Sep 21

Don’t fear a routine and healthy dip

By Jani Ziedins | End of Day Analysis

End of Day Update:

On Thursday the S&P500 experienced the largest drop in over two-weeks. As dramatic as that sounds, we only lost 0.3% in a relatively benign pullback to support. This was the lowest volume day this month and the first time trade has been below average since August.

As far as pullbacks go, this one was as mild as they get. There are two ways to interpret this. Either this dip was the best bears could manage in such a resilient and strong bull market. Or these are the first cracks in what is about to become a larger selloff.

If a person thinks a bull market needs to go up every single day, they should be worried about this price-action. For the rest of us, we know markets moves in waves and down days are a normal and healthy part of moving higher. Prior to today the S&P500 was up seven out of the last eight days and a routine down day was long overdue.

The question is if this is the first signs of a larger down move? Headline wise not a lot happened Thursday. The biggest market news was a continued digesting of Wednesday’s Fed policy statement that announced the unwinding of their bond positions and the continued possibility of a third rate-hike later this year. While both of those actions are relatively bearish, the market widely expected these moves and no one was caught by surprise. We slipped a little in Wednesday’s intraday trade, but a late-day rebound put us back where we started by the close. Thursday’s dip retraced some of Wednesday’s selloff, but it didn’t undercut the lows.

If we are expecting the market to collapse on bad news, Thursday’s “news-less” day definitely won’t cut it. This market withstood a nearly constant barrage of negative headlines over the last month and barely sold off two-percent. If those headlines couldn’t break us, there is definitely nothing in the current news cycle that tops ballistic missile launches, nuclear bomb tests, and back-to-back hurricanes. That resilience means we can safely cross news-fueled selloff from the list of vulnerabilities. If this market was going to crash on bad news, it would have happened weeks ago.

The next possibility is this bull market is extended and exhausted. Markets that rally too-far, too-fast are prone to collapse because everyone who could have bought has already bought and there is no one left to keep pushing prices higher. But the thing about exhaustion tops is prices race ahead and climb at a steeper rate than the prior uptrend. Is that price-action happening here?

The last several months were a sideways consolidation that ended with a double bottom and rebound off of the 50 day moving average. That looks more like sustainable base building than overextended exhaustion.

If this market is not vulnerable to negative headlines and the recent consolidation looks more supportive than threatening, do we really think Thursday’s dip is the start of something bigger? Or just one of those normal and healthy down-days that accompany every increase in prices?

As I’ve been saying for over a month, if this market was fragile and vulnerable, we would have crashed by now. While the rate of gains is nothing to get excited about, a market that refuses to go down will eventually go up. I see no reason to think anything has changed in the last several days. That means keep doing what has been working. Continue holding your favorite positions and adding more on the dips.

As I write this, overnight futures slipped on Asian weakness. But as I said above, testing support is a normal and healthy part of moving higher. There is nothing to worry about if we dip under 2,500 support. A wave of selling might hit us as recent buyers’ stop-losses are triggered. But that selling will quickly dry up like it has every other time this year. Confident owners didn’t sell far more dire headlines last month and there is no reason to think they will start bailing out now. Confident owners keep supply tight and prop up prices. That has been happening all year-long and there is no reason to think something has changed here.

Jani

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Sep 20

Contrarian Investing: Why most people screw it up

By Jani Ziedins | Free CMU

Welcome to the new Cracked.Market University educational series. Look for new articles every Monday and Wednesday. 

Spend any time following the market and you will come across the term “contrarian investing”. For those that don’t already know, this investing strategy takes a position in the opposite direction as the larger crowd. If the crowd claims something is a sure-thing, the contrarian sells it. If the crowd is rushing for the exits before things get worse, the contrarian jumps in and buys the dip. That description is simple enough to understand, but less clear is why this counter-intuitive trading strategy works so well and how come the crowd gets it wrong so often.

The first thing to realize is the crowd’s ideas are not wrong. Wisdom of crowds is a very real and powerful phenomena that I will cover in another blog post. For the time being, trust me when I say the crowd is smarter and more insightful than any of us can ever hope to be. But where following the crowd’s ideas gets investors into trouble is these ideas are already priced-in. That means most of the profit from investing in these ideas has already been made. I will use the following basic supply and demand model to show you how this happens.

The first thing to understand is stock prices are set exclusively by active buyers and sellers. I will dig deeper into this topic in another blog post, but for the sake of this discussion, people who sit in a stock or stay on the sidelines don’t affect the price. Only traders actively trying to buy and sell the stock determine the current market price. The price they agree to is the exact balance point between supply (sellers) and demand (buyers) at that precise moment in time.

