“Trade what you see; not what you think.” – The Old Fool,
Richard McCranie, trader extraordinaire.
CHRISTMAS QUIZ: What kind of animal is Alvin, the
animated character who sings carols with his brothers? Answer at bottom of
blog.
Merry Christmas everyone. I'll be back for Tuesday's blog
NY TIMES BLASTS HARVARD’S GAY IN PLAGIARISM REVIEW
(ZeroHedge)
“The New York Times has come out with a scathing article,
analyzing five instances of plagiarism committed by Harvard President
Claudine Gay. To review, Gay has been credibly accused of more
than 40 acts of
plagiarism during her tenure at Harvard - which the university
secretly investigated, threatened journalists over, and ultimately
concluded was no big deal - clearing her of breaching
Harvard's "standards for research misconduct." Story at...
https://www.zerohedge.com/political/ny-times-blasts-harvards-gay-detailed-plagiarism-review-scandal-spirals-out-control
TREASON OF THE INTELECTUALS (The Free Press)
“In 1927 the French philosopher Julien Benda
published La trahison
des clercs —“The Treason of the Intellectuals”— which condemned the
descent of European intellectuals into extreme nationalism and racism...
Those who were meant to pursue the life of the mind, he
wrote, had ushered in “the age of the intellectual organization of political
hatreds.” And those hatreds were already moving from the realm of the ideas
into the realm of violence—with results that would be catastrophic for all of
Europe.
A century later, American academia has gone in the
opposite political direction—leftward instead of rightward—but has ended up in
much the same place. The question is whether we—unlike the Germans—can do
something about it...
... The lesson of German history for American academia
should by now be clear. In Germany, to use the legalistic language of 2023,
“speech crossed into conduct.” The “final solution of the Jewish question”
began as speech—to be precise, it began as lectures and monographs and
scholarly articles. It began in the songs of student fraternities. With
extraordinary speed after 1933, however, it crossed into conduct: first,
systematic pseudo-legal discrimination and ultimately, a program of
technocratic genocide...
... Today’s academic leaders would never recognize
themselves as the heirs of those Benda condemned, insisting that they are on
the left, whereas Benda’s targets were on the right. And yet, as Victor
Klemperer came to understand after 1945, totalitarianism comes in two flavors,
though the ingredients are the same.” - Niall Ferguson, trustee University of
Austin, Milbank Family Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution,
Stanford.
https://www.thefp.com/p/niall-ferguson-treason-intellectuals-third-reich?_hsmi=287090390
My cmt: This was a very long piece. I’ve only excerpted a
small part above.
PERSONAL INCOME / SPENDING (The Real Economy Blog)
“November’s personal income and spending report, released
by the Commerce Department on Friday, showed a 0.4% monthly increase in nominal
income and spending, while inflation-adjusted spending advanced by 0.3%.” Discussion
at...
https://realeconomy.rsmus.com/u-s-income-and-spending-see-strong-gains-as-year-nears-an-end/
PCE PRICES (CNBC)
“The core personal consumption expenditures price index,
which excludes volatile food and energy prices, increased 0.1% for the month,
and was up 3.2% from a year ago... On a six-month basis, core PCE increased
1.9%, indicating that if current trends continue the Fed essentially has
reached its goal... Including food and energy costs, so-called headline PCE
actually fell 0.1% on the month and was up just 2.6% from a year ago...”Story
at...
https://www.cnbc.com/2023/12/22/pce-inflation-november-2023-.html
DURABLE ORDERS (Marketplace.org)
“...today’s durable goods orders numbers from the Census
Bureau...shot up nearly 5.5% in November, way more than economists were
expecting, and reversing October’s big decline.” Story at...
https://www.marketplace.org/2023/12/22/durable-goods-orders-rise-as-businesses-spend-to-boost-productivty-regardless-of-higher-interest-rates/
NEW HOME SALES (YahooFinance)
“Sales of new homes fell 12.2% in November from a month
prior...” Story at...
https://finance.yahoo.com/video/home-sales-tumbled-12-2-154310462.html
MARKET REPORT / ANALYSIS
-Friday the S&P 500 rose about 0.2% to 4755.
