Rick Ackerman

Subscribers used a 2940.25 target I posted in the chat room to get short two ticks off the intraday high, but the subsequent six-point drop was mostly recouped minutes after the final bell, suggesting buyers have plenty of steam left. Accordingly, I'll suggest using a 2984.25 target as a minimum upside objective, although we should monitor a lesser Hidden Pivot resistance at 2946.75 closely, since it looks pretty solid. A close above it, or a move intraday that exceeds it by more than 3-4 points, would suggest that more upside to 2984.25 is all but certain.

The stock market proved once again that it is not so much cool, calm and collected as it is out of its frigging mind, tacking on yet more price gains in the face of mounting crises on two fronts. The tariff war with China has escalated to the point where its effects have surpassed those that were said to have caused stocks to gyrate wildly in the Smoot-Hawley days leading up to the 1929 Crash.  Meanwhile, matters seemed equally unsettled on Capitol Hill, where Trump subordinates at the Justice Department and FBI were threatening to disobey his order to declassify key documents related to the Russia probe.  He could fire them all for this, and if he does it will turn his political enemies and their komrades in the news media even more savage. Since no one expects the President to back down, it is remarkable that Wall Street seems not to care even slightly about the prospect of political nuclear war breaking out before the November elections. Investors act as though they're confident that all of the ugliness will stir up Trump's base and tip the election his way. Maybe they're right. But with the stock market in screaming-bullish mode, it would appear that they've made no allowance for a Democratic victory in November that would be economically and politically disastrous for the country.

It is an extemely delicate moment for America as it tries to reckon with the scary excesses of feminism's #MeToo phase coupled with the growing political hatred between red- and blue-state voters. Half the country is at war with the other half, and it seems increasingly likely the battle is going to turn bloody at some point.  In the meantime, any guy who utters just one sentence with a meaning that could be construed as outside the narrowing bounds of  political correctness could lose his job and a whole lot more. If Kavanaugh's nomination gets torpedoed, then all men are just Bill Cosby in the eyes of the #MeToo jihadists. The stakes are high indeed when a man of such evidently exceptional character can be assassinated by the likes of Dianne Feinstein and Patrick Leahy. I make no apologies for believing Kavanaugh's side of the story, or for deplorable way in which the Democrats have weaponized Prof. Ford's accusations stemming from an incident that supposedly took place 36 years ago when the two were in high school. It is suspiciously uncorroborated so far by anything that has come to light concerning Kavanaugh's subsequent life. Let's hope the hearings -- and America -- do not take a turn for the worse during next week's hearing.

Wall Street has done a great job tuning out a tariff war that has grown every bit as menacing as Smoot-Hawley must have seemed in 1929. Admittedly, even Rick's Picks at its most dour assumed just a few short months ago that everything would turn out hunky-dory.  Clearly that has not been the case, at least not so far, and the prospect of China capitulating at the eleventh hour appears to be dimming. Perhaps yesterday's mild weakness in the broad averages was caused by a few sensible traders tiptoeing toward the fire escape? If so, they are going to miss one heckuva a rally should the Chinese finally come around. That statement implies the outcome is still a straddle bet, although premium sellers who are handicapping it could raise the ante to near-infinity before most traders get their trousers on one newsworthy morning. Trump's latest levy on Chinese goods amounts to $200 billion, and he's threatening hundreds of billions more. The numbers are so big that most us have lost track.  This is a very dangerous game, and investors should not be comforted by the fact that, as of midnight Monday, the smart money had not lost its cool. But if Trump should accidentally create his own perfect storm, tipping the economy and Congress the "wrong" way more or less simultaneously over the next six weeks, the Dow will shed 10,000 points so fast that no one will escape. It's still not too late to join those tiptoers.

AAPL's latest wilding spree has died somewhat shy of a 232.30 rally target touted here earlier that should have been a piece of cake. I hesitate to infer this signals an end to the bull market, but it certainly deserves watching, since AAPL is not a stock accustomed to trend failures. If we were to look for a possible reason why, we need search no further than this headline atop a recent Wall Street Journal break page:  Apple's Phones Get Bigger, Pricier. That achievement, if you could call it that, is going to be crucial to the company's fortunes, given that smartphone sales account for two thirds of Apple's revenues. Steve Jobs Rolling in His Grave To say the Cupertino behemoth has lost its edge would be a charitable understatement; uber-innovator Steve Jobs is probably rolling in his grave. The latest iPhones are 15% pricier than last year's, averaging $949. The screens are bigger than ever -- not so much to entertain users as to make certain they see advertisers' messages, but good. In this way, cell phones have come to usurp the role of television, a medium conceived not simply to entertain and amuse viewers, but to aggregate their eyeballs and serve up those eyeballs to advertisers in categories, or "demographics," that suit sellers' needs. Smartphones can do this far better than TV ever did, tailoring ads not just to broad categories of consumers, but to individuals. How well does this business model work? Your editor is probably the wrong person to ask. I have a low-end, small-screen Android phone that can do nearly everything iPhone can do, and perform some tasks even better. I can't see why tens of millions of users would cough up nearly a thousand bucks for a new cell phone -- especially since most

