Archives January 2022

The rescue operation showed up overnight as the S&P 500 Index camped on the Weekly Expected Move low – approximately 4550 on the Futures and 455 on the SPY. And when all else fails, one can redraw the intermediate trendline to give it some benefit of the doubt at this level. All we can do is give it our best shot.

As with last month, the market is seemingly drawn into the monthly options expiration Friday. Why that has been a dip these last 6 -7 months has escaped me. I will look into it, but it has drawn us into the 50-day line over and over, and it has paid to buy the dip. This month, the 50-day line sits materially above us – so options expiration is a bit more negative.

And the WEM low also equates to the weekly 21 or mean line – a logical pivot point. And then there is the intermediate cycle – we are in the 15-week zone of a cycle running between 14 and 18 weeks since the March 2020 Covid low. We should expect a pivot soon.

Were it not for next week’s Fed meeting; you would have had a nanosecond to get positioned before takeoff. And that is interesting in and of itself. Not long ago, the prognosticators told us that the Fed couldn’t raise interest rates or the world would come to an end. Then they told us the Fed wouldn’t raise interest rates. Now, they tell us the Fed will make up for lost time because they are behind the curve and their “credibility” is at stake. They have had no credibility in my lifetime. I suspect “transitory” will join “irrational exuberance” (as in 2000) as the defining term of this era.

And when you have a stock market priced for perfection, the challenges abound. 7% consumer inflation and 10% wholesale inflation will show up somewhere. Either corporate profits will shrink – or consumers will stop buying at the higher prices. After all, the cure for higher prices is higher prices. Wages are not even close to keeping up. Inflated prices are their own natural governor.

Anyway, I don’t think there will be a sustainable upside until next week, but we will let the price action guide us. Yes, rates will go up, but they are still not going to be high by historical standards. The natural forces are working to abate inflation. For all we know, it could be peaking.

But the easy days of blindly buying dips are behind us. It would be nice if the market could hold the intermediate trend, but I still see a 50/50 chance of tagging the October low at 4268. The 200-day line (remember that?) is rising and sits around 4418.

And I am wondering if we will see a capitulation or spike low to end this corrective phase—something like the old days – where the market pukes before it recovers. The Fed meeting is a good crescendo point next week.

By the way, the Fed balance sheet shrank over the past week. So quantitative “tightening” is now real.

I think it is a bit too late to short unless you want to sit in front of the computer 24/7. So I am looking for a buy at this point.

Anyway, let’s see how the rescue operation goes today. Maybe we can do something towards the close.

In the meantime, oil prices are approaching new highs. That signals economic growth, not contraction. Gold is in a converging triangle – ready for a big move. It is just that I have not yet figured out the direction. I am working on it. Given the inflation at hand, one would expect a move north. But Gold has not exactly delivered as one might have expected up to this point. And higher interest rates on U.S. Treasuries provide stiff competition.

I will drop a line when and if something changes. Cash is king for now – but let’s see if we can get a characteristic intermediate low in the next week or so. We are not there yet by most measures.

Let’s see if the rescue operation follows through today.

A.F. Thornton

The S&P 500 is wedging into the WEM low, laying the ground for a rescue operation. May be good for a quick bounce trade.

https://www.tradingview.com/x/Hmz9HeZk

The S&P 500 has already shot to the Weekly Expected Move low right out of the gate in this shortened trading week. It is another test of the demand line and intermediate trend, the fourth since the year began. It is also a test of last Monday’s low.

One would expect the market makers to mount another rescue operation here. If they fail, the selling could accelerate as market makers sell futures to neutralize their portfolio deltas. The put/call ratio has climbed to significant fear levels as it did Friday so that one could hope for another short-covering rally later in the session.

The problem this morning, of course, is the breakout in interest rates and the inflation-driven campaign for a reversal of friendly Fed policy. The Fed meeting is next week. Market participants will hang on every one of these meetings for the foreseeable future. It promises to be a rough ride for equity investors.

As you can see, the critical 10-Year U.S. Treasury rate is breaking the long-term Head and Shoulders reversal pattern we have been watching for many months. This breakout is a monumental event—nearly every loan in the country keys off this rate. It won’t help the deficit either.

