 

Considering the fact that other groups are simply consolidating or correcting through time instead of price, we'd argue that this looks more like an expansion in participation rather than rotation. But it's really just semantics. It's all bullish at the end of the...

From the desk of Steven Strazza @Sstrazza and Grant Hawkridge @granthawkridge

In today's post, we’ll discuss some of our favorite and most important intermarket ratios and see what they’re suggesting for markets and risk appetite around the globe.

One thing we found interesting when digging through these charts is that many of them look a lot like stocks do right now. 

Sideways. Range-bound. Messy. But, within the context of underlying uptrends.

So these are basically just continuation patterns on shorter timeframes.

But, after consolidating for months and even quarters now, we are beginning to see some resolve higher… kind of like we’re seeing from stocks on an absolute basis.

Coincidence? Probably not.

We think this makes a lot of sense and bodes well for risk assets. Let’s take a look at some of these charts now.

Here’s one of the most important cross-asset ratios we track, and it’s a great example of exactly what we’re talking about. 

This is the stocks-versus-bonds ratio $SPY/$TLT:

...

From the desk of Willie Delwiche.

Consumer Sentiment for August was expected to be little changed from where it was in July (81.2). The actual data (based on responses collected over the first half of the month) showed consumer sentiment undercutting last year’s lows and dropping to its lowest in nearly a decade. While consumers’ assessment of current conditions moved lower in August, the collapse in the overall sentiment index was really fueled by more dour expectations about the road ahead. Consumer expectations indexes are considered leading indicators for the economy overall and the August collapse may point to increased economic headwinds as we head toward the end of the year.

JC has a short post up today about "The Oil Dilemma." He and I talked about this situation yesterday and I like the way it is setting up for a little premium collection to complement an existing position we have on the books.

From the desk of Steve Strazza @Sstrazza

Financials have made quite the comeback in recent weeks, with the Large-Cap Financial SPDR $XLF trading back to record highs as bank stocks around the world have fought to repair some of the damage endured during Q2.

We even saw regional banks break back above a major level of interest last week. The importance of this can't be overstated.

But that's just the US. What are financials doing in the rest of the world? Are they confirming this strength we're seeing from the US?

In this post, we’ll provide an in-depth rundown of what’s going on with this critically important sector--not just in the US, but around the globe.

Let’s kick things off with last week’s mystery chart. As always, thanks to everyone who participated.

We asked whether the recent highs were a false start or a failed breakout. The answers were skewed in favor of the bulls, as most of you said it was merely a retest of the previous highs. And it looks like you were right!

Here it is... the S&P Global Financials Index $IXG:

Do you have any exposure to Energy?

Then this is the chart for you!

It's Crude Oil stuck between 76 and 66:

How's the market done in 2021?

That's a tough one to answer.

And I'll tell you why.

January was still what most of 2020 was like. The environment isn't going to change based on the calendar year. It's going to do what it wants.

This is the video recording of our August 13, 2021, All Star Charts Crypto Weekly Strategy Session.

This is the video recording of the August 12th Town Hall Meeting w/ Willie Delwiche

08/12/21 2PM ET

From the desk of Willie Delwiche.

I enjoyed the chance to catch up with my friend Oliver Renick on the TD Ameritrade Network yesterday afternoon. You can see the entire conversation here, but I wanted to highlight (and expand on) a couple of things he and I talked about.

In the world of crypto, there's one overarching relative theme that governs the entire asset class.

That is, Bitcoin vs everything else.

Over the years, this simple trend has dominated the asset class for so long. Due to the sheer size of Bitcoin compared to the others, when it's in a leadership position, it scoops up so much capital that most of the other coins are forced to wait for their turn.

Could this change?

It would only make sense, especially as the market-caps of the other altcoins grow.

But as we said in yesterday's note, all we can do is look at what's in front of us, right now.

That is, this relationship is still the single most important relative trend for crypto traders to pay attention to.

We've talked in great lengths about this dynamic before, and the various way to visualize it.

The Ethereum/Bitcoin ratio, for instance, serves as a...