Experienced market participants know that stocks spend most of their time in seemingly random ranges. It is only for a short time that they will actively trend up or break down. This is logical since companies will go about their business in a somewhat predictable and systematic way. When something unusual or extraordinary happens, or … Continue reading The Significance Of Ranges
Breaking Out
Gold
As you'd expect, there has been positive activity in the Gold sector. It may be surprising that relative strength was occurring here even before the recent market volatility. As we look at the relative performance of some major sectors, it wasn't obvious that gold stocks were outperforming the overall market (as measured by the Nasdaq). … Continue reading Gold
‘A Bubblin’ Crude
There's an old saying that Generals are always fighting the last war. In similar fashion, many stock market participants do the same thing. Since the great market swoon in December of last year, market pundits on video and print media obsess about the return to the new lows, or at least a test thereof. The … Continue reading ‘A Bubblin’ Crude
Oil And Oil Services
As we begin this new calendar year, the markets continue to surge into new highs even as some fatigue seems to be settling in among some individual issues. Plotting the performance of select sectors versus the benchmark S&P shows that many of the strong momentum groups remain strong and not exhibiting conspicuous weakness. Technology stocks … Continue reading Oil And Oil Services
Healthcare/Pharma Activity
In mid June of this year, we pointed out some activity that appeared interesting from the longer term chart patterns of some healthcare/pharma stocks. One of the stellar performers since then has been Abbvie (ABBV), a pharma company which produces Humira, a top selling anti inflammatory treatment among other high profile drug therapies. After breaking … Continue reading Healthcare/Pharma Activity
Base Metals
Most of the news activity surrounding the stock market recently has revolved around the continued strength, or not, of the high profile tech stocks including Amazon, Tesla, Apple etc. In the meantime there has been conspicuous and steady accumulation in another, considerably less exciting area: base metals. Using the Base Metals ETF as a proxy, … Continue reading Base Metals
Healthcare Stealth Advance
We all know that the equity markets have been steadily climbing since the US elections last November. There have been some dramatic pullbacks, but the unmistakable trend has been for higher prices. As we know, markets are not monolithic and within the aggregate market moves, there have been winners and losers. Energy has been the … Continue reading Healthcare Stealth Advance
CENX
Century Aluminum has been popping up more often in our list of stocks moving up from long term bases. The weekly chart shown above clearly shows a bullish collection of events occurring. After tracing out a long one year base, CENX has managed to surpass not only the 5o period but now also the 200 … Continue reading CENX
The Long Game BRKS, FAST
While it's always rewarding to catch the meat of a swing trade, to do so requires a fair bit of analysis, some confluence of technical events and, don't kid yourself, a good dose of opportune timing. Looking beyond the swing trading time frames, monthly charts will give useful perspectives on target prices and therefore the … Continue reading The Long Game BRKS, FAST
PHM Pulte Group
PHM has just recently broken away from a long sideways coiling pattern. These are the kinds of patterns we look for since they can hold the most potential for movement once a threshold is broken on either side of the range. In this case, price has moved decisively above the 4 year trading band and accordingly, we … Continue reading PHM Pulte Group
TC-TECHNICALS 