“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.”
HEGSETH FORCED OUT ADMIRAL HOLSEY (WSJ)
“Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth shocked official Washington in mid-October when he announced that the four-star head of U.S. military operations in the Caribbean was retiring less than a year into his tenure.
But according to two Pentagon officials, Hegseth asked Adm. Alvin Holsey to step down, a de facto ouster that was the culmination of months of discord between Hegseth and the officer. It began days after President Trump’s inauguration in January and intensified months later when Holsey had initial concerns about the legality of lethal strikes on alleged drug boats in the Caribbean…” Story at…
https://www.wsj.com/politics/national-security/hegseth-asked-top-admiral-to-resign-after-months-of-discord-9e7b357f?gaa_at=eafs&gaa_n=AWEtsqfqcncLBQyRTMm82pEEEDDYDfTZSfRykb0_DJ8Km_mky08McrOTEiK2EnoMspU%3D&gaa_ts=69332794&gaa_sig=xVVUQh4B3HR15z3UVIrjCMZBSmKmTMeZbvyJXS-PhIFe5JhptObZDIGuTKtO2YOKEbNxIO3ya89v8RoVDPd5kA%3D%3D
My cmt: …as we guessed when the news of his retirement was announced. I heard Professor Brad Jacob, Associate Dean for Academic Programs and professor of Constitutional Law at Regent University, state that the entire program of attacking drug boats on the high seas was un-constitutional and illegal. As a religious university, Regent is a conservative school so his opinion is not political.
JOBLESS CLAIMS
“Employers announced 71,321 layoffs last month, according to a Thursday report from the global outplacement firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas. The cuts…announced in November 2024…amounted to the highest total for the month since 2022…
…new data from the Department of Labor showed 191,000 initial claims for unemployment benefits were filed in the week ending Nov. 29, down from 218,000 the week prior to reach the lowest level since September 2022.
https://finance.yahoo.com/news/job-market-mixed-bag-jobless-claims-drop-to-3-year-low-but-employers-shed-71000-jobs-in-worst-november-since-2022-124809562.html
FACTORY ORDERS
Factory orders rose 0.2% after a downwardly revised 1.3% increase in August, the Commerce Department's Census Bureau said on Thursday. Economists polled by Reuters had forecast orders would gain 0.5% after a previously reported 1.4% rebound.
https://finance.yahoo.com/news/us-factory-orders-rise-less-152050560.html
PCE INFLATION (CNBC)
“The core personal consumption expenditures price index, which excludes volatile food and energy prices, indicated a 0.2% monthly rise while the annual rate was 2.8%. The monthly rate was in line with the Dow Jones consensus, but the annual level was 0.1 percentage point lower. The core annual rate edged down from 2.9% in August.” Story at…
https://www.cnbc.com/2025/12/05/pce-inflation-report-september-2025.html
MARKET REPORT / ANALYSIS
-Friday the S&P 500 rose about 0.2% to 6870.
-VIX declined about 2% to 15.41.
-The yield on the 10-year Treasury rose to 4.139% (compared to about this time prior market day).
MY TRADING POSITIONS
XLK – Added 11/26/2025 & 12/1/2025
Technology has been the loser during this pullback. It has room to run.
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, 3 gave Bear-signs and 20 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 remained +17 (17 more Bull indicators than Bear indicators), a very 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; it continued higher, a BULLISH sign.
Repeating:
The strong move higher in the daily indicators and the 10-day spread strongly suggests market weakness is over. The market may be well primed for a Christmas rally. At the bottom, the S&P 500 never reached its 200-dMA; however, it did manage to bounce higher from its 100-dMA.
9 of the last 10 days have been up-days so we can expect
a down-day tomorrow or soon. Indicators are strong enough to suggest any
weakness should be relatively short-lived.
The S&P 500 is 0.3% below its all-time high.
BOTTOM LINE
I’m bullish and fully invested.
ETF - MOMENTUM ANALYSIS:
TODAY’S RANKING OF 15 ETFs (Ranked Daily) ETF ranking follows:
Five of the ETFs I track have split 2 for 1. I will need to load a lot of data to update my ETF momentum chart - that will take a while.
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
FRIDAY MARKET INTERNALS (NYSE DATA)
My basket of Market Internals remained BUY. (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.
“Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth shocked official Washington in mid-October when he announced that the four-star head of U.S. military operations in the Caribbean was retiring less than a year into his tenure.
But according to two Pentagon officials, Hegseth asked Adm. Alvin Holsey to step down, a de facto ouster that was the culmination of months of discord between Hegseth and the officer. It began days after President Trump’s inauguration in January and intensified months later when Holsey had initial concerns about the legality of lethal strikes on alleged drug boats in the Caribbean…” Story at…
https://www.wsj.com/politics/national-security/hegseth-asked-top-admiral-to-resign-after-months-of-discord-9e7b357f?gaa_at=eafs&gaa_n=AWEtsqfqcncLBQyRTMm82pEEEDDYDfTZSfRykb0_DJ8Km_mky08McrOTEiK2EnoMspU%3D&gaa_ts=69332794&gaa_sig=xVVUQh4B3HR15z3UVIrjCMZBSmKmTMeZbvyJXS-PhIFe5JhptObZDIGuTKtO2YOKEbNxIO3ya89v8RoVDPd5kA%3D%3D
My cmt: …as we guessed when the news of his retirement was announced. I heard Professor Brad Jacob, Associate Dean for Academic Programs and professor of Constitutional Law at Regent University, state that the entire program of attacking drug boats on the high seas was un-constitutional and illegal. As a religious university, Regent is a conservative school so his opinion is not political.
“Employers announced 71,321 layoffs last month, according to a Thursday report from the global outplacement firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas. The cuts…announced in November 2024…amounted to the highest total for the month since 2022…
…new data from the Department of Labor showed 191,000 initial claims for unemployment benefits were filed in the week ending Nov. 29, down from 218,000 the week prior to reach the lowest level since September 2022.
https://finance.yahoo.com/news/job-market-mixed-bag-jobless-claims-drop-to-3-year-low-but-employers-shed-71000-jobs-in-worst-november-since-2022-124809562.html
Factory orders rose 0.2% after a downwardly revised 1.3% increase in August, the Commerce Department's Census Bureau said on Thursday. Economists polled by Reuters had forecast orders would gain 0.5% after a previously reported 1.4% rebound.
https://finance.yahoo.com/news/us-factory-orders-rise-less-152050560.html
“The core personal consumption expenditures price index, which excludes volatile food and energy prices, indicated a 0.2% monthly rise while the annual rate was 2.8%. The monthly rate was in line with the Dow Jones consensus, but the annual level was 0.1 percentage point lower. The core annual rate edged down from 2.9% in August.” Story at…
https://www.cnbc.com/2025/12/05/pce-inflation-report-september-2025.html
-Friday the S&P 500 rose about 0.2% to 6870.
-VIX declined about 2% to 15.41.
-The yield on the 10-year Treasury rose to 4.139% (compared to about this time prior market day).
XLK – Added 11/26/2025 & 12/1/2025
Technology has been the loser during this pullback. It has room to run.
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, 3 gave Bear-signs and 20 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 remained +17 (17 more Bull indicators than Bear indicators), a very 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; it continued higher, a BULLISH sign.
The strong move higher in the daily indicators and the 10-day spread strongly suggests market weakness is over. The market may be well primed for a Christmas rally. At the bottom, the S&P 500 never reached its 200-dMA; however, it did manage to bounce higher from its 100-dMA.
I’m bullish and fully invested.
TODAY’S RANKING OF 15 ETFs (Ranked Daily) ETF ranking follows:
Five of the ETFs I track have split 2 for 1. I will need to load a lot of data to update my ETF momentum chart - that will take a while.
For more details, see NTSM Page at…
https://navigatethestockmarket.blogspot.com/p/a-system-for-trading-dow-30-stocks-my_8.html
My basket of Market Internals remained BUY. (My basket
of Market Internals is a decent trend-following analysis that is most useful when it diverges from the Index.)
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.
