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.

Why Gold?

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If the decades old bubble in paper assets is ending, that’s why gold!

Various promotions along the way of the Continuum have distilled the case for gold down to handy buzz phrases like “got Gold?” as if it were a carton of milk. Other promotions have presented gold as the go-to asset through all types of macro phases, from “fiat is gonna blow up any day now” to “inflation is gonna eat your future” to “a deflationary Armageddon is on the way”.

Yet all along the Continuum, policymakers papered it over, inflated the mess at every crisis as long as the Continuum allowed.*

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SPX: Pleasure First, Then Pain

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The S&P 500 (weekly, log scale) and a few of its risk indicators

I have recently started making videos that tend to be shorter and maybe more to the point than some of my articles, and am gaining a comfort level with this medium, and so here is the latest macro blurb to check out. For we nerds, this stuff is fascinating. Way more so than stock picking, Fed obsession, doom and gloom or bull greed forecasting. Just a market and the indicators informing its forward view.

The overwhelming view I get from this is that Wayne and Garth can party one now, possibly even to the tune of ‘happy days are here again!’… before the real bear market gets going in H2, 2023. For the coming bear trigger we are watching short-term technical levels using daily charts.

Gold Out-Performs

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The inflation trades are fading and gold is ascending to its rightful place in the disinflationary macro

The favored NFTRH plan is working out well as we planned the Q4 (2022) – Q1 (2023) rally back in November and as lumpy as it has been, it is intact to this day. Amid the fade in the inflation trades, our projected leadership (Tech and Semi, amid a disinflationary interim Goldilocks theme) is fully intact as well.

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Goldilocks Now, Deflation Later

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The NFTRH view has been for a macro transition from inflation (past) to ‘Goldilocks’ (present) to deflation (later)

Since projecting the Q4-Q1 broad market rally back in November, we have been managing a macro transition within this rally. Based on the leadership of the Semiconductor sector and Tech, it has been dubbed a “Goldilocks” (inflationary pressures not too hot, not too cold) transition, as inflationary pressures ease (the inflation has come and gone, while it’s lagging supply chain and services related effects linger on) and the former inflation trades under-perform.

There is a word for what supply chain and related services are doing and it’s called “gouging” by opportunistic entities squeezing the inflation hysteria for all it is worth. But I digress.

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Two Macro Market Signals Positive

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Excerpted from this week’s edition of Notes From the Rabbit Hole, NFTRH 747, a look at two currently positive macro market signals. When they turn it will be time for change. Meanwhile, the Q4-Q1 broad rally continues:

Two positive macro market signals

Last week we noted two market leadership signals, one positive (Semiconductor and Tech leadership) and one potentially negative (Healthcare relative to the broad market). The potential bottom in the XLV/SPY ratio looks like less of a potential one week later (positive for the markets) as the would-be low got bent out of shape, and Semi and shorter-term Tech leadership are still intact.

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