The chart pattern projects a near doubling of the rate up to 3%. The pre-covid rate was about 3.25%. While the higher rate would indicate a return to normal conditions, it is still a massive adjustment for lofty equity markets when combined with the higher inflation we have been experiencing. Of late, the higher rates punish growth stocks (e.g., technology and the NASDAQ 100 the most).

Save for bank stocks and energy, the broad markets are already fragile. We had a lot of breadth divergences on the December high. If interest rates cause the big cap names to cave, there is not much to help the markets hold their current ground. A move to the October lows on the S&P 500 futures (4260) is not outside the realm of possibilities.

It has been a few years since we saw the kinds of corrections that would give us capitulations and spike lows, but one has to assume that such corrections (which are normal) will ensue again. It will be a treacherous environment for equity investors for now. A bear market could undoubtedly follow, but only time will tell.

Investors should not initiate longer-term equity positions until we have clear evidence of the cyclical low, likely to come in after the Fed meeting and towards early February.

In the meantime, there should still be some good, short-term trades in both directions,

Friday now appears to be a one-hit-wonder, as we were flat stopped on all positions this morning as the Navigator moved back into an hourly sell signal. The buy signal was short-lived, as they sometimes are. The market is now in a bearish tilt.

Naturally, things could still improve this morning, but we are now trading below the intermediate trend line on the S&P 500 in a third test of the trend and the fourth on the year. The NASDAQ 100 is worse, having arguably lost its intermediate trend as interest rates are climbing.

For now, we will stay in cash and do our best to identify the intermediate low that lies ahead.

Fed policy uncertainly is ruling the day in an otherwise lofty stock market.

A.F. Thornton

[Uodated with Chart and Weekly Expected Move parameters]

More pressure on interest rates over the three-day weekend has the markets erasing most of Friday’s short-covering rally. The market will open on the intermediate trend threshold for the third test in a week and fourth of the year. I would use Friday’s low as today’s bull/bear threshold. The S&P 500 Futures WEM range is 4752 to 4576 this week.

If Friday’s low fails to hold, we would finally have a break of the intermediate trend, and we would then focus on the Weekly Expected Move low for the rest of the week. This would most likely lead us to establish the bottom of a trading range. If Friday’s low holds, then we have a chance of climbing back into the rising wedge on the daily charts.

Remember, we still have some cyclical forces and this Friday’s monthly options expiration, both exerting downward pressure on the markets. Wherever we might land, the wind could be at our back after the end of the month and starting into early February.

The cycles vary somewhat and could drag us into March, so we have to take this on a day-by-day basis. Also, we have a Fed meeting next week, so buyers may hold their powder until that meeting passes.

As of now, Gap Rules will be in play at the open this morning as the market is slated to gap lower (not a true gap but a significant one to the bottom of Friday’s range). Overnight inventory is net short, which could give us a bounce at the open on overnight short inventory profit-taking. If the market can move above the overnight halfback at 4626, that would bolster today’s bullish case. Below 4626 and I have to give a slight edge to the bears.

Persistence beats resistance. We cannot keep pounding on the intermediate trendline and expect it to hold much longer.

A.F. Thornton

[Updated with Expanding Charts]

We hit it out of the park with Friday’s trades in the unique circumstance where the major indices tagged important demand levels while the crowd was overly fearful and short on the session. As suspected, the shorts panicked into the close giving us a 50 point rally from our entry point on the S&P 500. The IWM (small company ETF) and the QQQ (Nasdaq 100) delivered similar, positive results. Again, the circumstances were unique for trades with very low risks to stop.

There is yet nothing to indicate that the equity markets are out of the woods. However, as long as the S&P 500 Index stays above the current demand line marked on the S&P 500 futures chart above, the intermediate bull market channel is intact even though it is a rough ride of late.

This gives us an absolute dividing line to guide us in the weeks ahead. Break it, and we can use time at price from December to calculate a new fair value target for January at 4440. This level is also likely to converge with the rising 200-day line – a logical, new demand area. I would back up the truck on long options should we achieve that level – everything else being equal.

I thought it useful to show you the put/call ratio on Friday in the chart above. It hit a short-term extreme associated with the October and early December lows. This was unusually helpful for Friday’s session.

Traders were pounding on the demand line all day trying to break it, resulting in a lot of traders stuck “short in the hole.” When the market then fails to break the demand line by late Friday afternoon, the shorts tend to run for the exits all at once, fearing a long weekend and Tuesday rally (the U.S. markets are closed on Monday). We saw that panic short-covering materialize about two hours before the close, and it never stopped.

