Creep

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“As goes January, so goes the year.”

What a bunch of unmitigated crap. January was amazing. We started off instantly with a big drop, and the bulls were terrified and utterly on the run. It looked like 2016 was, at long last, going to be the Year of the Bear.

Ummm, nope. Indeed, as hope got smothered slowly since February 11, the final blow was dealt on May 24. There wasn’t even any particularly big news that day. But, from a charting perspective, that was the moist pair of fingertips that pinched the softly-glowing wick at the top of the candle and snuffed out ursine hope. I’ve tinted the fateful day in green. Since then, the market has been, quite reliably for the bulls, simply creeping up day after day. We are, as I type this, at new highs for the year.

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So that’s why we’ve got a VIX that’s about to crack below the teens and an atmosphere very much akin to Hillary Clinton clinching the Democratic nomination – – – – reliable, boring, expected, and really quite unfortunate.

Crude oil makes the case even more complete, as we are solidly above the $50 area and steadily marching within the confines of the same wedge which has been oil’s abode for months now.

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It’s much harder to find interesting bullish setups than bearish setups, but I guess I’ll just need to do that. The only kind of “drop” visible is in freakish pockets, such as Valeant this morning, which is getting clobbered something like 17%. Don’t nobody tell Bill.

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