The other key concept in this illustration is people trade what they think. If an investor loves Apple and he believes the stock is going to double or triple, we can be fairly certain this investor is already fully invested in AAPL. It doesn’t matter if a trader uses intuition, fundamentals, or technicals, as soon as he is convinced a stock is a good buy and he has the money, he buys it.

But the thing to realize is no matter how much this investor believes in this stock, once he buys, he places his bet and from that point forward is simply a passenger on the market’s rollercoaster.

If this is early in the process and the investor’s point of view is unique, he can spread the word and encourage other investors to follow his lead. But as his view becomes more and more popular, it is harder to find new people who don’t already believe in the idea. At this point the crowd of believers is so large that new recruits are hard to find. Even though owners have never been more optimistic, serious problems arise when there is no new money left to buy the stock.

Remember, price is the exact point where supply and demand are balanced. If we cannot find new buyers willing to join this party, it doesn’t matter how enthusiastic the crowd is, demand shrivels up and is overwhelmed by supply. The crowd is still extremely excited about this stock’s future, but without new buyers to keep pushing the price higher, supply and demand forces punish the stock.

This is an example of a bubble forming and the subsequent climax top, but the exact same process happens in reverse during capitulation bottoms. “Sell now before things get worse”, but the scariest point is usually the bottom of the dip because that is where we run out of sellers. Once that happens, supply dries up and prices bounce. Headlines stop mattering when no one is left to sell the bad news.

While these are extreme examples of climax tops and capitulation bottoms, the same process happens to a lesser extent every day across every timeframe. It’s no secret prices move in waves and almost everyone acknowledges this on a cognitive level. Yet every time prices move too far one direction or the other, rather than acknowledge this is just a normal and healthy gyration, human emotions take over and we assume this small move is the beginning of the next big move.

We can call the previous section Part 1. This is most obvious example of contrarian investing because it goes against the market’s price trend. But just as important to the contrarian investor is Part 2, when he goes along with the market’s trend.

All too often people mistakenly think they are contrarian investors when all they are doing is arguing with the market. If a price is going up, they sell it. If the market is going down, they buy it. At this point many of you are scratching your head because that sounds exactly like what I described in Part 1. Isn’t it?

Nope, not even close. Don’t feel bad, this is an easy to mistake to make and it costs a lot of smart people a lot of money every day. Contrarian investing is not going against the price or the trend. Never forget price and trend have nothing to do with contrarian investing! The only thing that matters to the contrarian is what the crowd thinks.

More often than not the contrarian trade is actual follows the market trend and buys something that has gone “too far”. Or sells something that has gone “too low”.

I will use AMZN as an example. Two years ago the stock was “unbelievably expensive” at $400 and its valuation was widely viewed as “unsustainable”. Yet today AMZN is trading near $1,000! How did that happen? Quite simply,  the crowd didn’t believe in Amazon. Rather than have too many people buy the stock at $400, too few people were buying it and there was a lot of upside opportunity left in it.

Never forget contrarian investing is going against the crowd, not the price. Don’t make that costly mistake when you are tempted to short something that is “too high”, or buy something that is “too low”. More often than not the right trade is the exact opposite of the one you want to make. That’s because our primal instinct compels us to become a member of the crowd and believe what the crowd believes. This is a fascinating topic that I will save it for another post. Stay tuned!

I’m excited about this new series because my head is overflowing with ideas and insights that came from two-decades of trading experience. I hope you come back for the next post. 

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Sep 19

Stick with this Bull

By Jani Ziedins | End of Day Analysis

End of Day Analysis:

The S&P500 added to last week’s breakout and continues its steady ascent into record territory. A tenth-of-a-percent is definitely not setting the world on fire, but these slow and deliberate gains tell us there is strong support behind these prices.

Rather than take profits near prior resistance, most owners are confidently holding for higher prices. While conventional wisdom warns us about complacent markets, what it fails to mention is periods of complacency last far longer than anyone expects. Confident owners don’t sell dips and the resulting tight supply props up prices. That description fits this market to a tee and I don’t see a reason for that to change anytime soon.

Several weeks of bearish headlines failed to dent this market and Trump was at it again Tuesday, telling the UN he will “Totally Destroy” North Korea. But by market standards, this is already old news and it barely reacted to those provocative headlines. Clearly these headlines matter to geopolitics, but they no longer affect the market because anyone who fears these North Korean headlines sold weeks ago. These nervous sellers were replaced by confident dip buyers who demonstrated they are not afraid of these headlines. When no one is left to sell the bad news, it stops mattering.

