I am dying to read the comments, but I keep getting distracted by other stuff that needs doin'....

Just for fun, I decided to calculate the differences between the peaks and valleys of the S&P since the bear market (yes, we're in a bear market.....) began last fall. It's an interesting data set:

Of course, my conjecture that we've "peaked" in merely one day will be considered outlandish to, oh, just about everyone. But that's how we roll here on Slope. I would point out, however, that the % change from Thursday afternoon until Friday afternoon was comparable to the prior gains; indeed, it was quite a bit higher than the prior gain which took 27 days.

The GLOBEX opened recently.........so far, so good. Sunday's activity (so far; it's not even been an hour) is highlighted in red.

I wish I was writing this with the insights, articles, and suggestions from the hundreds and hundreds of comments posted over the past few days, but I would rather get this post done first than make everyone wait until God-knows-when. The rich content that exists here on Slope from the users is marvelous for all readers, myself included, and I am so grateful for the participation level that so many people show here. Thank you!

I occasionally try to post "evidence" that I'm not a permabear (which, if true, would mean I'm a non-thinking individual). On Tuesday, I wrote this non-equivocal post shouting that buying gold, energy, and the NASDAQ were the things to do. I was right, but the intestinal fortitude required to hold on to those positions from Tuesday afternoon (when I said it) until the end of the week is something most do not possess (I certainly do not; I got "blown out" of my NASDAQ long positions a couple of times until, finally, the thing soared on Thursday afternoon).

Having said that, my brief flirtation with bullishness has come and gone. Sadly, a lot of people have be spooked into the bullish camp. Let me say, without any lack of clarity, what I believe:

1. I am convinced, now more than ever, that we are in the throes of a bear market which is far from over, and that the resumption of the fall is very close, if not imminent;
2. The United States will never regain the stature and strength it once knew in the world, based on the actions of an administration which, at best, has misguided intentions, and at worst, is involved in a conspiracy upon which I will not even conjecture;
3. There is going to be sweeping financial ruin felt by many folks who simply don't know what they are doing.

Perhaps I am overly cautious about my views (the above notwithstanding) in order to not be branded a wearer of tin-foil hats. I've seen the breathless videos on some popular financial bloggers agonizing over the ruin of our once-great land. I'm just not the conspiracy type. I've consistently viewed those who make it their life's work trying to find the "bad guy" behind JFK's death or the "loose change" 9/11 conspiracy as bored and unhinged. This blog, after all, is about making money based on chart analysis. It's not a political blog. But the extraordinary nature of what is happening compels me to say something, even if it's just a prognostication.

If may seem pathetically naive, but for God's sake, at least take a few minutes to write your Congressional representative and your Senator.. This nation is supposed to be a democracy. I'm willing to invest a few minutes of my time, even if it means nothing, to at least be a doer and not just a complainer. If you have other effective means to get an opinion heard, please say so in the comments section and provide links.

Bulls can't seem to deal with life unless stocks are going up. Bulls are whiners, and no welfare recipient can hold a candle to the bulls. I've been looking at the kind of chatter from bulls out there, and it's all the same: "rig the game so that we are guaranteed to win." Wimps.

I was glancing around other blogs and found this post from someone who supposedly is a professional analyst with something called Capital Investment News (I'm pretty sure I know who the guy is, and he apparently wrote an article on September 1st suggesting that July 15th was the bottom for financial stocks; errr, he was wrong). Anyway, this is example number 8,323 that bulls can't even manage the simplest rules of writing (I've boldfaced each error that I saw).

I believe their will be a slight pull back as this plan is finalized. I will be holding my stock. THings are happening so fast that I don't want to miss the upswing. I do believ a permanant ban on shorts needs to be enacted. Look at stocks since the ban they have started to grow once again. Congress and the sec needs to realize that if an american has a 401k they are the losers when you allow the shorts to manipulate the stock price lower. The short sellers say it keeps the finacial system honest, thats a bunch of bull. The hedge funds make a killing on shorting companies because of the rumors it spreads and its the false rumors that have been recking havoc. There is no ligintmate reason for shorting. If you believe in a company buy their stock if you don't don't buy them. I'm tired of watching my 40k get depleted by the short sellers manipulating a stock price.

Jesus H. Christ, you must be stupid! Setting aside the utterly fallacious nature of your pontifications, didn't you learn the evils of run-on sentences when you were in grade school? But I digress......

On Thursday, the interest rate that the market was demanding to put their money in a safe place was 0.01%. That's one. One hundreth. Of a single. Percent.

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In the past, I have pointed out specific charts of securities that I believed were especially attractive. But I'm not going to do that now, and I might not do that for a while to come. The reason is that, at this point, my disposition is to Short Everything That Has a Ticker Symbol. The charts I am looking at are so jumping-up-and-down obvious as shorts, that it's almost not worth bothering to point out individual issues. Not to say that this is an ideal market for shorting. The $VIX is still quite high and those running the game keep changing the rules of the game. Who is to say short-selling isnt' made outright illegal, as the bulls desire? Who is to say that put options aren't banned?

Anyway, the Chinese market looks ripe for another plunge. I'm going to be buying FXP this week.

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There might be a little upside left for oil and gas, but this graph is simply bear-rific.

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The $INDU made a 1,000 point reversal late last week. The pink rectangle shown below right is my new best friend.

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Notice a couple of thing about the QQQQs: first, take heed of the important trendline that was busted earlier this month and has been mostly retraced; second, notice that, in spite of no small amount of excitement on Friday, the volume was by far the lower of the entire week!

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The Russell 2000 was especially strong on Friday, and it went from pushing the low levels of its Bollinger to its high in almost no time.

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I consider the S&P 500 perhaps the most compelling of all. I've tinted a crucially important resistance level.

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And, love of my life, the $UTIL, is enough to make a bear weep tears of joy.

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Lastly, another juicy bearish graph is the $XAU. As with oil, perhaps there is a skosh of upside left, but the potential for downside is far greater.

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So that's it for me. I have gone from Bear to SuperBear. And I feel like I'm the last bear standing. Even Tony Caldaro has jumped ship, which I find profoundly disappointing. But I am pretty comfortable about what's coming.

Happy Sunday morning, everyone. I got up with a sick feeling in my stomach. The zeitgeist about putting a crown on Paulson's corrupt, bald head is pretty bad out there. I wonder to myself if the populist backlash is enough to throw a monkey wrench into plans for the "bailout." I don't have a lot of faith in the intelligence of the population as a whole (in spite of Bush's assurances they they are, in his words, "plenty smart"), but this is one time I'd appreciate God inspiring a few million people to get in touch with their freakin' representatives. I will, naive as it may sound.

My intention to read the thousands (literally) of comments posted here over the past week continues to be unfilled. But I need to give you guys a few decent charts first. Later today.

• The market will surprise everyone and resume its fall this week. It may not break last week's lows; and it may not start right away; but I am extremely confident the psychosis that gripped the world on Thursday and Friday is going to wear off, oh, just about now.
• Within the next year or two, assuming the economic situation gets a lot worse, you are going to be amazed at the kind of people dragged in front of courts on criminal charges. Like the senior management teams of Lehman, Bear Stearns, Merrill Lynch, Fannie Mae, and Freddie Mac.
• You won't see Paulson dragged in front of any court (although if this were some other country, he would disappear mysteriously), but, unless things really turn around miraculously, he will be vilified in the long-term.
• George Bush will increasingly be regarded as the single worst president in history. (Disclaimer: I am not such pot-smoking, hippie-loving left-wing nutjob; I grew up so Republican that it was embarassing; but the only thing Republican about Bush is his protection of the rich).
• The populist backlash is going to compel (more like "allow") Congress to make the tax code far more punitive, and the IRS is going to increase in power mightily as its need for cash grows.
• If things get really bad, you're going to see a push for the forced extraction of salaries and bonuses earned by the senior management of many of the companies involved in this credit crisis; and you will certainly hear a call for the senior management of all these firms getting bailed out to get $0 in severance packages as a condition for the gigantic bailout program.

