“Trade what you see; not what you think.” – The Old Fool, Richard McCranie, trader extraordinaire.
"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.”
"The Consumer Price Index rose at an annual rate of 2.7% in November, cooler than economists had forecast…core inflation, or CPI data that excludes volatile food and energy prices, rose by 2.6% over the past 12 months…” Story at…
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/cpi-report-november-2025-inflation-trump-tariffs/
“The Labor Department said initial jobless claims fell to 224,000, a decrease of 13,000 from the previous week's revised level of 237,000…Meanwhile, the Labor Department also said the unemployment rate rose to 4.6 percent in November…” Story at…
https://www.rttnews.com/3605148/u-s-jobless-claims-decrease-roughly-in-line-with-estimates.aspx
“The Philadelphia Federal Reserve (Fed) Manufacturing Index, a key indicator of general business conditions in the region, has taken a significant dive. The index, which is based on a survey of approximately 250 manufacturers in the Philadelphia Fed district, has reported an actual figure of -10.2.” Story at…
https://www.investing.com/news/economic-indicators/philadelphia-fed-manufacturing-index-plunges-signaling-worsening-conditions-93CH-4415177
-Thursday the S&P 500 rose about 0.8% to 6775.
-VIX declined about 4% to 16.87.
-The yield on the 10-year Treasury declined to 4.124% (compared to about this time prior market day).
XLK – Added 11/26/2025 & 12/1/2025
SPY – Added 12/1/2025. Stick with quality.
NVDA – Added a small position 12/1/2025.
At the close today, of the 50-Indicators I track, 10 gave Bear-signs and 7 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.)
The daily, bull-bear spread of 50-indicators improved from -8 to -3 (3 more Bear indicators than Bull indicators), a NEUTRAL indication. I consider +5 to -5 the neutral zone. The 10-dMA curve of the spread (purple on the chart above) smooths daily fluctuations; it continued down, a BEARISH sign.
I’m bullish and fully invested. That may change – we’ll see.
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
For more details, see NTSM Page at…
https://navigatethestockmarket.blogspot.com/p/a-system-for-trading-dow-30-stocks-my_8.html
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.
