FED Decision … Retail Sales … NAHB Housing Index … 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.
 
“Never, never, never, believe any war will be smooth and easy, or that anyone who embarks on that strange voyage can measure the tides and hurricanes he will encounter. The Statesman who yields to war fever . . . is no longer the master of policy but the slave of unforeseeable and uncontrollable events.” - Winston Churchill.
 
“There’s a lot of exuberance out there,” Dimon continued. “But it was in 1972, 1986, 2000, 2007. That doesn’t give me comfort.” – Jamie Dimon
 
"I'll be honest. I don't think the president could spell AI if I gave him the first letter." - Rep. Stephen Lynch during Treasury Secretary Bessent’s Congressional testimony.
 
TRUMP WANTS HIS NAME BACK ON THE KENNEDY CENTER (CNBC)
“Trump said that the center will close immediately, and that renovations will not begin unless and until a higher court reverses the decision to remove his name from the facility’s official name. Story at…
https://www.cnbc.com/2026/09/15/trump-kennedy-center-name-ruling.html
My cmt: What a petty, peevish, petulant person. Who voted for this guy? Oh, I forgot - The Democrats ran a California Commie in 2024.
                           
FED DECSION (Yahoo Finance)
“The Federal Reserve voted to raise interest rates by 25 basis points on Wednesday to a range of 3.75%-4% amid persistently high inflation. The decision was unanimous. The median Fed official expects …” Story at…
https://finance.yahoo.com/economy/policy/live/federal-reserve-meeting-live-updates-25-basis-point-interest-rate-hike-chairman-kevin-warsh-143452661.html
 
RETAIL SALES (AP News)
“Consumers may be griping about higher prices at the pump and elsewhere, but they keep spending, helping to power the economy, according to the latest government snapshot. Retail sales rebounded at a better-than-expected 1.2% increase last month…” Story at… 
https://apnews.com/article/retail-inflation-consumer-sentiment-economy-474ed13de492362589405a47ec044d29
 
NAHB HOUSING INDEX (NAHB Wells Fargo)
“The NAHB/Wells Fargo Housing Market Index (HMI) is designed to gauge and track the pulse of the single-family housing market…Builder confidence in the market for newly built single-family homes fell three points to 32 in September.” Report at…
https://www.nahb.org/news-and-economics/housing-economics/indices/housing-market-index
 
QUICK MARKET SUMMARY
-Wednesday the S&P 500 declined about 0.5% to 7552.
-VIX only rose about 3% to 17.71 – the Options Players aren’t that worried.
-The yield on the 10-year Treasury was little changed at 5.002% (compared to about this time prior market day).
 
MY TRADING POSITIONS
QLD – Added 5/28/2026
NVDA – Added 12/1/2025, 2/6/2026 & 8/3/2026
XLK – Added 6/5/2026
 
CURRENT SUMMARY OF APPROXIMATELY 50 INDICATORS:
At the close today, of the 50-Indicators I track, 20 gave Bear-signs and 5 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 market reaction to the Fed hike is pretty clear in the chart. The Nasdaq chart was similar, but it recovered and finished essentially unchanged.
 
The daily, bull-bear spread of 50-indicators declined from -13 to -15 (15 more Bear indicators than Bull indicators), still a very BEARISH indication. I consider +5 to -5 the neutral zone. The 10-dMA curve of the spread (purple on the chart above) that smooths daily fluctuations continued lower, a BEARISH sign.
 
There was a Bollinger Band Squeeze Monday. 
“A Bollinger Band Squeeze is a technical analysis pattern that happens when the upper and lower [Bollinger] bands come close together, signaling a period of low market volatility that often precedes an explosive price breakout…To determine breakout direction, Bollinger suggests that it is necessary to look to other indicators…
If there is a positive divergence—that is, if indicators are heading upward while price is heading down or neutral—it is a bullish sign. For further confirmation, look for volume to build on up days. On the other hand, if price is moving higher but the indicators are showing negative divergence, look for a downside breakout—especially if there have been increasing volume spikes on down days. Another indication of breakout direction is the way the bands move on expansion. When a powerful trend is born, the resulting explosive volatility increase is often so great that the lower band will turn downward in an upside break, or the upper band will turn higher in a downside breakout.” - Investopedia.
 
Bollinger used RSI and a couple of other indicators I don’t use to judge the breakout direction. RSI is closer to a buy than a sell. Other indicators are bearish, so indicators suggest a downside breakout, but Bollinger Bands were oversold today – mixed signals. Since I use RSI and Bollinger Bands together, Bollinger Bands alone don’t signal a bottom.
 
The S&P 500 closed 0.9% below its 50-dMA and now sits around ½% above its100-dMA
 
The Index I only 3.3% below its all-time high.
 
The market reacted to the Fed hike today by falling on its face. Was that an overreaction? It sure seems like it since the rate hike was almost certain. Futures are up as I write this (7:45 Wednesday night) so I am not in a rush to sell. I think markets will recover, but we’ll watch to see what really happens.
 
BOTTOM LINE
I remain neutral, but concerned.
 
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
 
WEDNESDAY MARKET INTERNALS (NYSE DATA)-

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

My invested position is about 60% stocks, including stock mutual funds and ETFs. 50% invested in stocks is a normal, conservative position for a retiree. (80% 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.