OK, change of heart, I wanted to do one other quick post before the weekend.

I'd like to know (via the comments section) who had troubles with their broker this week? By that I mean downtime, bad fills, and other horror stories. I had a couple of bad "events", one of which was that Principal was down all day long.

If you're not comfortable sharing your story in comments, you can email me (see the "Contact Me" link in the upper right). Thank you! (By the way, if you decide to give thinkorswim - - my employer - - a try, use the ad on the right column here on this blog. No, I don't get any money for you doing so, but frankly my employer is nice to host this blog, and it would be good for those who haven't tried it to "show some love" and try a new platform!)

I will be doing a post this weekend, by the way (probably Sunday). There will be plenty of charts!

The week is done. Finally.

I am completely exhausted from lack of sleep and hard work. I need some recovery time. I'm not going to post again until this weekend. I hope to catch up on comments and get a sense for the chatter that's been going on.

I'm not sure if my post will be Saturday or Sunday. Sign up for my Twitter notifications and I'll tweet everyone when the post is up. I hope you made it through this week OK. I did, all things considered. Thanks.......

For your consideration, a few choice charts for shorting. I am like a kid in a candy store.

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I have put 100% of my IRA into SDP this morning. Everything.

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OK, I can't help myself. I've got to say - - if this is the "new world" of options, forget it. I'll just trade ETFs. There is no way I can trade in a market where the bid/ask spread is 50% of the price.

This sort of risk would really handicap me.

The chart below shows the S&P 500 with a couple of important retracements drawn. The most important is the 38.2% retracement level at a price of 1267.64. As of this writing (about an hour before the open), the S&P is trading up 56 points higher (!) at 1260. How about that?

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I'm sure most of you have noticed the paucity (Ned: that funny word means "lack of") charts lately.

This morning, I intended to post some ideas, but, simply stated, there are too many. Based on what I'm seeing in the bid/ask, just about everything I like to short is setting up beautifully.

It's like the government has taken a couple of months of impatient waiting for stocks to get to good shorting territory and compressed it into just a few hours.

Thanks, Hanks! I owe you bagel and lox, Cox! Thankie, Bernanke!

As I woke up this morning, I realized I owe American an apology.

I'm sorry I put Lehman Brothers out of business. And Fannie Mae. And Freddie Mac. As well as Bear Stearns. Come to think of it, since I've been trading a while, I also want to apologize for the destruction of HealthSouth, WorldCom, and Enron.

I used to think their failure was due to their own wreckless mismanagement by people paid hundreds of millions of dollars. But, assuming we live in a rational world, the cold fact of the matter is that by selling the stock of these companies, and then buying it back at a lower price, I put them out of business.

I hope that Dick from Lehman, Mr. Cox from the SEC, and all the other gentlemen (including the late, great Mr. Lay from Enron) can find it within their little black souls to forgive me. Thank you for your consideration.

I don't want to go through another week like this one again. Monday seems like months ago. If you've been active in this market, it should. To me, BAC buying MER happened lifetimes ago. This week is so dense with historical events, it seems like we're going through a 9/11 every morning, and again every night. The insanity is the only thing keeping me from collapsing in a heap.

Today the wheels absolutely came off. Britain bans short selling. The US plans to ban short selling. The New York Attorney General announces criminal investigations of short sellers. The Federal Government plans to gather their chiefs (particularly those follicularly challenge) over the weekend to put together a plan to "fix" everything.

Earlier today, I was distressed to think that - once again - I'd have to wait several months before things were ready to short again. I think the government shenanigans are going to be a huge time saver. I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that, yes, this blatant socialist interference with the markets will push them higher, and that will create a golden shorting opportunity for which otherwise we'd have to patiently wait. And then, come October, earnings will start to roll in, and it will be plainly evident that corporate America's equities are a poor place to have your money. So a lot of people are going to sell. And - - as of this writing - - selling stocks is still permitted in this formerly great nation of ours.

