FED Minutes ... Consumer Credit ... Crude Inventories ... Momentum Trading DOW Stocks & ETFs … Stock Market Analysis ...

 
“Trade what you see; not what you think.” – The Old Fool, Richard McCranie, trader extraordinaire.
 
“Far more money has been lost by investors in preparing for corrections, or anticipating corrections, than has been lost in the corrections themselves.” - Peter Lynch, former manager of Fidelity’s Magellan® fund.
 
"This is maybe the most dangerous market of my career, and that includes 1987's crash, that includes the savings and loan debacle market of the early '90s, that includes the 1999 to 2009 lost decade in the S&P 500 in the dot-com bubble. This is the most difficult market of my 45 years." -  Bill Smead, Smead Value Fund (SMVLX), May 2025.
 
TRUMPS ENERGY POLICIES ARE GUTTING THE OIL PATCH (Houston Chronicle)
“Nine months ago, Kirk Edwards [CEO of Latigo Petroleum] was feeling good. Oil and gas prices were high, drilling costs were reasonable and Donald Trump was back in the White House...Now, with oil selling at middling prices and tariffs driving up the cost of drilling, Edwards acknowledges a stark "disconnect" between the industry and Trump administration. He believes Trump's tariffs have emboldened OPEC, the Saudi-controlled cartel of Middle Eastern and African oil exporters, to flood the market with oil... Buyer's remorse is taking hold across the oil and gas industry, as majors shed jobs and leaders openly question the sanity of Trump's whack-a-mole energy policy. Exxon, Chevron and ConocoPhillips announced massive layoffs, and the industry has lost 4,000 jobs in the U.S. this year alone...” Commentary at...
Trump's energy policies are gutting the oil patch | Editorial
 
FOMC MINUTES (CNBC)
“The meeting summary indicated near unanimity among participants at the Federal Open Market Committee that the central bank’s key overnight borrowing rate should be cut due to weakness in the labor market.
They split, however, on whether there should be two or three total reductions this year, including the quarter percentage point move approved at the Sept. 16-17 meeting." Story at...
https://www.cnbc.com/2025/10/08/fed-minutes-september-2025.html
 
CONSUMER CREDIT (KPMG)
“Consumers demonstrated caution about taking on more debt in August, marking a pullback from July. Consumer credit outstanding eked out a 0.1% gain at seasonally adjusted annual rate in August. That is markedly down from an upwardly revised 4.3% rate in July. On a year-over-year basis, consumer credit outstanding edged higher by 0.2%.” Story at...
https://kpmg.com/us/en/articles/2025/august-2025-consumer-credit-outstanding.html
 
CRUDE INVENTORIES (EIA)
“U.S. commercial crude oil inventories (excluding those in the Strategic Petroleum Reserve) increased by 3.7 million barrels from the previous week. At 420.3 million barrels, U.S. crude oil inventories are about 4% below the five-year average for this time of year.” Report at...
https://ir.eia.gov/wpsr/wpsrsummary.pdf
 
MARKET REPORT / ANALYSIS
-Wednesday the S&P 500 was up about 0.6% to 6754.
-VIX declined about 5% to 16.30.
-The yield on the 10-year Treasury declined slightly to 4.123% (compared to about this time prior market day).
 
MY TRADING POSITIONS:
SPY – Added 8/26/2025
XLK – Added 8/26/2025
 
CURRENT SUMMARY OF APPROXIMATELY 50 INDICATORS:
Today, of the 50-Indicators I track, 11 gave Bear-signs and 12 were Bullish. The rest are neutral. (It is normal to have a lot of neutral indicators since many of the indicators are top or bottom indicators that will signal only at extremes.)

TODAY’S COMMENT
The daily, bull-bear spread of 50-indicators improved from Zero to +1 (1 more Bull indicator and Bear indicators), and remained a Neutral indication. I consider +5 to -5 the neutral zone. The 10-dMA curve of the spread smooths daily fluctuations; turned higher – a Bullish sign, but just barely. The 10-day has been flopping back and forth and without much direction so the 10-day isn’t helping yet.
 
On Monday there was another new all-time high for the S&P 500. At all-time highs, I always check breadth on the NYSE. When we look at New, 52-week highs, we see that around 5.1% of issues on the NYSE made new 52-week highs today.  That number is below the 5-year average of about 7%. That’s a concern, but it does not trigger a warning, i.e., new-highs’ are ok, but I’d like to see them higher.
 
There was high, unchanged volume Wednesday. I know, you’re tired of reading my standard note:
As I’ve often said, many believe that this indicator suggests investor confusion at market turning points. Are markets turning back down? That could always happen and the indicators are now mixed. Still, “High-unchanged-volume” is not one of my indicators because it is often wrong.
 
The Index closed 11.8% above its 200-day moving average. 10% to 15% implies sell. For my purposes, when the S&P 500 is 12% above its 200-dMA, it is too stretched and issues a bearish signal. I don’t act on one signal, but it does warn that it may not be a good time to add new money to stocks. This can get to 20% above the 200-day, but that is a very rare occurrence.  
 
8 of the last 10-days have been up, but that is not yet suggesting a reversal. If Thursday is an up-day, it would be unusual enough to give us another bear-signal.
 
Sentiment improved and is now neutral.
 
There has been a regular bubble-discussion on CNBC regarding whether the markets are currently in a bubble.  That discussion isn’t as informative as it might seem.  If there is a bubble, markets can still go higher.  At major tops, my indicators have given top-warnings and I have reduced stock-holdings to avoid major declines; I enjoy the bubble discussions, but I don't act on them.
 
Repeating from yesterday: All-in-all, it appears that the S&P 500 will drift back towards its lower trendline.  That is partly a guess since the indicator spread remains neutral and either up or down would be in line with my indicators.
 
BOTTOM LINE
I am cautiously bullish to neutral. I’ll be paying attention to indicators, as always.
 
ETF - MOMENTUM ANALYSIS:
TODAY’S RANKING OF 15 ETFs (Ranked Daily) ETF ranking follows:

The top ranked ETF receives 100%. The rest are then ranked based on their momentum relative to the leading ETF.
*For additional background on the ETF ranking system see NTSM Page at…
http://navigatethestockmarket.blogspot.com/p/exchange-traded-funds-etf-ranking.html
 
DOW STOCKS - TODAY’S MOMENTUM RANKING OF THE DOW 30 STOCKS (Ranked Daily)
 

The top ranked Stock receives 100%. The rest are then ranked based on their momentum relative to the leading Stock.
For more details, see NTSM Page at…
https://navigatethestockmarket.blogspot.com/p/a-system-for-trading-dow-30-stocks-my_8.html
 
WEDNESDAY MARKET INTERNALS (NYSE DATA)

My basket of Market Internals improved to HOLD. (My basket of Market Internals is a decent trend-following analysis that is most useful when it diverges from the Index.) 
 
 
 
 

My current invested position is about 50% stocks, including stock mutual funds and ETFs.
50% invested in stocks is a normal, conservative position for a retiree. (75% is my max stock allocation when I am confident that markets will continue higher; 30% in stocks is my Bear market position.)
                                             
I trade about 15-20% of the total portfolio using the momentum-based analysis I provide here. When I see bullish signs, I add a lot more stocks to the portfolio, usually by using an S&P 500 ETF as I did back in October 2022 and 2023.