I jumped the gun here the other day when I touted a 'mechanical' buy signal at the (p2) red line in this vehicle and a couple of others. We'll play it by-the-book from now on, initiating 'mechanical' trades only at the green line. Why did I shift tactics in the first place? Simply because I'd lost sight of the possibility that the S&Ps might correct like they meant it for once in a rare change. The 'mechanical' trade itself, you will recall, is geared toward exploiting particularly nasty corrections, and that is why we typically bottom-fish at the green line rather than the red one. Considering this is the S&Ps and not bitcoin, the two-levels pullback could signal that the bull market is weakening. In any event, we'll need more evidence before we can infer that with confidence.______ UPDATE (Sep 18, 6:05 p.m.): Numerous subscribers reported taking the trade flagged in the chart (see inset). As I noted in the chat room, traders should have taken off half at p=2900.63 and another 25% at p2=2918.44. If you still hold a position do as you please, but I'd suggest keeping the 2936.25 rally target in mind. Here's an updated chart that shows the  rally. (Note: 2940.25 is the equivalent target for the December contract.)

AMZN's steep dive today turned a weak 'mechanical' buy signal into chop suey, but the weakness won't start to look serious until such time as sellers exceed the structural support at 1855.55 recorded in mid-August (see inset). Were that to occur, the stock would be signaling a new kind of weakness -- or at least a malaise that hasn't been seen in a long time.  My gut feeling, however, is that the weakness is being engineered by the usual fraudsters looking to accumulate shares at fire-sale prices. The stock fell on news, after all, that the company was investigating a bribery scandal in China. Reportedly, some Amazon employees have been selling data that would give certain vendors and edge. This sort of corruption is par for the course in China, one of the most corrupt countries on Earth, and pretty dog-bites-man, as far as such stories go. That's why I think it'll blow over. But we should still pay close heed to the downtrend, since it would signal genuine -- as opposed to stage-managed - weakness if it starts to exceed 'D' correction targets on charts of minor degree. _______ UPDATE (Sep 18, 6:13 p.m.): Buyers recouped most or Monday's losses but left a challenging shelf of supply just above $1970 untried. Let's see how they handle it on Wednesday._______UPDATE (Sep 19): Wednesday's weak performance did not change the technical picture._______ UPDATE (Sep 20, 10:09 p.m.): Still no change. AMZN looks to be basing for a run-up to 2082.36, but it will take a decisive push above p=1984.89 to make this an odds-on bet for the near term.

In the chat room Monday, subscribers reported jumping on call options when VXX was bottoming Friday inches from a compelling downside target at 27.45. Accordingly, I am establishing a tracking position of four 21 Sep 30 calls @ 0.24, the worst price reported. As always, I'll suggest offering half of them for twice the price paid, good-till-canceled, and a third option for quadruple the price. If you hold stock instead, you should scale out the position at the same intervals where I've advised profit-taking on the options. Although we have know way of knowing how far this rally will carry, we have the wind in our sails at the outset, significantly reducing the risk of the trade. If VXX relapses, I'll stop out the tracking position @ 0.15, but you'll have the option of holding onto it if you please. ______ UPDATE (Sep 18, 6:15): The calls ticked 0.15, but if you held onto them don't sweat it. VXX cannot but bottom at so clear a Hidden Pivot support as 27.45, even if the exact timing of its next flight of fancy is uncertain._______ UPDATE (Sep 19, 9:23 p.m.): VXX gapped below 27.45, showing unusual weakness. I still doubt that this vehicle can stay down at these levels for long or get pushed much lower. It's akin to submerging a beach ball below the water line._______ UPDATE (Sep 20, 10:21 p.m.): VXX has been pushed beneath an 'interesting' Hidden Pivot with such force that we must consider a new target. The one shown, at 25.54, would be more compelling if the AB impulse leg had exceeded a distinctive low, but that is not the case. We'll use it anyway to bottom-fish, but I'll leave the details up to you. I'd suggest using just-out-of-the-money calls expiring in 5-12 days._______ UPDATE (Sep

So much for summer doldrums. The broad averages have tacked on nearly 10 percent since June, with no hint that the torrid pace will cool with the official start of autumn later in the week. But isn't that always the case before a new market paradigm surfaces, often with the subtlety of electroshock therapy?  Indeed, Mr. Market has historically been at his most wrenching come October, and it is perhaps only waxing expectations of this in recent years that has tempered his inclination to mete out punishment to the unwary. The Dow Industrials, playing catch-up with indices skewed toward the digital economy, look eager to test January's record high at 26616. The requisite 462-point rally could happen as early as this week, and while it would appear that the Indoos will have little trouble getting there, there's no reason to be complacent, much less ebullient, when the headlines trumpet the news.