Someone emailed me to ask if I thought put options would be banned. I would have formerly laughed this off as the musings of someone wearing an aluminum foil hat. Not anymore. It seems absolutely plausible. It even seems within reason that the government would shut down stock exchanges. They did in Russia. Hey, Russia isn't the U.S., but it's not the Congo either. That's a large, powerful, highly industrialized country. And they shuttered the exchange to restore what they think of as "order."

I've glanced at other sites, and there's a ton of electronic ink being spilled on how wretched the government is. At least, that's how thinking people regard it. See, banning short-selling is a politically attractive stance. I mean, why would John Q. Public have a problem with the rumor-spreading short-sellers who..........good God!............want to see stocks go down in price! .........getting banned? Bears are about as popular as the tax man. Naturally the vast majority of the nation (most of whom, as with any normal distribution, aren't the sharpest knives in the drawer).

I am going to carefully prepare my coming trades. Provided that put options are still legal, I'm going to buy a lot of them. Not necessarily tomorrow, but soon. The next fall in prices.......and it is coming, make no mistake.........is going to make this week look like Mr. Rogers Neighborhood. And I firmly believe that we are heading to a level on the Dow below 9,000 by the middle of next year.

Wow. I cannot believe what I am reading. I honestly cannot.

This is becoming a police state. The numbskulls in so government has become so desperate, that they are resorting to an interference with the markets that I honestly thought never would happen in a "free" country.

I have speculated before that this sort of thing might happen, but I wasn't really serious. This is really disappointing, since it shows a level of meddling that I thought was just for the third world. Not us.

And, frankly, it only convinces me more that this market is doomed. Because if they have to go to this extreme - - making shorting stocks illegal - - this market is going to eventually get pounded. They can make shorting illegal. But not selling.

I feel a hundred times better about the market than I did, oh, about four hours ago. Today went great. My gold shorts (which were really aggressive) performed fantastic. My SSO position was a bomb until the last hour of the day, when it was sensational. And, having closed that long position, I got back into the bear's game again and bought a substantial $RUT put position when the IWM was near the day's highs.

This week has been a psychological roller coaster. I know many of you feel the same way. I'll be doing a post late tonight (I solemnly swear!). Thank you.

The SPY has been struggling mightily, but it's finally (with 55 minutes left in the day; I always have to qualify these statements!) getting some strength. It's index expiration day, and all eyes have been on GS, MS, and the rest of the financial sector. I'm looking forward to doing a long post this evening. I just wanted to pop my head into the blog and provide a really quick update and comment-cleaner.

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VIX topped out an 42.16, which I believe is a record for the VIX (since the calculation was changed in 2003, only the past five years should be considered).

What. A. Day.

Having been awake for 25 hours straight now, I'm anticipating collapsing in a heap early this afternoon. Better bring a pillow to the office!

I'm going to make this quick, because I still have a lot of charts to look at. But some quick points:

• There were about 1,000 comments on the blog yesterday, and there were a couple of fist fights breaking out (julia/2sweeties and itrade4real/buster); please, folks, be nice to one another. Or if someone bothers you, just ignore them. 90% of the value of this blog is the wonderful collection of comments, insights, and links (thanks brutusmaximus...). I love reading the comments and learning from the "collective mind" we have built here, so let's keep the quality of discourse high and the behavior civil.
• I thought folks were joking about short selling being "banned" until I saw the Reuters article; I guess it didn't exactly help yesterday, even though it was supposed to have.
• In spite of my bellyaching about not having index puts, I was happy to see some of my shorts which had been doing absolutely nothing finally starting cooking. NIHD, AMX, and SMG spring to mind.
• Molecool told me to chill with the dozen posts a day; I guess the frequency of my posts is symptomatic of the frenetic nature of the market. There was a time when one post a day was plenty. Anyway, I will cool it today (although don't yell at me if this post gets 500 comments before I do a new post).