A market that fails to go down on bad news creates a powerful buy signal. It means the path of least resistance is higher and prices will pop once the flow of bad news abates. That is exactly what happened last week when we surged to record highs. While it is easy to say this after it already happened, readers of this blog knew this rebound was coming several weeks ago.

Going against the crowd and buying when everyone else is running scared is hard to do, but that is the best way to make money in this business. Keep your cool by carefully analyzing the headlines and price-action. The thing to remember is trends continue countless times, but they reverse only once. Keep that in mind every time someone tries to convince you this time is different. Without a doubt they will eventually be right, but they will be wrong an awful lot before that happens.

As we saw today, the North Korean rhetoric no longer matters to the market and we can safely ignore it. Next item coming up is the Fed’s policy statement on Wednesday. Consensus is the Fed will start winding down its balance sheet. This is an anti-stimulus move, but the market is largely ready for it. Yellen and the Fed have done a great job telegraphing their moves to minimize disrupting financial markets. While we should expect a brief bout of volatility, it’s been years since a Fed decision affecting the market in a significant and lasting way. I don’t expect tomorrow to be any different.

If this market was fragile and vulnerable to a crash, it would have happened by now. Last month’s dip and consolidation refreshed the market and gave us a solid foundation to build on. That said, the market likes symmetry and last month’s small and short dip will lead to an equally unimpressive rebound. We’re already most of the way there and it will take something new to keep prices rising.

Luckily there are a lot of recent sellers and underweight money managers under pressure because they are missing this rebound. Soon the fear of a selloff is going to be replaced by fear of being left behind. Expect this chase for performance to fuel a strong rally into year-end.

As I said previously, if we were going to crash, it would have happened by now. Markets don’t move in straight lines and expect volatility to continue, but the path of least resistance is definitely higher. Stick with what has been working: buy-and-hold and jumping on each dip.

Jani

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Sep 14

North Korea still doesn’t matter

By Jani Ziedins | End of Day Analysis

End of Day Update:

On Thursday the S&P500 slipped modestly, but it is hard to call a 0.1% dip a material loss. This is the third close above 2,490 and continues the strength following Monday’s breakout. These record highs are a long way from the fear and uncertainty that dominated headlines over the last several weeks. As I’ve been saying for a while, a market that refuses to go down will eventually go up. And that is exactly what happened here.

It is constructive to see the market hold Monday’s breakout. Bears have been unable to break this bull market even through multiple waves of bearish headlines. This shows most owners are more inclined to hold for higher prices than take profits or succumb to fearful selling. The last several weeks of consolidation firmed up support and built a solid base for the market’s next up leg.

But just as things were starting to look good, North Korea launched another missile over Japan after Thursday’s close. Fortunately the stock market is reacting less and less to each successive provocation. In after-hours trade the S&P500 only dipped 0.2%. That’s because stock owners who fear this story sold weeks ago. These nervous owners were replaced by confident dip-buyers who demonstrated a willingness to hold these headlines. If there is no one left to sell the news, it stops mattering.

Even though this latest North Korean threat is unlikely to trigger an avalanche of selling, it is enough to keep buyers sitting on their hands. Their lack of buying could weigh on prices tomorrow. But just like every other dip over the last few weeks, any weakness is a dip-buying opportunity. If the previous North Korean provocations couldn’t break this market, there is no reason to think this episode will end any different. If we were going to crash, it would have happened by now.

Once we traverse this latest North Korean speed bump, expect the slow drift higher to continue. Confident owners don’t want to sell no matter what the headlines say and their conviction is keeping supply tight. Conventional wisdom warns us about complacent markets, but what it often forgets to mention is these periods of complacency last far longer than anyone expects.

Few things calm nerves like a rising market. Expect these steady gains to shift the focus from fear of a crash to being afraid of being left behind. Recent sellers and underweight money managers will start realizing the dip they predicted isn’t going to happen and they will be forced to start chasing prices higher. Last week’s seller will be next week’s buyer. And that’s how the slow grind higher will continue.

Keep doing what has been working and that is sticking with this bull market.

Jani

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Sep 12

Why bears got it wrong

By Jani Ziedins | End of Day Analysis

End of Day Update:

On Tuesday the S&P500 extended Monday’s breakout to record highs. While the gains were modest, traders were more inclined to buy these highs than take profits. But this is no surprise to regular readers of this blog. Last week I warned bulls to close their shorts proactively and take losses while they were small.

