The best thing that happened to me today was that I successfully renewed my driver’s license. Yes, the bar was set that low. After all, when one’s profit peaks a few minutes after the opening bell, and by the closing bell one is looking at a small loss, well, that pretty much sucks the wind right out of you. So knowing I won’t have to visit the horrible DMV office for another six years is the thin reed on which I am hanging today’s happiness.
The thing that tatters my tulips (OK, I just made that up…….) is how equities have completely ignored the slumping Euro which should have, in a just world, dragged stocks right down during the past two months. This is the kind of gloriously melting graph that makes me beam:
Perhaps it’s starting to dawn on me that trading a manipulated market like U.S. stocks is foolhardy and I should just trade the likes of the FXE. It’s been said more than once that the FOREX market is the only one on the planet too big for Bernanke to screw with in the long-haul.
As I mentioned earlier today, what scares the devil out of me is the prospect of a Euro-bounce, because after all, if stocks can shrug off weakness, God help the bears (that would be me and some guy on the East coast named Sid………we’re the only two left) if the Euro actually recovers. We must – I say again,must – break the lows set in mid-November to wreck the Euro on a lasting basis.
Mid-November, you may recall, was when stocks bottomed. Again, in a just world, we should see stocks at about those levels now, but instead we’re looking at lifetime highs on many major indexes.
For almost the entire month of March, the market has been actively farting around. One glance at the candlestick charts on the NQ show that we have spent the entire freaking month at about 2790, plus or minus a few points, and everyone is losing their mind while the market tries to make up its mind. (Reality? Go down! Artifice? Go up! Decisions, decisions!)
For the moment, the NASDAQ remains safely within the confines of its ascending channel. As nettlesome as the market is, it has been painting some very clean patterns.
One rather enticing opportunity is the miners (GDX), which have retracted beautifully to their gap and failure point. Provided it stays under about 38.10, this could be a very clean short setup.
Added to which, although I’ve only mentioned it 398 times, the cleanest long-term bearish chart remains the miners ($XAU, $HUI are both beautiful).
In spite of shaking in my boots about the Euro, the $XBD – the broker/dealer index – is still nicely configured for a drop. Maybe April will finally give us some love.
I, for one, am glad to see this quarter end (I’ve been saying that for, what, the past 11 quarters or so?) It’s a slog, my friends. It’s a slog.