Here are an interesting snippet I saw in the wee hours (at which time I've also been watching the e-mini futures, which had been looking reasonably strong, but as of this writing, 50 minutes before the open, are only a little in the green).

In a stunning turnaround, the benchmark Hang Seng Index lost more than 1,350 points in the morning session to its lowest level in more than two years, only to claw back all of the lost ground and then some in the closing moments. The index, which lost 15.2% in the previous six sessions, finally ended 0.03% lower at 17,632.46. The sharp recovery was aided by news that the Federal Reserve and other major central banks planned to inject hundreds of billions of dollars worth of liquidity into the financial system in a bid to thaw frozen short-term money markets.

Good luck, everyone. This is a very tough market to consistently draw profits from, and only the most dextrous are able to do it.

Alexander Elder wrote a book called, I believe, Welcome to My Trading Room. I think I should write a book now called Welcome to My Bedroom, because I'm still slumped here in bed, in the wee hours of the morning, going through charts. My alarm is set for 3:15 a.m. so I can dive in more seriously.

Hello, God, it's me, Tim. I know I could have made more during this downswing, and for that I am a sinner. Could you see your way clear to push the markets back on to their necklines? If you could do that for me, Lord, believe me, I'll take advantage of it. Thank you. Oh, and amen.

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This schedule is grinding my body into hamburger. Ugh. I can only hope I manage to get up as early as I need - - like 3 a.m. - - to go through all my charts. There's no way I am able to do any kind of epic post right now. I can't even manage to read the comments (one of my favorite aspects of doing this blog).

In a macro sense, everything I've been talking about all these months is finally happening. The trade in $UTIL is a great example. So I am hopeful that the kinds of suggestions discussed here, particularly in the past eight weeks, have yielded the collective readership of this blog many millions of dollars in profits.

The saying that "nobody makes money in bear markets, including the bears" is starting to make sense to me. I'm making money, but God almighty, it's exhausting. In retrospect, it need not be, because you just let things fall to pieces. But given the way the market can rip higher unexpectedly, playing "defense" with one's profits takes a lot of vigilance.

The market is bound to snap higher sometime soon. I thought it was going to be today, and that cost me a portion of the day's profits (and a large opportunity cost). Given the "rush for the exits" near the day's end, it's obvious the notion of holding stocks for more than one trading day has become terrifying for people.

Gobbling up index puts at this point seems horrifically risky. I need to clear my mind and look at all my charts to really find out what I'm going to do next (whether taking profits on my existing shorts or selectively going long battered positions). A few hours of sleep is what I need now. I'll do a post before the open.

I've been up since 4 a.m., and I'm feeling the effects. I'm getting sick of saying "What a day!" every day. We are experiencing financial 9/11 day after day after day. Even for a bear like me, it's exhausting.

I hope to do a post later, but it'll be late tonight. I haven't even managed to read today's comments yet. Anyway, hang in there; I hope you folks are doing well.

I'm looking forward to reading comments (even though there's probably a small amount of snark in there.........) Obviously today was incredible, and obviously I missed a huge opportunity by not owning index puts today. Indeed, I came into the market long the QQQQ. So - - irony of ironies - - Mr. Bear got smacked by the Bear Market.

Not to say that today was bad. I made some money, but not nearly as much as I "should" have (the quotes are deliberate, because it's all too easy to second guess ourselves). Naturally I am disappointed, and I am going to go through all my charts (well over 1,000 of them) to get a fresh look before the opening bell tomorrow.

I honestly thought the Dow would shake off most of its losses today, but I think the persistent fear is My God What Is Next. So people couldn't stomach the idea of staying long. Two hours before the close, the Dow was really blasting higher. That fell to pieces.

