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From the monthly archives:
June 2011
A powerful rally has punched through minor, sundry Hidden Pivots and now bids fair to reach 28.400 over the near term (see inset). A close above that number would augur 35.66. The midpoint of the lesser pattern’s C-D leg is 26.495, and because it will now tend to act as support, that’s where Pivoteeers should look for an entry spot if the opportunity arises. Globally, so much sugar acreage has been replanted with other crops that it’s possible the bull market begun in 2008 is just getting warmed up.
A short squeeze on extremely thin volume is accomplishing during the night session what buyers could not accomplish during the day — i.e., pushing the futures above Friday’s 1277.25 high to generate a fresh, bullish impulse leg on the hourly chart. Any camouflaged trading opportunities initiating entry with-the-trend will likely come from the impulsive pattern that I’ve fleshed out hypothetically on the hourly chart (see inset). If the actual move as of 3:35 a.m. EDT goes more than a few ticks higher than the current 1279.50, however, opportunities to board the easy way are apt to diminish. A time-stopped entry may be necessary, with a buy-stop at ‘x’ taking a quick exit after, say, 30 seconds if no liftoff is forthcoming. _____ UPDATE (10:59 a.m. EDT): The rally matched my sketch almost exactly, although, strictly speaking, the absence of a single-bar ‘C’ on the intraday charts would have precluded taking the ‘buy’ signal at point ‘x’.
Yesterday’s constructive price action warrants raising the minimum upside target for the near term by six cents, to 36.535. Night owls should look for camouflaged buying opportunities on a pullback to the 35.895 midpoint resistance, which is now hidden support. Please note that a rally achieving the target would surpass two ‘external’ peaks along the wall of the June 10-13 selloff, presumably breathing new life into the bull trend. _______ UPDATE (10:55 a.m. EDT) ): The pattern played out almost precisely as shown, reaching a so-far high today of 36.530. The final pullback overnight before the futures took off was to 35.975, however, making it more difficult to attempt camouflage by-the-numbers.
Unfurl August Gold’s 480-minute chart and you begin to understand why this now seven-week-old correction is taking its sweet old time. A clear bullish pattern projecting to 1582.70 took fully nine months to play out, culminating in an early-May spike that begged chastisement. We note as well that the actual high at 1577.70 fell $5 shy of the predicted top, auguring a period of penance more prolonged than we might have expected if the target had been reached or exceeded. The shortfall, slight though it was, will require us to pay particular attention to downtrending abcd correctionss, since bear markets typically begin with a missed rally target of intermediate degree.
In this case, however, the first significant pullback turned from within less than $1 of a key midpoint support — exactly what bulls might have asked for if they were looking for solid evidence that the selloff was “healthy.” Since then, we’ve witnessed a strong rally in May, followed by the stagnation of “dueling impulse legs” since. Such price action demands cautious bullishness and, on the lesser charts, attention to details that eventually will either confirm or refute our still-bullish outlook for the long-term.
Incidentally, if you don’t subscribe to Rick’s Picks but would like to know more about the proprietary camouflage trading technique that we use to keep entry risk to a bare minimum, click here for information about the Hidden Pivot Webinar in late June. You could also take a free week’s trial subscription that will give you access not only to detailed trading recommendations each day, but to a 24/7 chat room that draws experienced traders from all over the world.
AAPL has looked like hell recently, but if any stock is capable of leading a turnaround it is this one. Let’s try bottom-fishing at the 317.39 ‘D’ target shown in the chart, since it looks like a good one. Specifically, I’ll recommend buying two July 335 calls if and when stock gets within 15 cents of the target. Stop yourself out if the calls trade for 20 cents less than you paid for them. ______ UPDATE (11:13 a.m. EDT): The stock opened on a gap slightly below the target, very strongly implying there were still lower prices to come (as indeed there were). The calls first traded at 3.35 but touched our stop within a minute, generating a theoretical loss of $40 plus commisions. Today’s so-far low came within 11 cents of a major target at 310.39 (240-minute chart, A=364.90 on February 16, B=320.16 on April 18), so there’s a good chance we’ve seen an important bottom. However, if there is one last feint lower, it would be to 306.19, a Hidden Pivot that you can bottom-fish as you please. _______ FURTHER UPDATE: We’ll put this one aside for now, since it appears that the 310.39 pivot marked a potentially important swing low.
A snapshot of some key markets is made literal in today’s touts, since there are charts for each and every one. Looking ahead, we’ll want to keep a particularly close eye on the 10-Year Note, since continued strength would have bearish implications for stocks and bullion.
Yesterday, Rick was interviewed by Kerry Lutz of The Financial Survival Radio Network about The Hidden Pivot Method. Click here for the short audio presentation.
The continuous T-Note contract has traded well above the midpoint resistance shown in the chart, suggesting that April’s show of strength was no fluke. In fact, there is now the strong possibility of a further four percent rally. That would of course hold bearish implications not just for stocks, but for gold, Silver and the entire commodities complex. In the meantime, it would take a selloff exceeding 122^04 to the downside to turn the hourly chart bearish.
Will the United States Survive Until 2015?
by Rick Ackerman on June 20, 2011 12:01 am GMT · 42 comments
America appears primed for a political revolution, but will it happen? Or are we too glutted with middle class amenities to put creature comforts at risk? A similar theme permeated Will the Soviet Union Survive Until 1980?, an important essay published in 1970 by Soviet dissident Andrei Amalrik. Amalrik predicted revolution would come despite the seductive appeal of the middle-class life that many Russians were beginning to experience in the post-Khrushchev era. With so many households so close to owning a Lada automobile, a washer/dryer and a color TV, why would anyone risk rocking the boat? The average Russian had lived like a serf for centuries, after all, and so the promise of significant improvements in the standard of living was no small thing.
Such concerns may be no less relevant today in the USA, where the economy even in recession has sustained bourgeois luxuries at levels not far below the civilizational peak achieved in 2008, just before the Great Financial Collapse. Indeed, even as joblessness mounts and the country continues to wallow in what has cynically come to be called The Great Recession, one needn’t leave the couch to enjoy a surfeit of bread and circuses that puts Rome at its most decadent to shame . However, and ironically, the escapist trash of reality TV has distanced huge swaths of the populace from reality itself. In such a climate of hedonism and shop-till-you-drop hubris, the Founders’ concerns with liberty and the tyranny of government hold about as much interest as a philosophical treatise by Plato, Mill or Emerson. » Read the full article