Slope of Hope Blog Posts

Slope initially began as a blog, so this is where most of the website’s content resides. Here we have tens of thousands of posts dating back over a decade. These are listed in reverse chronological order. Click on any category icon below to see posts tagged with that particular subject, or click on a word in the category cloud on the right side of the screen for more specific choices.

Despair Jones

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Just a reminder for those who use twitter that you can follow me. I don't send tweets that often, but sometimes they are – in retrospect – pretty prescient!

Looking back to the 19th, it's incredible what has happened, and how fast it has happened. Look at the tinted circle on the left and then the one (much lower) on the right. In the course of just five weeks, this index has lost nearly 50% of its value. Of course, the put options have gone up thousands of percent. But let's not go there.

In spite of a pretty sucky day (up hugely earlier, down hard later), my disposition toward the market is pretty much the same – – long equities, long energy, long gold, and short the dollar. Things are even more "stretched" to the downside than when I wrote about it this weekend.

I haven't touched anything in Asia, either long or short – – as I mentioned last week, there's really nothing but air at this point.

As for OIH – – again, this is my "keystone" position, and if/when it does bounce, it's going to fly higher. But we're at a pretty critical juncture. Another weak day tomorrow could completely dash my hopes for a good trade here.

I rarely mention the $SOX, but this is another index which is positioned for a possibly strong bounce. Indeed, it actually went up today a little, which in this market is absolutely extraordinary.

My dollar short isn't doing well, but I'm hanging on. This rally is going to break Real Soon Now ™.

We could all use a little humor. So let's have at it…….

Flop

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Well, yet again, the bulls (of which I am a semi-member now) tried to get their market mojo back, and they failed. The Dow was up over 200 points earlier today, and we're looking at yet another triple-digit loss. This is getting a little silly.

What I found interesting was this……….over the weekend, I gave 2sweeties' free retracement tool a try, and it provided me this:

As you can see from my notation in the lower-left, today's high almost perfectly matched the highest probability level from the retracement tool. Amazing stuff, 2sweeties!

OIH Showing a Pulse

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My largest position is long OIH. Things are finally starting to stabilize a bit and perhaps even form a bit of a base. If the market could manage, say, three up days – – – even small ones – – it would be a tremendous tonic for investors. It doesn't have to be an explosion higher. But if you had a few days of the Dow up even 30 or 40 points each, people would really calm down.

Stalemate

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The market is just grinding around all morning long. My sense is that:

  • The bulls are hoping for a bottom, but having been burned over and over and over and over again, they are too nervous to seriously commit to the market.
  • The bears are hoping for a capitulation plunge, but try as it might, the market simply isn't cooperating. It inches down to almost daily new lows, but they are only a little bit lower, and they are quickly erased.

So everyone is frustrated, and so far, nobody is making money on either side.