Reaching for my report card, I'd give myself a B- today. Considering the circumstances - - and greatly aided by my bullish gold call! - - it wasn't so bad. But I can't help but say I am disappointed in myself for not believing the Bear could dig deeper. I've waited far too long for this market to act in that manner. Shame on me.

I just bought a large PUT position on symbol GLD. I think this gold panic has run its course. The $IRX chart, by the way, continues to amaze me. What a day! What a day!

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I sold my RUT puts (acquired today and, amazing, capable of yielding a handsome profit) and got into IWM calls with a stop at the day's low of 67.64. The Dow chart was pretty compelling for me (in terms of looking for a bounce). Looking at the IWM chart, I think we are revisiting January 23rd. That is - - - hitting a major Fib level and, the next day, going a little bit below that level before pushing off higher. Notice the highlighted areas below.

The Dow 30 is almost exactly at its 78.6% retracement, which, as you can see, has been an important support or resistance level in the past. This might be significant.

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In spite of the numerous posts, I am really busy here, so I haven't had any chance to read any of the comments. It's pretty humbling to jump up and down about being bullish on the NDX yesterday when, yet again, the market is falling to pieces. Of all people, you think I wouldn't succumb to any bullish temptations. But I did, and it cost me.

Not to say I entered the day a pure bull. I still had about 40 puts, almost all of which (obviously) are doing well today. But I got hit in the gut pretty hard with some of my bullish players, and much worse, the opportunity cost of NOT taking advantage of the marvelous run-up in the $RUT yesterday afternoon was regretable.

Maybe the lack of sleep is starting to affect my judgment!

I am none too pleased with myself. Good for me for going long gold. Shame on me for not having faith in the potential of the bear market. Today is crucial. Are we going to break Monday's lows? If we do, look out below.

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Care to discuss what the implications of this are?

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Well, the gold longs are doing fantastic. My QLD long got blown out of the water. Naturally it's a bit painful for a bear with no index positions to see the market still trying to find a bottom. But at this juncture, I am simply not comfortable pursuing any more index puts. To my mind, the risk is simply too high, and I'd rather focus on better opportunities.

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So far, so good. My bullish (yes, you read that right; bullish) proclamations on gold and oil yesterday are working out pretty well.

What's it going to be like when the markets move up or down just a little each day? What are we going to do when the biggest financial event in a quarter is a company bumping up its dividend a little? What will it feel like when a 100 point move on the Dow is pretty big news? We have gone through the looking glass, folks, and entered a totally new world. Someday it will get back to normal.

The reason for the title of tonight's post is that some people were actually ticked off (or "fading" me) since I had "turned bull." (To be clear, I was going long calls on specific sectors). I received a few emails from people, as if I had turned my back on "the cause." I am not here as a representative of the Financial Al Qaida; I don't pray for the destruction of the United States and its assets. I simply want to objectively take advantage of the insights I gain from charts. I may seem like a raving bear sometimes based on the juxtaposition between (a) what I see and (b) what the talking heads are saying; but reality and the charts have gotten a lot closer together lately, so I'm a pretty mellow fellow.

Suffice it to say that it is my life's goal to shake my permabear tendencies and be as dispassionate as possible. My "bullish calls" today are a symptom of my attempt at personal transformation.

The volume on AIG - - just one stock - - was nearly 1.2 billion shares today. It had a multi-hundred percent intraday range. And tonight, after hours, it is getting slammed yet again. I imagine this will be the big story on Wednesday, one way or another.

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Now, a lot of folks have been needling me about a "pledge" to do just one post a day; you misunderstand - - I meant the final three days of this week. I'm going to be very tied up with "normal" work. What I wouldn't give to have three quiet days on the market! But that's not going to happen. What I'll probably do is just write a one-sentence post so that people don't lose their minds posting comments; in other words, I don't want people to have to load 15 charts every time they post a comment; and, at the end of the day, I'll do a regular post (OK, I guess that's two per day).