Quoting Thursday’s free blog post:

Anyone who is still short this market is probably only a little in the red. Rather than hope and pray for the selloff that isn’t happening, a smart trader admits defeat and takes his losses while they are small. This bearish trade has been given every opportunity to work, but this simply isn’t the right environment to be short. Be proactive and close a trade that isn’t working when the losses are small, rather than wait until the pain of losing money gets so strong it forces you out.

There is no magic to this. Basic market psychology and supply and demand told us the path of least resistance was still higher. In early August we tumbled when Trump and North Korea fell into a war of words that quickly escalated into North Korean missile and nuclear bomb tests. Then the Trump administration endured a rash of turnover in its senior ranks and at the same time exchanged barbs with senior Republican leaders. And finally two hurricanes did their best to pummel the Gulf Coast. Any one of those things would have crushed a vulnerable market. Put them all together and it creates a storm only the strongest market could endure. Yet that is exactly what we did.

The thing to remember is market crashes are breathtakingly fast and the only way to survive them is to sell first and ask questions later. But this latest selloff occurred in slow motion. In nearly a month of selling we only managed to dip 2% from all-time highs. That was after an endless string of negative headlines. Bears had their perfect storm, yet the market was still standing. That was the clearest warning possible that bears were on the wrong side.

As I’ve been writing for months, confident owners are keeping supply tight. While conventional wisdom tells us complacent markets are prone to collapse, what it forgets to mention is these periods of complacency last far longer than anyone expects. That’s because confident owners keep supply tight when they refuse to sell every headline and dip. If owners don’t sell the news, it stops mattering. That is exactly what was happened over the last month.

Since early August, nervous owners were bailing out of the market and selling to far more confident dip buyers. These new owners showed a willingness to own this uncertainty. In a bit of a self-fulfilling prophecy, those that confidently bought were willing to own the risk and uncertainty. Because they didn’t sell the fear, supply dried up and we bounced. News gets priced in once those that are afraid of it sell to new buyers who don’t fear it.

But that was then and this is now. What most readers want to know is what comes next. Plain and simple, expect more of the same. If we were going to breakdown, it would have happened by now. The path of least resistance is still higher. Nothing calms nerves like rising prices and this breakout to record highs is making the fears of the last several weeks fade from memory. Fear of the unknown is quickly being replaced by fear of being left behind. Big money managers are returning from summer vacation and they will start positioning their portfolios for year-end. Many of the underweight managers are coming to the realization that the dip they were waiting for isn’t going to happen. The pressure of being left behind will force them to chase prices higher into year-end.

This is a slow-moving market and I don’t expect us to launch higher, but expect the slow rate of gains to continue. A market that refuses to go down will eventually go up and that is what is happening here. Recent sellers will realize their mistake and fuel the next round of buying. I expect volatility to pick up this fall, but every dip is a buying opportunity. Stick with your buy-and-hold positions and keep adding when prices slip. This bull market will eventually break like every one that came before it, but we are not at that point yet. If you are out of the market don’t chase prices higher, but if you want to get in, be ready to jump on any dip.

Jani

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Sep 07

A warning for Bears

By Jani Ziedins | End of Day Analysis

End of Day Update:

The S&P500 finished Thursday mostly unchanged. Even though we find ourselves inside a holiday shortened week, volume picked up and has been above average the last three days, something that hasn’t happened in over a month.

Summer is winding down and big money managers are finally returning to work. For most of the summer we’ve been stuck in neutral because smaller traders don’t have the firepower to drive a sustainable move. nstead every directional move fizzled and reversed because big money wasn’t there to join the buying and selling. Now that they are finally back at work, we should finally see some life come back into this market.

The big question is if institutional managers will keep throwing money at these record highs, or if they will chicken out and start taking profits ahead of the widely forecast tumble.

As a contrarian I get suspicious every time I hear something from too many different sources. And this includes current predictions of doom and gloom. It’s been a really rough few months. Healthcare reform failed in a spectacular way. There’s been a revolving door at the Trump administration. Trump’s frequent criticisms of Republican leaders is not helping either. Then there is this North Korea thing that just won’t go away and keeps getting worse. And finally two hurricanes to cap it all off.

Any one of these items is more than enough to takedown a fragile market. Combined they are as formidable as a hurricane. Yet here we stand, less than 1% from all-time highs. Surely something isn’t right.