-VIX dipped about 2% to 13.31.
-The yield on the 10-year Treasury rose to 3.901%.
PULLBACK DATA:
-Drop from Top: 1%. 25.4% max (on a closing basis).
-Trading Days since All-Time Top: 496-days. (The top was
3 January 2022.)
The S&P 500 is 9.7% ABOVE its 200-dMA and 6.4% ABOVE
its 50-dMA.
*I won’t call the correction over until the S&P 500
makes a new-high; however, evidence suggests the major bear-market bottom of
the 25% decline was in the 3600 area and we called a buy on 4 October 2022.
MY TRADING POSITIONS:
XLK – Technology ETF (holding since the October 2022
lows).
XLY - Consumer Discretionary ETF. (Holding since the
October 2022 lows - I bought more XLY 8/21/23.)
INTC – Added 12/6/2023.
BA – Added 12/6/2023.
DWCPF - Dow Jones U.S. Completion Total Stock Market
Index. – Added 12/7/2023. This is a large position in my retirement account
betting on Small Caps.
TODAY’S COMMENT:
On 1 September there were
Zero bear signals and 22 bull. That was at a short-term top and the S&P 500
fell nearly 9% from there. That’s just a reminder that indicators give a most
likely direction for the markets – they are not perfect. Further, a lot of indicators are trend
following and unless there are divergences with market action, they don’t
always give us very good information. Still, it’s the best we’ve got.
We look at a summary of indicators on Friday. (These
indicators tend to be both long-term and short-term, so they are different than
the 20 that I report on daily.) The weekly rundown of indicators remained very
bullish this week: now 3-bear and 21-bull.
BULL SIGNS
-The 10-dMA percentage of issues advancing on
the NYSE (Breadth) is above 50%.
-The 50-dMA percentage of issues advancing on the NYSE
(Breadth) is above 50%.
-The 100-dMA percentage of issues advancing on
the NYSE (Breadth) is below 50%
-MACD of the percentage of issues advancing on the NYSE
(breadth) made a bullish crossover 12 October.
-Smoothed Buying Pressure minus Selling Pressure.
-MACD of S&P 500 price made a bullish crossover 12
Dec.
-My Money Trend indicator is rising.
-Long-term new-high/new-low data.
-Short-term new-high/new-low data.
-Slope of the 40-dMA of New-highs is rising.
-The graph of the 100-day Count (the 100-day sum of
up-days).
-McClellan Oscillator.
-On average, the size of up-moves has been larger than
the size of down-moves over the last month.
-VIX indicator.
-There was a high up-volume day on 21 December canceling the
High down-volume day on 20 December. In addition, there were back-to-back, high
up-volume days (80%+) on the NYSE 13 & 14 Dec.
-XLI-ETF (Cyclical Industrials) vs the S&P 500. The
40-dMA of spread is turning up – call it bullish.
-S&P 500 spread vs. Utilities (XLU-ETF) is bullish.
-The 5-day EMA is above the 10-day EMA, so short-term
momentum is bullish.
-The 5-10-20 Timer System is BUY.
-There was a Zweig Breadth Thrust 3 November. That’s a
rare, very-bullish sign, that will remain bullish until the McClellan
Oscillator turns negative.
-69% of the 15-ETFs that I track have been up over the
last 10-days. (45-55% is neutral.)
NEUTRAL
-There was a Distribution Day 20 Dec.
-There have been 4 Statistically-Significant days (big
moves in price-volume) in the last 15-days.
-Bollinger Bands.
-Overbought/Oversold Index (Advance/Decline Ratio).
-Sentiment.
-Bollinger Band Squeeze 28 April - expired.
-The 50-dMA percentage of issues advancing on the NYSE
(Breadth) has not been below 50%, for more than 3 days in a row.