Looking back, I think I'd give myself a solid "B+" for my performance today. I dumped a huge number of puts early in the day, most of them at very good prices (although I painfully noticed that CEG, on which I owned puts a few days ago, was plunging like crazy!) I was kind of ham-handed with a few positions, notably RUT and OIH. But on the whole it was a good, profitable day, and I can't fault myself too much given the insanity of (a) the general craziness we're going through (b) Fed day, which is always nuts. The $VIX, not surprisingly, poked into "maybe this is the bottom for now" territory, as you can see below. This is only the 4th such instance pushing above 33 in at least the past five years.

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As for what's next, it's tough to say; as of now (just a few hours after the Tuesday close), the GLOBEX is down mildly hard. As you can see from the DIA below, we bottomed nicely at mid-July levels and covered the entire Fibonacci range today, closing near the highs on huge volume.

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The SPY, also sporting gigantic volume, opened down very hard and created a sizable bullish engulfing pattern (although let's remember last week's similar pattern didn't mean squat).

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And then there's the IWM. It's pretty easy to see in all three of these ETFs how, even if they open stronger tomorrow, they might bump their heads pretty hard at the respecting overhanging Fib levels.

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I should note for the record that I have no index options at all right now. I did buy some NDX calls, and I closed those for a few thousand bucks profit (I couldn't stomach the idea of a big call position overnight). I did go long a wide variety of issues, almost all energy- or gold-based, as I described in the prior post.

Looking at the S&P 500 daily chart, it's pretty easy to make a case for today's low being the intermediate low for a while. Just look at January (and, later, March) of this year; it hit that Fib level and spent months climbing higher. I think the culture, if you will, of the market has changed enough to shorten the countertrend. But I have trouble picturing the S&P just slipping right past 1170 and heading down to the next level of 1075. If we did "crash", however, that's where I'd say it was going to fall.

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Another reason for my slight case of bullishness is the NASDAQ and, more specifically, the $MSH. The pattern below is hardly a marvelous long-term hold, but it certainly looks like a decent bounce point; failing Tuesday's lows, however, would really crush this market. The new "oh sh*t!" point in many cases are the lows from Tuesday morning.

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Here we see crude oil (on a continuous basis) spanning back ten years. You can see how it "overshot" its trend very significantly. Likewise, it has "undershot" the trend here. I think that long-term crude oil is going to be bearish, but in the short-term I think it could make a push back to the very low triple digits.

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I will close by saying this - - I'm tired! This "bear market" stuff is really exhausting. The thing which stinks about the slope of hope (not the blog, but the market) is how it requires such riveted attention. I could have lost a ton of money today if I simply ignored the market. The "wall of worry" (a climbing market) is great because it's plodding, deliberate, and non-volatile. So that's probably the main reason I would love to see us enter a bounce for a little bit; I could really use a break from all this! Something tells me the market doesn't care a whole lot about how rested I feel, though. We need to take it as it comes.....

Sorry about all the "Calls" but I need to remind myself. As usual, the number following is the stop price.

ANR 49.59 call
UNG 32.30 call
BUCY 41.05 call
CAT 61.21 call
CENX 34.35 call
CIEN 10.31 call
EAC 40.46 call
BEN 85.03 call
BGC 32.96 call
GG 25.50 call
GOOG 423.71 call
ISRG 259.50 call
JBL 11.65 call
LNN 64.55 call
PXP 32.25 call
SSRI 14.40 call
VSEA 26.63 call 

No change in the interest rates. Unanimous decision.

And, as usual, the quotes are insane on the ETFs; things like 118.88 bid and 118.46 ask (in other words, comletely screwy and behind............)

Three reasons.

1. Gary Savage, whom I've grown to respect tremendously, has gone ga-ga over gold. This means a lot to me.
2. Elliott Wave International, which never seems to have met a market they didn't think was going to go down, has actually turned bullish on gold (medium-term).
3. The charts look like they've bottomed out (again, medium-term)

I have been TRIMMING, TRIMMING, TRIMMING. CASH CASH CASH! I did re-enter RUT puts when the IWM got to about $70.

I must say $UTIL is so gorgeous - - Mwah! Love it!

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I would like to thank my fellow blogger Andrew Crowder for reminding us all that "cash is also a position." I took this advice to heart this morning when I immediately sold two huge positions - one in RUT puts and another in OIH puts, both with profits bordering on the pornographic. The S&P 500 target of 1170 I've been watching for many, many weeks was nailed, and I got out.

Thank you, Andrew; and thank you to all the other commenters; I have gleened so many wonderful ideas and suggestions from reading what you write. You are what makes this blog great!

First up, let me say there won't be fifteen posts today. In fact, after today, get used to maybe ONE post a day (sorry!) because I'm really, really busy with work. Speaking of fifteen posts, that was a large factor in the explosive, unprecedented traffic to this blog yesterday; some surely would say this is a $SLIX reversal indicator flashing a warning!

This is what my morning office looked like at 4:30 as I drifted into it. You can't see all the charts awaiting me.

There is more than a little risk today. All the past data indicates today would be a big up day, in spite of current pre-market indications (as of now, although CPI is reported in a few minutes, and there's still an hour left for the government to do God-knows-what).

I think I'm ready for some rest. Time to head upstairs. But one last post.

This is my 15th post today.  In the entire month of June, I did 59 posts. Today we have nearly 500 comments on Slope. Plus well over 40,000 page views, which has smashed the old record to pieces. The $SLIX indicator is flashing another warning!

There's a lot of talk about the $VIX, but you want to know something I realized? Today's candlestick was white. Big deal, right? But this is quite intriguing - - in all the other big "spike" days, the candle was black; in other words, fear was maximum at the open and subsided heavily toward the close. Today was the opposite. Not only was it the opposite, but it's the only "spike" instance I see in my entire $VIX history that looks like that! Compare the candle today with what is on the extreme left of the chart, which was the mid-March BSC spike.

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I usually have a ton of puts. Right now, I have a megaton. And I'd rather not have a megaton explosion under my bottom if the market flies higher. My shot-in-the-dark guess as to what Tuesday will hold is a sharp drop at the open (barring any pre-morning surprises............) and then wild swings throughout the day, followed by a relatively tame close (not much up or down). I'm not very confident about where we're going to close, but I do feel that on a number of big indexes, we're getting near major support levels. The $NDX is one, with both fan and retracement confluence at ~1700.

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The S&P is nearly the 1170 level I've spoken about many, many times. This is the 50% retracement. We're already there on the GLOBEX as I'm typing this!

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I had many short positions in energy, and equity bounce prospects aside, I'm feeling pretty good about these. This H&S pattern on the $OIX is quite substantial.

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I'm exhausted. And I need to be up way before the open. I'm off. Ta ta.

I have successfully gotten my little girl to sleep, four books later, and am uncomfortably hunched over my laptop on top of a butterfly blanket. Such are the lengths I go to for my readers.

I'm going to do a post later tonight (which will be, what, my 15th of the day? And we've had probably over 1,000 comments posted today). From Elliott Wave International (elliottwave.com) I share this fascinating graph in the meantime.

Come back later. And sleep near your computer. You'll want to be ready in the morning.

Things fall down.

People look up.

And when it rains, it pours.

The bears were right this whole time. That's been proved beyond a doubt.

You're thinking the same thing I am. The Bald Brothers are going to pull the one trick they have left out of the book: a surprise interest rate cut. Anything to goose the market.

I closed half my index puts before the close for an obscene profit. I'm going to leave the other half exposed, in spite of the fact that I'm almost certain the darlings in D.C. are going to futz with the market on Tuesday.

I think the fate of the market is pretty clear at this point.

Congratulations to all Slopers on a fantastic day. I need to go collapse now.

Well, the Fibonacci bedazzlement continues. I closely watch the retracements on Merrill Lynch (MER) drawn starting in 1974. Where did the action top out today? A retracement line, of course!