One of the most effective ways to study the market focusing on what it is NOT doing. What should the market be doing, but it isn’t? Given this flow of overwhelmingly bearish headlines, clearly this market should be in freefall. But it isn’t. What gives?

There is a lot of headline uncertainty surrounding this market, but it doesn’t care. The thing to remember about headlines is they get priced in over time. That’s because anyone who is afraid of those headlines sells to dip buyers who are not concerned. This turnover in ownership replaces weak with strong, creating a robust foundation.

For nearly a month this market has withstood one bearish headline after another. We slipped under the 50dma for a brief period. All of this selling cleared out most owners who could be convinced to sell. Now all that is left is people who don’t care about these headlines. No matter what people think “should” happen, when there is no one left to sell a headline, it stops mattering.

This is an important thing for bears and most especially shorts to understand. You have been given a golden gift in this relentless barrage of negative headlines. There has been more than enough to cripple a vulnerable market. But the thing to keep in mind is selloffs are breathtakingly quick. Sell first and ask questions later is the only way to survive a market crash. Yet here we stand nearly a month into this “selloff”. If we were going to crash, it would have happened by now. If this relentless barrage of headlines couldn’t scare owners into selling, I don’t know what it will take.

Anyone who is still short this market is probably only a little in the red. Rather than hope and pray for the selloff that isn’t happening, a smart trader admits defeat and takes his losses while they are small. This bearish trade has been given every opportunity to work, but this simply isn’t the right environment to be short. Be proactive and close a trade that isn’t working when the losses are small, rather than wait until the pain of losing money gets so strong it forces you out.

Keep doing what has been working and that is sticking with your favorite stocks and adding on weakness. Bears need to admit their short trade isn’t working while the losses are small because the biggest risk remains to the upside. If we were going to crash, it would have happened by now.

Jani

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Sep 05

Why this selloff is no different

By Jani Ziedins | End of Day Analysis

End of Day Update:

On Tuesday the S&P500 tumbled for the third time in as many weeks. Midday selling pushed us under the 50 day moving average, but fortunately we bottomed not long after and closed well off the lows. Volume was the highest in nearly a month and this was one of first above average volume days in quite some time.

North Korea was the primary culprit yet again as they tested a nuclear bomb over our extended holiday weekend. That was enough to send shudders through global markets. But the thing to remember is this was their fifth nuclear detonation over the last decade. If the first four didn’t trigger a massive selloff, then there is a good chance this one won’t either.

Last week we rallied when the flow of negative headlines abated for a few days, but Tuesday abruptly ended that reprieve. In addition to North Korea, Trump added political uncertainty when he distracted Congress from budgets and the debt ceilings when terminated Obama’s Dreamer program for underage illegal immigrants. Then attention turned to Hurricane Irma, a category 5 storm headed for Florida. Taken together, these three headlines were more than enough to ruin last week’s jovial recovery.

But is the rebound really dead? Three things tell us not to be so hasty.

First the late-day rebound put us back above key support. The 50 day moving average was a ceiling for most of the last few weeks. But overhead resistance often turns into support after we break through. Today’s late recovery suggests that is the case here. Rather than spiral out of control, supply dried up when we tested this key support level.

Second, volume was one of the highest days we’ve seen in recent weeks. All the other sharp down-days also included elevated volume. But rather than portend of worse things to come, these high-volume days were capitulation and we rebounded within a day or two.

Third, all of these headlines are recycled. There is nothing new here. If one of these stories was going to take us down, it would have happened already. Selloffs are breathtakingly fast. Hesitate for a moment and it is too late. Sell first and ask questions later is the first rule of surviving a crash. But this North Korea selloff is going into its fourth week. The market never gives us this much time to think rationally and act calmly before a punishing selloff.

Simple supply and demand is behind this market’s strength. Those that are afraid of Trump and North Korea have long since bailed out of the market and been replaced with confident dip buyers. That is why today’s dip ran out of sellers so quickly. If the current crop of owners didn’t sell the first or second North Korea scare, why are they going to sell this one? Today’s limited selloff tells us they held their ground.

Markets don’t give us this long to sell the top and this one is no different. If we were going to crash, there have been more than enough reasons for us to plummet. The fact we are still standing strong near the highs tells us this market is more solid than most people give it credit for. Keep doing what has been working. Stick with your buy-and-hold positions and keep adding on any dips.

As I’ve been saying all month, a market that refuses to go down will eventually go up. Don’t lose your nerve now.

Jani

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