From the desk of Louis Sykes @haumicharts

There's a common adage around here, a bit of advice to "draw your lines with crayons, not pens and pencils."

What it means is that when you're drawing support and resistance levels, it's best to construe them as zones rather than in terms of a single price.

It's a good rubric and a sound principle. But it makes sense to explore in greater detail why this is the case, particularly for cryptocurrency.

When it comes to this new asset class, technicals are a far more popular choice among traders and investors. It only makes sense in a market where there aren't nearly as many sophisticated fundamentals.

You're not going to discount a crypto project's cash flows to arrive at a valuation; you're going to trade the chart.

But, amid the growing popularity of technical analysis, proponents often don't recognize why price action principles work. There's far more to understand beyond drawing rectangles on charts.

So, let's explore what makes "supply and demand" work as a primary trading and analytical indicator, how to apply it, and why we argue for using...

There’s been a noticeable lack of Hot List activity, as insiders seem to be sitting out the latest rally.

Today is no different, as we have a single Form 4 and one 13G.

This is our ASC Research Q3 2022 Playbook.

Investors have a lot of questions right now. With sentiment and at some of the most pessimistic levels in history, what will it take for some of these trends to change in the second half of the year? I believe some major trends are already changing.

The Playbook takes a step back and looks at things from a more Structural perspective. If you're specifically looking for more tactical opportunities, you can check out this week's Live Mid-Month Conference Call.

Here's what we'll be discussing in our Q3 Playbook:

• Stocks (International & U.S.)
• U.S. Sectors & Industries
• Market Breadth & Sentiment
• Commodities
• Currencies
• Intermarket Analysis
• Cryptocurrencies
• New Trade Ideas
• Overall Strategy

From the Desk of Ian Culley @IanCulley

The US dollar and interest rates are still two of the most important charts out there. You’re probably tired of hearing it, but their future direction impacts the entire marketplace.

And, believe it or not, the currency market provides a great read on both.

Bullish data points continue to roll in left and right, supporting dollar strength. From the Korean won and Singaporean dollar to the euro and the pound, the dollar seems to break out against another currency every few days. 

No matter where we look, the US dollar is dominating. 

When we evaluate the trends in emerging market commodity currencies, it reveals insight into the recent rise in interest rates. Instead of showing strength, these currencies are catching lower -- which doesn’t jibe with a rising rate environment.

Let’s take a look.

Here’s an overlay chart of the US 10-year yield and our Emerging...

From the desk of Willie Delwiche.

The current imbalance between job openings and unemployed persons gets plenty of attention. That there are twice as many job openings as there are people looking for a job is a historically unique situation. Having more job openings than job searchers, however, is not unprecedented. That was also the situation in 2018 and 2019, though the emergence of COVID seems to have washed that from our collective awareness. I can still clearly recall discussing skilled worker shortages with small business owners in the Midwest. The policy responses (both fiscal and monetary) to COVID exacerbated these imbalances, but the seeds of the current wage and price pressures were being sown before lockdowns and social distancing became a reality. 

This suggests a more deeply embedded issue for the economy in terms of reducing wage and price pressure than many (even those at the Fed) appreciate. The relative scarcity of workers may also mean that employers will be less likely to reduce headcount in the face of economic headwinds than they have in the recent past. Looking at average weekly hours and...

The next new trade in our Paid-to-Play portfolio is:

We had a resting GTC order filled at our profit target in the Paid-to-Play portfolio today:

Yesterday, we explained how we're still approaching this recent rally with a high degree of caution.

Most names still find themselves below overhead supply, and this is a tape where whipsaws and fake-outs are likely to continue.

Beyond Ethereum and a handful of other names, this rally hasn't been widespread. Instead, most cryptos are still exhibiting generally weak action.

While this means there are still actionable ideas out there from the long side, we want to explore a higher-conviction trade over more substantial time frames that'll likely be prone to fewer whipsaws.

The Auto sector has been the flavor of the season. And by the looks of it, the season isn't over yet! We're here today to discuss another popular stock from this sector.

Shares of Apple stock just went out at the highest levels in history relative to the S&P500.

This is what we refer to as "Relative Strength".

Apple had originally peaked relative to the market almost 2 years ago towards the end of the summer of 2020.

That's when the Apple's underperformance first began.

And now here we are making new all-time highs once again:

We retired our "Five Bull Market Barometers" in 2020 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.

Warren Buffett filed his latest Form 4 yesterday, as Berkshire Hathaway $BRK continues to accumulate shares of Occidental Petroleum $OXY.

The additional 1.94 million shares leaves him with an ownership percentage just shy of 20%.