From the Desk of Ian Culley @IanCulley

Failed breakouts and trading ranges dominate the charts.

It’s a mixed-up, messy market environment wherever you look — bonds, stocks, commodities, forex…

US treasuries are a prime example, playing it cool with muted volatility and tight credit spreads while yields climb.

Perhaps the near-term rise in rates makes it difficult to grasp, but the US benchmark yield is actually chopping within a broader corrective phase.

Before we dive into the charts, I want to make two things clear: 

One, I am not an Elliottician or an Elliott Wave specialist on any level. And two, if you give five Elliotticians the same chart, you’re likely to get five different wave counts.

Nevertheless, my journey to earning the CMT designation exposed me to the Elliott Theory, and I find it prudent when examining the US 10-year yield.

So here we go…...

Stock market volatility is at the highest levels since October.

The majority of stocks are NOT in uptrends.

This market is NOT like it was last year.

In fact, coming into today, the majority of stocks on the NYSE are down for the year. Also 2/3rds of the stocks on the Nasdaq are negative for the year.

Go and count for yourself.

You'll quickly see that the majority of stocks in the Large-cap Nasdaq100 are down this year. Same for the Small-cap Russell2000 Index and the S&P Mid-cap 400.

Different markets call for different strategies.

Here's the $VIX hitting levels this week not seen since Halloween:

This is the video recording of the April 2024 Mid-month Conference Call.

From the Desk of Steve Strazza @Sstrazza

When investing in the stock market, we always want to approach it as "a market of stocks."

Regardless of the environment, there are always stocks showing leadership and trending higher.

We may have to look harder to identify them depending on current market conditions. But there are always stocks that are going up.

The same can be said for weak stocks. Regardless of the environment, there are always stocks that are going down, too. 

We already have multiple scans focusing on stocks making all-time highs, such as Hall of Famers, Minor Leaguers, and the 2 to 100 Club.

We filter these universes for stocks that are exhibiting the best momentum and relative strength characteristics. 

Clearly, we spend a lot of time identifying and writing about leading stocks every week, via multiple reports.

But we're also highlighting lagging stocks on a recurring basis.

Welcome to the Short Report.

We...

This market is just NOT like it was in 2023.

It's much different.

I've said it right here hundreds of time already.

But today's chart of the day really shows this well, reiterating why it's so important to adapt to changing markets.

Here is the S&P500 with a line plotted below it. This line represents the percentage of stocks in the index that are in longer-term uptrends, but are NOT in short- to intermediate-term uptrends.

From the Desk of Ian Culley @IanCulley

Have you noticed these trends driving the markets?

Commodities are ripping. The energy sector is outperforming. Interest rates are climbing while US treasury bonds fall apart…  

Of course, we can’t forget about the US dollar’s rally.

I continue to err in the direction of these underlying trends. But the dollar rally will likely run out of gas soon…

Check out the US Dollar Index $DXY printing its highest level since November. 

My near-term DXY bias flipped bullish late last month. Aside from improving momentum and multiple tests of overhead supply, our bullish USD trades shifted my outlook.

The tactical shorts in the British pound and New Zealand dollar were in play and have...

Gold is one of the biggest winners so far in 2024.

But you can argue that it's really the commodities complex that is leading, and Gold is just one of them.

Check out the YTD returns here.

But the unwind in Gold stocks relative to other types of stocks looks to be just getting going.

Here is the Gold Bugs Index, which is loaded with all the top mining stocks, compared to the S&P500.

Notice the dramatic underperformance for so long, followed by a failed breakdown, and now the squeeze is just getting started:

I have three big ideas to take advantage of the current markets.

It's pretty obvious to everyone now that this year is not like last year.

Some people are pretending it still is.

You are welcome to lie to yourself if you'd like.

But I have the data.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average is flat so far in 2024. Small-caps are actually still down.

It's Crude Oil, Silver, Gold and Copper leading the way:

From the Desk of Steve Strazza @Sstrazza.

Welcome back to Under the Hood, where we'll cover all the action for the two weeks ended April 12, 2024. This report is published bi-weekly, in rotation with The Minor Leaguers.

What we do here is analyze the most popular stocks during the week and find opportunities to either join in and ride these momentum names higher, or fade the crowd and bet against them.

We use a variety of sources to generate the list of most popular names.

There are so many new data sources available that all we need to do is organize and curate them in a way that shows us exactly what we want: a list of stocks that are seeing an unusual increase in investor interest.

Click here for a behind-the-scenes look at our process.

Whether we’re measuring increasing interest based on large institutional purchases, unusual...

From the Desk of Ian Culley @IanCulley

Readers often ask how long it will take for an open trade to reach our target. 

I wish I knew. 

Only the market can answer that question, as gold did last Friday…

In today's Flow Show, me and Steve Strazza took a look at some potential directional bets, but we both agreed that the right trade for today is one that would benefit from some sideways trading action.

With the broader markets looking a bit indecisive here, making a strong directional bet (in either direction) feels like a high-risk proposition. But there's a big cap name currently stuck in a range that is offering us nice options premiums to bet on further sideways action. We'll likely have to hold through an earnings event to earn our profit, but with a defined risk and a large margin for error, I like our chances.

There is a big theme going on right now - and that's the inability for important indexes to get above their 2021 highs.

You're seeing it at the individual stock level, you're seeing it across specific sectors and industry groups, and you're definitely seeing it in the S&P500 and Nasdaq100 Equally-weighted.

These indexes below eliminate the excessive weightings in certain stocks and sectors and equally-weight all of its components.

Look at both of them still stuck below their 2021 highs: