As trick-or-treaters make their annual rounds Monday night, we should be reminded that bulls will have seasonality on their side into year’s end. As some old-timers may recall, Christmas shopping used to commence officially the day after Thanksgiving,. These days, though, retailers at the local mall will be revved up to the redline by the time Turkey Day rolls around. The stock market may be off to a running start as well, since it has been trending higher since mid-October. So much for this year’s “October Crash,” which had been tentatively predicted by the Hindenburg indicator, among others. Stocks supposedly have moved beyond the danger zone time-wise, but there are other indications as well that selling pressure poses no particular threat over the near-  to intermediate-term.

One such sign is that minor-trend rallies have been pushing past my hidden-pivot targets, albeit weakly. On Monday, for instance, I’d projected rallies in the mini-Dow and the mini-S&P to, respectively, 10489 and 1211.00. Both numbers were crucial to the day’s action, and for the first half of the session it appeared the respective uptrends would stall almost exactly where forecast. But by the final bell the mini-S&P had achieved 1214.00; the mini-Dow, 10498. The overshoot in either case was small, but sufficient nonetheless to tip us moderately bullish for Tuesday. For your guidance (and – Happy Halloween! – that of lurkers), I’ll note that a hidden pivot resistance at 1215.00 is our benchmark for today. It has yet to be breached, although yesterday’s peak at 1214.50 came close enough for us to infer that an attempt will be made today.

The pivot would have made a luscious spot to attempt shorting on Monday, but I’m not quite so enthralled with its second-day prospects. Generally speaking, the stopping power of a hidden pivot is diminished when the underlying vehicle approaches it a second time after a near-miss on the first. Even so, the 1215.00 target is not chopped liver, and it should therefore exhibit discernible stopping power. It has the potential, in theory, to produce an important top, so we should be alert to that possibility now that the futures have been as high as 1214.50. Of course, a close above 1215.00 would be ample reason for bears to run for the hills.

Tomorrow: A great analysis of Google by Prof. Ross Miller.