“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...
“Reagan had the gift of being able to deal with people
with whom he didn’t agree. There is a reason he took 49 states in the 1984
presidential election: He knew how to bring people together. His love of
American values and greatness permeated all of his thinking.
As for Mr. Trump, he has been a great divider... he has
deviated from many tried-and-true Republican policies like free trade and standing
up to dictators...” - Douglas Lempereur, WSJ letters.
POWER THE EPA EV FANTASY? (WSJ)
“The futurists at the Environmental Protection Agency are
confident that electric vehicles will soon become cheap, reliable and easy to
fuel... Widespread adoption of EVs will require an unprecedented and
staggeringly expensive expansion of local electrical grids. This will require a
huge increase in the production of electrical transformers, along with more
power plants and transmission lines to produce and deliver energy.. We estimate
that achieving the EPA’s goal will require north of $1 trillion in grid
upgrades by 2035... EV advocates at the EPA suggest that these mandates will
induce market forces that will solve the attendant challenges. That’s a
novel—and dubious—theory of innovation. Some behavioral changes might help,
such as rationing access to EV charging or reducing the number of cars. Perhaps
that’s the real goal. Whatever the motivation, the EPA’s de facto EV mandate is
another green fantasy.” - Jonathan A. Lesser, a senior fellow and Mark P. Mills, director of the National Center for Energy
Analytics. See the full opinion piece at...
https://www.wsj.com/articles/can-we-power-the-epas-ev-fantasy-electrical-grid-energy-vehicles-a786d535?mod=opinion_lead_pos5
“The Environmental Protection Agency’s own climate model
predicts that the proposed emissions standards for light, medium and heavy
vehicles would reduce global temperatures in 2100 by 0.02-degrees Celsius.” - Benjamin Zycher, American Enterprise Institute. From WSJ at...
https://www.wsj.com/articles/electric-vehicles-ev-wont-save-the-climate-carbon-eda2089e
My cmt: Isn’t that weird? Auto emissions contribute a
negligible amount to Climate change, but the Biden administration wants to
outlaw ICE (Internal Combustion Engines) by 2035. It reminds me that Democrats canceled
the Keystone Pipeline. As a result, oil must be carried by train to US
refineries, a more costly and environmentally risky proposition – but it “sounds”
better and plays to the environmental extremists.
ISRAEL’S NEW STANDARD OF WARFARE (Newsweek)
“The Israel Defense Forces conducted an operation
at al-Shifa hospital in the Gaza Strip to root out Hamas terrorists recently, once again taking unique
precautions as it entered the facility to protect the innocent; Israeli media
reported that doctors accompanied the forces to help Palestinian
patients if needed. They were also reported to be carrying food, water and
medical supplies for the civilians inside... In my long career studying and
advising on urban warfare for the U.S.
military, I've never known an army to take such measures to attend to the
enemy's civilian population, especially while simultaneously combating the
enemy in the very same buildings. In fact, by my analysis, Israel has
implemented more precautions to prevent civilian harm than any military in
history—above and beyond what international law requires and more than the U.S.
did in its wars in Iraq and Afghanistan... yet, analysts who should know better are still engaging in
condemnation of the IDF based on the level of destruction that's still
occurred—destruction that is unavoidable against an enemy that embeds in a vast
tunnel system under civilian sites in dense urban terrain.” Story at...
Israel
Has Created a New Standard for Urban Warfare. Why Will No One Admit It? |
Opinion (msn.com)
DURABLE GOODS / CONSUMER CONFIDENCE (Yahoo News)
“Orders for long-lasting U.S. manufactured goods
increased more than expected in February, while business spending on equipment
showed tentative signs of recovery as the economy's growth prospects in the
first quarter remained upbeat.,, Orders for durable goods, items ranging from
toasters to aircraft meant to last three years or more, rose 1.4% last month...
the Conference Board said its consumer confidence index was little changed at
104.7 in March. "Recession fears continued to trend downward," said
Dana Peterson, chief economist at the Conference Board. "Meanwhile,
consumers expressed more concern about the U.S. political environment compared
to prior months." Story at...
https://www.yahoo.com/news/us-durable-goods-orders-rebound-124603369.html
MARKET REPORT / ANALYSIS
-Tuesday the S&P 500 slipped about 0.3% to 5204.
-VIX dropped about 2% to 12.92. (The Options Players aren’t
concerned about a correction.)
-The yield on the 10-year Treasury declined to 4.238%.
MY TRADING POSITIONS:
QLD- Added 2/20/2024
UWM – Added 1/22/2024.
XLK – Technology ETF (holding since the October 2022
lows).
INTC – Added 12/6/2023.
CRM – Added 1/22/2024
DWCPF - Dow Jones U.S. Completion Total Stock Market
Index. – Added 12/7/2023 when I sold the S&P 500. This is a large position
in my retirement account betting on Smaller Caps.
TODAY’S COMMENT:
The above chart is the spread between Bull indicators and
Bear Indicators (Bull minus Bear) shown in Red. Neutral indicators are ignored.
The Purple line is the 10-dMA of indicator spread (red line). The data suggests
that a sharply falling 10-dMA spread usually
(but not always) precedes, or occurs early in corrections. We can also
note that the S&P 500 is at its lower trend line. Currently, the 10-dMA of
Indicator spread is relatively flat so we don’t have a correction indication
yet. The caveat is that there is only about a year of data in the chart above so
we can’t feel too confident in that conclusion.
CURRENT SUMMARY OF APPROXIMATELY 50 INDICATORS:
Now there are 10 bear-signs and 13-Bull. Monday,
there were 8 bear-signs and 15 bull.
-The S&P 500 remains stretched and is now 12.9% above
its 200-dMA. The Bear indicator is 12% above the 200-day, but I don’t trade one
signal – we care more about the ensemble.
LONG-TERM INDICATOR: The Long Term NTSM indicator
remained HOLD: PRICE is positive; SENTIMENT, VOLUME & VIX are neutral.
(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 am cautiously bullish. We’ll see...
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
XLK moved to 4th place.
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
I skipped my rules on Intel
and it has been a disappointment. Serves me right! Now, Salesforce (CRM) has fallen out of the
top 3. It is an AI play so it is not clear that selling it is the best
move. I’ll wait a bit longer.
TUESDAY MARKET INTERNALS (NYSE
DATA)
My basket of Market Internals remained 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
continuation of bullish market action.
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.
