FED Minutes … Chicago PMI … Consumer Confidence … 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.”
 
FED MINUTES (CNBC)
"The Federal Reserve on Tuesday released minutes from its highly divisive meeting earlier this month, which concluded with a vote to lower interest rates again that appeared to be an even closer call than the final vote indicated…“Most participants judged that further downward adjustments to the target range for the federal funds rate would likely be appropriate if inflation declined over time as expected,” the document said. With that, though, came misgivings over how aggressive the FOMC should be in the future.” Story at…
https://www.cnbc.com/2025/12/30/fed-minutes-december-2025.html
 
CHICAGO PMI (Investing.com)
“The Chicago Purchasing Managers’ Index (PMI), a key indicator of the economic health of the manufacturing sector in the Chicago region, has posted a significant increase. The actual figure released is 43.5, a marked improvement over the forecasted 39.8.” Story at…
https://www.investing.com/news/economic-indicators/chicago-pmi-beats-expectations-indicating-manufacturing-sector-expansion-93CH-4425504
 
CONSUMER CONFIDENCE (Conference Board)
“Confidence weakened for a fifth consecutive month as perceptions of business conditions were negative, and apprehensions about jobs and income deepened. The Conference Board Consumer Confidence Index® declined by 3.8 points in December… On balance, consumer spending trends in 2025 moved towards cheap thrills and necessary services and away from expensive and highly discretionary activities." Press release at... 
https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/us-consumer-confidence-fell-again-in-december-302648784.html
 
MARKET REPORT / ANALYSIS
-Tuesday the S&P 500 declined about 0.1% to 6896 on light volume.
-VIX rose about 1% to 14.34.
-The yield on the 10-year Treasury rose to 4.126% (compared to about this time prior market day).
 
MY TRADING POSITIONS
XLK – Added 11/26/2025 & 12/1/2025
SPY – Added 12/1/2025. Stick with quality.
NVDA – Added a small position 12/1/2025.
 
CURRENT SUMMARY OF APPROXIMATELY 50 INDICATORS:
At the close today, of the 50-Indicators I track, 6 gave Bear-signs and 14 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 slipped from +10 to +8 (8 more Bull indicators than Bear indicators), a BULLISH indication.  I consider +5 to -5 the neutral zone. The 10-dMA curve of the spread (purple on the chart above) smooths daily fluctuations; continued its downward trend, a BEARISH sign.
 
The bull indicators outnumber the bears by more than 2 to 1 – this is a bullish sign overall.
 
The S&P 500 has not made it back to its upper trend line since the end of October. That is something to watch. I’ve redrawn the lower trendline to align with the 50-dMA. The Index is 1.4% above its 50-dMA so for now, no problem. We don’t want to see a drop below the 50-day.
 
BOTTOM LINE
I’m bullish and fully invested.
 
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
 
TUESDAY MARKET INTERNALS (NYSE DATA)

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

As of Monday, 1 December, my 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 although I don’t trade as much as I used to. 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.