Shifts are taking place for the first time in over a year.

Bitcoin just printed its second consecutive negative monthly candle, which hasn't happened since the Covid crash. Meanwhile, Ethereum was down on the month for the first time since September of last year.

Riding along in the Cryptocurrency space has been the ultimate momentum strategy. As a result, gains have far exceeded any risk asset by a country-mile.

But the same applies to the downside.

In the case where volatility's ramped up as it has, there's nothing wrong at all with sitting on heavy cash positions until a more definitive trend forms. If the history of these digital assets have taught us anything, it's that knowing when NOT to be in the trade puts us in an incredibly advantageous position.

Just take a look at Ethereum's monthly candle:

From the desk of Steve Strazza @sstrazza

This is one of our favorite bottoms-up scans: Follow The Flow. In this note, what we do is simply create a universe of stocks that experienced the most unusual options activity - either bullish or bearish... but NOT both.

What we mean by this is that we have options experts, both internally and through our partnerships with TheTradeXchange, whereby we do all the digging through the level 2 details and do all the work upfront for our clients, in order to isolate only those options market splashes that represent levered and high-conviction, directional bets.

We weed out all the noise for you in terms of hedging activity and ensure there are no offsetting trades that either neutralize or cap the risk on these unusual options trades. What this leaves us with is a list of stocks that large financial institutions are putting big money behind... and they're doing so for one reason only: Because they think the stock is about to move in their...

It's messy out there.

Breakouts are failing all over the place.

In recent weeks, it's been a tough time for any type of trend following strategy. That's because most are not trending, but rather in ranges.

When this sort of action unfolds as it has done, we play an exercise.

That is, we zoom out.

In all this gut-wrenching volatility, let's not forget the extraordinary gains this asset class has achieved over the last few years are astonishing, even after a violent 50% crash.

Consolidation is painful, but it's necessary.

Let's jump into it with a quick look at how the top digital assets performed yesterday:

I can't begin to tell you how many people have approached me in recent weeks laughing about how they're happy I'm back on the Gold train.

Why wouldn't I be? Our gold trades are working.

One thing I learned the hard way in this business is to do less of what's not working and do more of what is.

It sounds too simple but I can't emphasize enough just how important this concept is.

This isn't like a Roulette wheel of randomness. Markets trend. That's why Technical Analysis works, because we're looking for trends.

One thing we know about new lows is that they are not a characteristic of uptrends.

We know this.

So here's an update on that whole Growth vs Value thing: New Monthly closing lows all the way down the cap scale.

Commodities have been a part of the discussion for quite some time. As base metals and precious metals alternate between their outperformance, another commodity is now taking center stage.

Cotton has been on our radar for quite some time, but we've been waiting for a resumption in trend. Much like the equity market, cotton too was stuck in a sideways mess.

Well, it seems like that mess has cleared.

This week we're looking at one long setup in Cement. Commodities and Infrastructure are bouncing from crucial levels. We'd like to look at a name from this segment.

We retired our "Five Bull Market Barometers" in mid-July 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.

As Technical Analysts, our primary goal is to identify the trend. If it's headed higher, it's positive. If it's headed lower, it's negative, and if it's stuck in between, it's sideways.

Sounds simple? Well, sort of.

As traders, your primary goal is to make money. Yes, we're all here to learn, but isn't the goal also making money?

Follow the trend, trade/invest accordingly, and book profits.

Sounds simple? Well, not so much.

Risk Management is probably the most important and the most undermined concept in the market. A great plan can turn into a disaster with bad execution. An average plan can turn into a success with good execution. It's the execution of the plan. That's where the magic happens.

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

Here we are on Friday, and it's been yet another eventful week for the commodity complex.

Steel futures ripped higher. Corn was limit-up on Thursday. Lumber continues to digest its gains with the same volatile fashion it made them in, giving back another 10% on the week.

And then of course there's Dr. Copper which appears to have successfully defended former resistance turned support at its all-time highs from 2011. It's impossible to overstate the importance of how this massive base in Copper resolves.

Bulls definitely don't want this move to evolve into a failed breakout... The 4.50-4.60 zone is the line in the sand. 

As for Energy Markets... Crude Oil making its highest daily close since October 2018 might be the biggest development of all.

We’ve talked a lot about Crude...

From the desk of Willie Delwiche.

We had fun with this one all week. We can frame it in the context of Ford’s aggressive foray into the EV market or more narrowly as an expression of suburbanite luxury truck preferences. It fits well within the growth to value conversation as well as “old is new and new is old” themes. Even if it’s not seen strictly as a pair trade, it reflects a shift in investor interest and preference. After establishing a big base versus Tesla (one which looks an awful lot like an inverted head-and-shoulders pattern), Ford is poised to break out and move into empty space. 

What if these consolidations in Financials and Materials do NOT resolve higher?

What then?

We're continuing to see strength and leadership in the semiconductor space. And a name the All Star Charts teams has been high on for some time has recently begun to break out from a new consolidation. Being that the stock is also making all-time highs -- you know situations like this get me excited.

So heading into a long Memorial Day Weekend, we're putting one more position on the books to round out our month.

From the desk of Steve Strazza @Sstrazza

Earlier in the week, we held our May Monthly Conference Call, which Premium Members can access and rewatch here.

In this post, we’ll do our best to summarize it by highlighting 5 of the most important charts and/or themes we covered, along with commentary on each.

Let’s get right into it!

Do you see something else here?

Massive tops? Check.

Lower lows? Check.

Lower Highs? Check.

On the this episode of Bearish or Bullish we talk about the Crypto Crash and how when Futures opened up on Sunday, they didn't care. Stocks were actually up a little. That's the market signaling to us that there is no systemic risk right now in Crypto. And we're not even close.

That's probably a good thing, and more bullish for the Crypto space considering how much larger it would need to get to really become intertwined with Stocks and Bonds, which combined are over $150T in market cap. Crypto is only 1.6T, just to put things in perspective.

We also discuss the latest Minor Leaguers Report which scouts the farm system for Small-cap stocks between $1-2B in market cap before they get called up to the Mid-caps ($2B+)

Relative strength in Bonds and European Banks. But is that sustainable? What should we expect?

All this and why Chardonnay is the world's most versatile grape on the latest Episode of Bearish Or Bullish.

Enjoy!

This is the video recording of the May 27th Town Hall Meeting w/ Willie Delwiche & JC Parets

05/27/21 2PM ET

From the desk of Willie Delwiche.

Wall Street is a trend following machine.

We all know the universal disclaimer: past performance being no guarantee of future results. 

But what has worked recently always gets a ton of attention from Wall Street. And for the past decade, buying and holding US large-cap stocks has worked. 

If you’ve benefited from that trend, you deserve congratulations. Deviating from the principles of diversification and putting all your investment eggs in that one basket has increased your return and reduced volatility. To some extent, the worse your behavior (relative to theory), the greater your reward.

There is plenty of historical data that says that was not supposed to happen. But it did. Price is price, and we don't argue with it. Lived experience takes place in the space between theory and anecdote. That is where most actual investment decisions take place as well.

But we can only celebrate the last victory for so long before getting ready for the next game. 

From the desk of Steven Strazza @Sstrazza

Check out our latest Mystery Chart!

What we do here is take a chart that’s captured our attention, and remove the x and y-axes as well as any other labels that could help identify it.

This chart can be of any security, in any asset class, on any timeframe. Sometimes it’s an absolute price chart, other times it’s on a relative basis.

It might be a ratio, a custom index, or maybe the price is inverted. It could be all three!

The point is, when we aren’t able to recognize what’s in front of us, we put aside any biases we may have and scrutinize the price behavior objectively.

While you can try to guess the chart, the point is to make a decision…

So let us know what it is… Buy, Sell, or Do Nothing?