But the CBOE put/call ratio is a very short-term guide – good for a session at best. Note that the 10-day put/call ratio average is still rising (yellow line in the chart above). For intermediate-term confidence, the line should be falling or peaking.

So intermediate investor sentiment is neutral, giving us no edge from a macro perspective. Regardless that we find ourselves in difficult price action, there is no sign of a reliable intermediate low. Investor sentiment would need to deteriorate further, resulting in more negative price action as we move into the 15-week trough next week. In short, we need more fear.

As you can see in the chart below, Smart and Dumb Money Confidence is also at a crossroads. This is additional confirmation that there is not enough negative sentiment to favor cruise control with our trades. We need to manage them closely at the moment. The CBOE put/call ratio can merely help us on a session-to-session basis.

We will work with the current trades using the Navigator Algorithm applied to the hourly charts. For the most part, we will ignore the news and speculative Fed narratives. Below, you can see the trades in Friday’s turn through the index quadrants.

We took the Navigator Algo buy signal on the 15-minute chart for the early entries in Friday’s case. The buy signal then materialized on the hourly charts as it moved across the various time frames in a “W” pattern. Applying the Navigator Algorithms to the hourly charts on the trades will tend to be more responsive than the daily charts with the current volatility. We will let the Algo takes us out when it is ready.

But short-covering is not the same as buying. There is no guarantee the markets will follow through Tuesday, but I suspect they will for a few sessions, especially given Friday’s successful retest of Monday’s low and the reversal candle off the demand line.

The chart above shows the entry on the S&P 500 Index futures 15-minute chart from a longer perspective. Note that the 15-minute candles have moved above the mean. The mean should now provide support, and perhaps an additional entry point if one wants to add to positions. We would use a combination of a mean violation and an algo sell signal on the 15-minute chart to go to a high sell alert status. Ultimately though, the hourly chart sell signal would take us out.

All in all, what Friday’s trough represents is another 20-day cycle low. Clearly, the pattern is loose and exaggerated, which is bearish. This wide, unruly pattern departs from the relentless one-time framing candles we saw even as late as the year-end rally. But the pattern of higher highs and lows remains intact.

Perhaps more important, the intermediate cycle has been running about 14 to 18 weeks, trough to trough, at least since the March 2020 lows. The latest week is the 15th week since the October trough and coincides with Friday’s low. The cycle varies somewhat and the trough could still be in front of us to combine with next Friday’s monthly options expiration to exert a potential negative influence. After that, and depending on where that takes us, I might be inclined to be more bullish and continue to work the rising wedge pattern on the daily chart.

You can expect us to undertake many similar kinds of “trades” as the year ensues. The year ahead has the potential to destroy the latest crop of novice investors, assuming it doesn’t take down long-term investors as well. The Federal Reserve (along with a misguided Democrat administration) has managed to screw up the economy so badly; it will take a miracle and a lot of time to recover from the various distortions. The fear now is that another Fed policy mistake (reversing course too fast) will only make things worse.

Not that I am qualified to be a critic. I don’t even pretend to be an expert on the economy or inflation. In fact, I don’t think I have ever met any such purported expert. I do observe a lot of bloviating. Yet knowing that the Federal Reserve can mess up so badly with more resources than any entity in the world only underscores why I won’t even try to tackle these “theoretical” concepts.

What I do understand is price action. The rest is a bunch of noise and egocentric pontificating. And while others will continue to try to explain everything to you (as if they even know), I will stick to what I know. I intend to make a fortune this year doing so, just as I have these past two years we have worked together. I hope you will join me.

When we can enter and hold on, we will. When we have to trade, we will trade. And when it is not clear, we will stay out.

I am working on a video this weekend that will explain the strategy for the year ahead. I have heard from many of you that my predictions at this time last year were right on the money – and you want more. Yes, I predicted the inflation that arrived and it has even exceeded my expectations. I think a first grader could probably have done the same – given the flood of money supply into individual hands. But it doesn’t really matter, and I would rather have been wrong.

For now, the biggest short-term risk on the table is a Fed policy mistake in the context of an overvalued stock market detached from fundamentals. The Fed correctly perceives that their credibility is at stake, which may cause them to overcompensate. They are, at the end of the day, human and fallible. Any further mistakes could devastate portfolios and retirees. Financial markets are in a delicate state.