-The short-term, 10-day EMA, Fosback Hi-Low Logic Index.
-The long-term, 50-dEMA, Fosback Hi-Low Logic Index.
-There have been 13 up-days over the last 20 sessions.
-There have been 8 up-days over the last 10 sessions.
-RSI.
-The Smart Money (late-day action).
-The Calm-before-the-Storm/Panic Indicator flashed a top
warning signal 15 Sept., but it may well have been a bottom signal. - Expired
-There was a New-high/New-low spread reversal on 4 October
(based on std deviation of spread). - Expired
-The S&P 500 is 9.7% above its 200-dMA. (Bear
indicator is 12% above the 200-day.)
-There were Hindenburg Omen signals 11 & 12 Sept 2023
– expired. The McClellan Oscillator turned positive.
-2.8% of all issues traded on the NYSE made new, 52-week
highs when the S&P 500 made a new all-time-high, 3 January 2022. (There is
no bullish signal for this indicator.) This indicated that the advance was too
narrow and a correction was likely to be >10%. It proved correct, but is now
Expired.
BEAR SIGNS
-The smoothed advancing volume on the NYSE is falling.
-Issues advancing on the NYSE (Breadth) compared to the
S&P 500.
-20 December there was a Bearish Outside Reversal Day. I’ll
keep this in effect until the S&P 500 closes above the high for 20
December, 4778.
On Monday’s update of the Friday summary of indicators (20
December 2021), 9 days before the top of the current 25% correction, there were
21 bear-signs and zero bull-signs. Now there are 3 bear-signs and 21-Bull.
Last week, there were 5 bear-sign and 23 bull-signs.
The daily spread of 20 Indicators (Bulls minus Bears) declined
from +11 to +10 (a positive number is bullish; negatives are bearish); the
10-day smoothed sum that smooths the daily fluctuations improved from +97
to +103. (The trend direction is more important than the actual number for the
10-day value.) These numbers sometimes change after I post the blog based on
data that comes in late. Most of these 20 indicators are short-term so they
tend to bounce around a lot.
LONG-TERM INDICATOR: The Long Term NTSM indicator
remained BUY: PRICE, VOLUME & VIX are bullish; SENTIMENT is neutral. (One
warning: The Long-Term Indicator is not a good top-indicator. It can signal BUY
at a top.)
(The important major BUY in this indicator was on 21
October 2022, 7-days after the bear-market bottom. For my NTSM overall signal,
I suggested that a short-term buying opportunity occurred on 27 September
(based on improved market internals on the retest), although without market
follow-thru, I was unwilling to call a buy; however, I did close shorts and
increased stock holdings. I issued a Buy-Signal on 4 October, 6-days before the
final bottom, based on stronger market action that confirmed the market internals
signal. The NTSM sell-signal was issued 21 December, 9 sessions before the high
of this recent bear market, based on the bearish “Friday Rundown” of
indicators.)
BOTTOM LINE
I remain bullish.
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)
DOW 30 momentum ranking
follows:
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
FRIDAY MARKET INTERNALS (NYSE
DATA)
My basket of Market Internals declined to HOLD. (My basket of Market
Internals is a decent trend-following analysis of current market action, but
should not be used alone for short term trading. They are most useful when they
diverge from the Index.)
...My current invested
position is about 65% stocks, including stock mutual funds and ETFs. I’m
usually about 50% invested in stocks. I’m “over invested” now expecting new,
all-time highs this year. That burns all the cash. I have about 25% of the portfolio in bonds.
I trade about 15-20% of the total portfolio using the
momentum-based analysis I provide here. When I see a definitive bottom, I add a
lot more stocks to the portfolio using an S&P 500 ETF as I did back in
October.
CHRISTMAS QUIZ: Ans. Chipmunk. “The Chipmunks have become
one of the most successful children's artists of all time. It has garnered two
number-one singles on the Billboard Hot 100 and won five Grammy
Awards, having four Top 10 albums on the Billboard 200 and
three certified platinum albums.” – Wikipedia.
