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.
The earnings season for Q4 2021 begins in earnest tomorrow morning, and as is customary, the banks lead it off. I guess the banks go first since it’s so simple to calculate profits when all they have to do is ask for free money from the government. Here are the “big four” that declare their criminal, ill-gotten gains before the opening bell:
It has strengthened a bit since I took this screenshot, but I wanted to point out that bonds, by way of the TLT fund, have closed their price gap and look poised to rally (as counter-intuitive as that may seem in a world of ostensibly rising interest rates):
I’m having a good day so far. Of course, every person reading this is at the mercy of Pencil Dick (AKA Jerome Hayden Powell) and his evil band of pranksters that are darkening the innards of the Eccles Building. I would suggest to you that the finance sector fund, symbol XLF, is absolutely key this afternoon.
The post-Thanksgiving gap and the broken trendline are allies of the bears. The ally of the bulls, damn them all, is that cluster of activity I’ve emphasized below. I believe it would be nigh impossible to break through that, at least today, but if we can at least start to push back into that zone, that will be a very encouraging sign for the ursine crowd. There is no sector more represented in my 30 positions than finance, so………...fingers crossed.
I’m probably going to “go dark”, perhaps even until the close, given the mayhem that Pencil Dick is going to thrust upon us.
The most important event this week (unless something extraordinary happens) is pre-market on Friday when the CPI number hits. That is probably the true “make or break” moment for the market for the rest of 2021. Just in case inflation continues to come in hot, financial stocks could flip lower in a big hurry. Below are ten charts I’ve plucked out for you in this sector that I think are worth a look.
For my principal focus of shorts, I have pivoted away from my riotously-successful energy plays to the world of finance. I am delighted – – absolutely DELIGHTED – – to report to you that, for the first time since the March 2020 Covid bottom, financials have broken their uptrend.
