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  • Finance 0

    The Natural Gas Gap Continues To Hold

    The natural gas gap held again today as the December natural gas contract bounced off it and rallied a bit through the day on marginally colder weather forecasts.  Some of the move was weather-driven, as the front of the strip saw the largest gains and parts of the rally coincided with American modeling guidance, but the rest of the strip did decently today as well.  Yet warmer weather risks and declines at the front of the natural gas strip have pulled H/J back down significantly, and it was only able to marginally recover today, indicating concerns about stockpile levels moving through the winter remain relatively lower than they were a f...
    On November 17, 2017 / By
  • Finance 0

    Hot Options Report For End Of Day – Friday, November 17

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    On November 17, 2017 / By
  • Finance 0

    Unmasking The VooDoo: Trends

    When discussing technical analysis and trends, the erudite snoots among us, which unfortunately can include me, like to talk about physics. Objects, or trends, in motion will stay in motion unless acted upon by an outside force. That’s inertia and yes, markets have it. How else do we explain momentum stocks, let alone bubbles? As the old Faberge Organics shampoo (with wheat germ oil and honey) commercial used to say, “If you tell two friends, then they’ll tell two friends, and so on and so on and so on.” The same goes for the markets. It’s the ultimate expression of keeping up with the Joneses. Everyone covets ev...
    On November 17, 2017 / By
  • Finance 0

    Market Talk – Friday, November 17

    The tax reform bill passing the US House yesterday certainly added to sentiment, after great earnings releases for markets but Asia need more help for cash today. Having opened strong all core markets then drifted and even saw the Nikkei trade negative. For the week it closes down 1.3% which has broken a two month rally. The Hang Seng performed well all day closing up around +0.6% but only off-set the decline in the Shanghai (-0.5%). India traded well following Thursday’s credit upgrade eventually adding an additional +0.7% onto yesterdays gain. All eyes are still on the DXY as we approach the weekend as just below we have the 50 Day Moving...
    On November 17, 2017 / By
  • Finance 0

    Shiller Is Wrong

    Robert Shiller had an interesting interview on CNBC in which he took the concept of passive investing to the woodshed, calling indexers freeloaders (on other people’s work) and stopping just short of calling the strategy un-American. I found the clip via Cullen Roche who also had some thoughts on the Shiller segment. One of Cullen’s major points, that I have made many times as well influenced by him, is that unless you somehow own every stock and bond in the world and then never make a change you are making some sort of active decision. What most indexers do is use passive funds to make in an active manner even if they’re not very a...
    On November 17, 2017 / By
  • Finance 0

    Gold Gains As Stocks Slide, Yield Curve Crashes, & Dollar Dumps

    Economic Data continues to surprise to the upside (compared to what had been terrible expectations)…is this as good as it gets? But credit, the yield curve, and now stocks are not loving it… Small Caps were the only major index green today… The Dow and S&P 500- fell for the 2nd week in a row – something they haven’t done for 3 months…Small Caps best on the week (followed by Nasdaq thanks to yesterday’s panic buy)… Futures show the crazy moves this week better.. VIX was slammed late on today in a desperat ebid to get the S&P green on the week… But while stocks rebounded briefly, F...
    On November 17, 2017 / By
  • Finance 0

    November 2017: ECRI’s WLI Growth Index Rate Down

    ECRI’s WLI Growth Index which forecasts economic growth six months forward remains in expansion. This is compared to RecessionAlerts similar weekly leading index. Analyst Opinion of the trends of the weekly leading indices Both ECRI’s and RecessionAlerts indicies are indicating modest growth six months from today. Current ECRI WLI Level and Growth Index: Here is this week’s update on ECRI’s Weekly Leading Index (note – a positive number indicates growth): Comparison to RecessionAlert Weekly Indicator RecessionAlert also produces a weekly foreward indicator using different pulse points tha ECRI’s WLI. Here i...
    On November 17, 2017 / By
  • Finance 0

    You Can’t Make This Up

    Lots of well-meaning pundits are pounding the table on the fact that although the Federal Reserve is raising rates, financial conditions are easing, muting the rate rises effects. Well, these financial prognosticators might have good intentions, but the reality is that this is nothing new. I don’t deserve any credit for this next observation – it was brought to my attention by Bloomberg reporter Luke Kawa. Over the past three hiking cycles, financial conditions have either gone sideways, or more commonly, actually eased. I guess you might argue that during this cycle, financial conditions are easing at a greater pace than previous c...
    On November 17, 2017 / By
  • Finance 0

    S&P 500 Quick-View Chart Book

    Each weekend as part of our Bespoke Premium and Bespoke Premium research service, clients receive our S&P 500 Quick-View Chart Book, which includes one-year price charts of every stock in the S&P 500.  You can literally scan through this report in a matter of minutes or hours, but either way, you will come out ahead knowing which stocks, or groups of stocks, are leading and lagging the market.  The report is a great resource for both traders and investors alike.  Below we show the front page of this week’s report which contains price charts of the major averages and ten major sectors. As seen in the charts below, the only ...
    On November 17, 2017 / By
  • Finance 0

    Kansas City Fed Survey: Activity Slows In November

    The Kansas City Fed Manufacturing Survey business conditions indicator measures activity in the following states: Colorado, Kansas, Nebraska, Oklahoma, Wyoming, western Missouri, and northern New Mexico. Quarterly data for this indicator dates back to 1995, but monthly data is only available from 2001. New seasonal adjustment factors were introduced in January 2017 and slight revisions were made to previous data as a result. Here is an excerpt from the latest report: KANSAS CITY, Mo. – The Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City released the November Manufacturing Survey today. According to Chad Wilkerson, vice president and economist at the Fe...
    On November 17, 2017 / By