I know the market’s ugly right now. Risk assets are getting crushed across the board.
But, believe it or not, greener pastures do exist in this market.
And, on days like these, I choose to focus on areas that aren’t free-falling into the fiery depths of hell.
Last week, I discussed the relative strength of the less economically sensitive grain complex. These contracts are more defensive in nature and are currently escaping the broad selling pressure.
That’s a relief!
When it comes to today’s trade ideas, I’m sticking to the individual contracts with the highest volume heading into the fall. Those are the charts and levels of the most importance.
Do the levels on the continuation charts come into consideration?
Absolutely!
Premium members can reference our Commodity Chartbook below for our structural outlook and reach out at info@allstarcharts.com with further questions.
From the Desk of Steve Strazza @Sstrazza and Alfonso Depablos @AlfCharts
Our Hall of Famers list is composed of the 150 largest US-based stocks.
These stocks range from the mega-cap growth behemoths like Apple and Microsoft – with market caps in excess of $2T – to some of the new-age large-cap disruptors such as Moderna, Square, and Snap.
It has all the big names and more.
It doesn’t include ADRs or any stock not domiciled in the US. But don’t worry; we developed a separate universe for that; click here to check it out.
The Hall of Famers is simple.
We take our list of 150 names and then apply our technical filters so the strongest stocks with the most momentum rise to the top.
Let’s dive right in and check out what these big boys are up to.
Here’s this week’s list:
Click table to enlarge view
We filter out any laggards that are down -5% or more relative to the S&P 500 over the trailing month.
On Wednesday afternoon, the Federal Reserve announced another 75-basis-point rate hike following its September policy meeting.
Yields across the curve ripped, and Treasury bonds dipped.
What else is new?
An aggressive hiking regime has been the Fed’s modus operandi since March. And it's made clear its intent to stay the course.
But what does the rest of the market think about the rise in rates?
Let’s look at our intermarket ratios to gain some insight.
First, we have a triple-pane chart of regional banks versus REITs, the copper/gold ratio, and the US 10-year yield:
These key intermarket ratios tend to peak and trough with interest rates. Notice all three peaked in 2018.
As rates roll over and growth slows, investors reach for the safety of gold and REITS versus the more economically sensitive copper and regional banks.
I was in the city yesterday for a few meetings and dropped by Fox Business to have a little chat with Charles Payne.
Charles is one of the few who let me talk about whatever I want. No agenda. Just price action.
I appreciate that.
It was just a short hit. But we talked about the seasonal tailwinds for stocks, how a stronger Dollar means stocks will remain under pressure, and what Financials and Homebuilders are telling us about the market.
Tuesday night we held our September Monthly Conference Call, which Premium Members can access and rewatch here.
In this post, we’ll do our best to summarize it by highlighting five of the most important charts and/or themes we covered, along with commentary on each
Investors lose money and look to others to blame for their mistakes. It's human nature; it takes less mental fortitude to pin the blame on an externality rather than adopt responsibility and work on yourself.
In bear markets, conspiracies are born, and hatred is often devised.
"If it wasn't for the Fed, my equity curve would still be sloping up."
"Wall Street and the wealthy are conspiring to make me poorer."
In my short stint in this industry, I've noticed a lot of this self-destructive behavior.
One particular notion I've seen catch traction in recent days is that the CME Group -- operator of the world's largest financial derivatives exchange -- is actively trying to suppress Bitcoin from global adoption.
Eventually, even thick skulls like mine get the point.
Pretty much all summer long, the team here at All Star Charts has been mentioning Enphase Energy $ENPH as a strong outperformer that is on the verge of a potential epic breakout. During today's internal Analyst meeting, the team agreed that now is finally the time to get involved.
JC and I did a video on a possible trade in $ENPH ahead of today's Fed Reserve Interest Rates announcement. We did just get into it moments ago. Enjoy this video to get a great idea of why we like this trade and how we'll play it:
We've seen these cycles play out over and over again throughout many decades.
But how do we profit from it all?
Well, for me, I like to use seasonal tendencies to help put the current market environment into context.
It's not about today and tomorrow, and it's not about next year. Where are we right now?
Our Cycle Composite does a good job of helping us put together a road map for this market's cycle.
On the left side of this chart we have the 2021 seasonal trends and on the right we have the 2022 trends.
Last year's composite includes every year since 1950, every post election year since 1950 and every year ending in 1, to include the decennial cycle. Look how closely last year's actual results mirrored the composite:
The US Dollar Index $DXY is on cruise control with nothing ahead but an open road.
The few obstacles that stood in its way are falling to the wayside. That’s right – the handful of commodity currencies that have refused to roll over during the past six months are beginning to slip.
Before we get to these fresh breakdowns, let’s set the scene with two currencies that have been anything but resilient – the euro and the British pound.