It does not help that the Fed’s track record in these matters is abysmal. As Zero Hedge illustrates in the chart below, since 1960, with stock market valuations over 20x earnings, the Fed started long-term rate-hiking campaigns that resulted in three bear markets, two recessions, and at least one debt crisis. The outcomes often led to new credit crises requiring even more bailouts.

That certainly is not an enviable track record. And so the question is, where does this all take us?

It ends with us becoming uberly wealthy by capitalizing on the mistakes and volatility at hand, taking advantage of the new crop of rank amateurs now participating in the financial markets. Remember, either they are taking our money, or we are taking theirs. While that may not help the country, our personal survival is ensured. I don’t know about you, but I have no intention of letting the idiots in charge destroy my wealth. I am too old to start over.

And what about Bitcoin? Unsurprisingly, it has not been a hedge against anything. You can have it – I am not interested.

As the Chinese proverb goes, “Better to be a dog in times of tranquility than a human in times of chaos.” But chaos is profitable. You cannot trade without volatility. There will be plenty of that as the year ensues. Let’s keep our eye on the ball and take full advantage.

A.F. Thornton

The Founders Group has just taken a small call position in each of the SPY, QQQ, and IWM ETFs. The S&P 500 chart appears above but all the charts are similarly oversold. We are utilizing at-the-money calls expiring on February 18th. These are our first trades of the year, and we are positioned just a few ticks above the morning lows.

Each of these instruments are on important support, with positive divergences on their 15-minute charts in the context of the CBOE Put/Call ratio fear guage set to a bullish position today. We are also positioned close to the WEM lows for today’s weekly options expiration.

I would not be surprised to see a short-covering rally towards the end of today’s session – as the shorts are not well-positioned here if the market fails to break. On the other hand, if it appears that we will close below this morning’s index lows. that would give me some pause in holding the trades over the weekend.

I am expecting these to be nothing more than short-term trades on an oversold bounce- as opposed to something we can hold longer-term. In fact, the trades may only be good for a move through Tuesday.

Cyclical forces don’t clearly turn until the end of the month. Moreover, we have seen the market pull down into monthly options expiration of late – a risk that remains with us until next Friday if the pattern is to repeat. So taking a long-term view is a bit challenging until we get into February.

Ultimately, I would consider getting aggressive on a swing trade closer to 4400 on the S&P 500, which is the 200-day line. We have not visited that line in many months, with the 89-day line catching the fall, as it just did again this week. That is highly unusual behavior, so the trip to the line is long overdue and would help to correct excess conditions.

In the meantime, we continue to live with the sloppy, overlapping consolidation pattern as can be seen in the daily chart above as the markets continue to reel from higher inflation and interest rates.

But regardless of the volatility, the S&P 500 Index remains inside its intermediate bull channel. Until that channel fails, doubts should be resolved in favor of this somewhat less rewarding bull market.

I am continuing to recover from the China Virus, slowly but surely. I will not be back to work until the end of the week. Of course, it is difficult to think, write and work with all of the medications. I have appreciated all the good wishes and have heard from many of you who are also sick. Hopefully, there won’t be much more of this craziness. I will also be thankful for natural immunity – but it is definitely earned.

The Founders Group came into the year 100% in cash which is where the models remain at this writing. This morning, the S&P 500 index is coming into important support on the weekly channel line. This will test the intermediate trend which has held in spite of the volatility of the past few months. Until this support is violated, the bull market remains intact, but perhaps now in a sideways trend.

We get the CPI numbers this week, as well as more Fed commentary. That will add to the debate as to what the Fed will have to do and how the market will react to it.

I look forward to getting back in the saddle.

A.F. Thornton

Happy New Year, and welcome to 2022. Unfortunately, the year has started on a bit of a sour note for me, as I have acquired the China Virus. It has been miserable but tolerable. If the averages are any guide, it may yet be a week or more before the virus has run its course. I am about six days into it so far.

As a result of the virus, I cannot focus or concentrate. It hurts to think. So I am delaying the launch of our new services and the daily updates for at least another week.

In the meantime, I would be assessing whether the market accepts the prices up in this new range. There could still be some tax selling right after the first of the year. So it does not hurt to give the market a few days to find its footing.

I will keep you posted.

A.F. Thornton