A month ago, we pointed out a divergence between 10- and two-year Treasury yield spread, which peaked as 2013 was unwinding, and financial stocks, which had ceased to track the spread and were rallying. Going back nearly 18 years, the … Continued
One more day, and one more post-Great Recession high on the Nasdaq Composite. In fact, the index is at a 14-year high, and yesterday was able to build on Monday’s breakout. There is of course a lot to quibble over … Continued
The Nasdaq Composite (4508.31)has managed to pull off a mini breakout, and is trading above the level identified previously. As a matter of fact, indices/ETFs such as the S&P 500 Large Cap Index and XLF (financials) have convincingly taken out … Continued
The rally the past couple of sessions, is it an oversold bounce or is there more to it than meets the eye? Particularly on Monday, money did come out of defensives such as utilities and health care, and into offensives … Continued
Non-commercials further added to net shorts in euro futures. They are now net short 129k contracts – a two-year high. In recent weeks these large speculators have been adding more shorts than cutting longs. Since early June, they cut longs … Continued
There is a lot of chatter these days around imminent asset purchases by the ECB. Speaking to the press post-Governing Council meeting yesterday, ECB President Mario Draghi hinted as much, saying policy makers are unanimous in their willingness to use … Continued
Chinese stocks have been on fire! From an intra-day low of 36.62 on June 24, FXI (iShares Trust FTSE-Xinhua China 25 Index Fund) shot up nearly 13 percent to 41.30 in a little over a month (by July 29, to … Continued
How equity traders are likely to position themselves for at least the next week or so will depend on how they answer the question above. As the accompanying chart shows, going back at least two and a half years, a … Continued
One consistent theme the last several weeks on this blog has been that of divergence. In a healthy market, things tend to – or are supposed to – move in unison. Simplistically, let us say a widget is in production. … Continued
Yesterday was the first time since April the S&P 500 Index violated its 50-day moving average – both simple and exponential. This was the first test since May, yet there was hardly any resistance from the bulls. Sellers simply overwhelmed … Continued