Rick Ackerman

AAPL's canny sponsors pushed the stock out of an accumulation zone Friday, presumably to levitate this behemoth to the 182.95 target shown. However, getting past the 176.98 midpoint pivot is not going to be a piece of cake, since it's the last significant line of resistance between current levels and open water.  There is an alternative pivot at 177.60 (where D=184.18) in case the lower number is easily surpassed, but you should watch for signs of resistance, or perhaps even a tradeable pullback, from either number.

Bulls carried the day on Friday, clearing a path to a least 2809.75. Although the upside penetration of the 2745.88 'midpoint pivot' was slight, it should be sufficient to keep the buying momentum going in the days ahead.  There are many ways to get long for the ride, but the one-size fits all recommendation would be to buy a pullback to the green line (2714.00), stop 2680.75.  This implies entry risk of about $1700 per contract, and so I am not recommending the trade to the faint of heart or those with accounts under $25,000. But the initial risk can be reduced to perhaps $50-$75 theoretical using alternative entry set-ups such as 'camouflage' or 'counterintuitive'.  Stay close to the chat room if you're interested, since many who frequent the room are familiar with these tactics. They can be useful for circumventing the possibility that the futures will move higher without pulling back to the green line.

If Warren Buffett is loading up on Treasury bills, shouldn't we be doing the same? Berkshire Hathaway reportedly held $109 billion in cash at the end of September, according to the Wall Street Journal. That's double what the legendary investment firm had in 2006 and up from $86 billion at the end of 2016. Even with Berkshire's huge hoard of capital, that wouldn't leave much spare cash to throw at the likes of Netflix, Amazon, Facebook, Google and Microsoft. For our part, we're taking a very cautiously optimistic view of the stock market, which could conceivably recoup all of this month's earlier losses by week's end. Why do we view this nine-year-old bull market 'very cautiously'?  It's not because of the charts, which in theory support the case for much higher prices. No, it's more a matter of our distrust of Mr. Market and respect for what he can do when sentiment is at such bullish extremes as it is now.  It is for that reason that Rick's Picks will be diligently focused on Hidden Pivot rally targets of intermediate degree just above the old record highs. Even the lesser charts, most particularly the hourly, have the potential to warn of a major reversal, since small, abcd corrective patterns will start to exceed their d targets if trouble is brewing. Mr. Market's Kill Shot We still think that a pop in the Dow, S&Ps and Nasdaq to marginal new all-time highs would be the perfect way for Mr. Market to set up bulls and bears alike for the kill shot. We note that some well-respected seers are now calling for the Dow to ascend to 50,000 or even higher.  Far be it from us to suggest this is impossible. Even so, we'll continue to use our own technical tools to

True to his diabolical nature, Mr. Market generated a potentially very important buy signal and a sell signal just hours apart on Wednesday. The latter was of somewhat larger degree, but either way, we're likely to see a big move in one direction or the other, and soon. I expect to be able to make a clear call on this by week's end, depending on how the E-Mini S&Ps act relative to bullish and bearish midpoint Hidden Pivots that lie nearby on their respective hourly charts. These are interesting times, for sure -- you can feel it in the tempo of the news both good and bad. We could pray for a dull ending to the week, but I doubt we'll be so lucky.

Toward the end of this session we dog-tailed Boeing, mainly to see whether we could get in and out of a $350 stock without getting dinged too badly. BA was in hurt-cripple-and-maim mode, so our efforts to master it, if only briefly, are instructive. As Boeing rose for about 7-10 minutes, we looked mainly for camouflage and mechanical set-ups, although not for buy-stop entries, since this critter is too squirrelly for them to work. All of our ‘mechanical’ entries did, however, and that is why you should check out this recording, especially the final 15 minutes.

Take a good look at this chart. If the bull market in bonds has truly ended there is a lot of clear sky above. Not normally a fan of ProShares due to inherent decay I would consider making an exception for TBT (ProShares Ultrashort 20 year Bonds) considering the potential gains from a once in a lifetime generational move if the Fat Bond Lady has indeed sung her final song. Once Bonds start to waterfall drop I suspect the move will be swift so keep an eye on Bonds on the lessor time-frame. This will not be easy to trade so size your lots appropriately and take it one Hidden Pivot target at a time. [Tout prepared by David Isham]

If the Bond bull market truly has ended we should look to getting short real estate. Mavin, a denizen chatroom pivoteer, recommended looking into shorting DHI (DR Horton) calling it the "Walmart of the housing industry and catering to the low end of the market". Also check out the TBT tout as another way to play dropping Bond prices. So does rising rates mean the end of the stock market? Not necessarily and quite possibly the opposite. Rates rose between 1927-1929 along with the stock market. The U.S. Bond Market is almost as big as the US Stock Market ($31T vs $40T) and Bonds globally exceed $100T. If the Bond bull market has ended where will capital seek shelter? I'm guessing the U.S. Stock Market. With retail participation even lower than pre-2009 crash levels (54% currently vs 62% in 2008) we are no where near a top in U.S. equities. [Tout prepared by David Isham]

Stocks dove late in Wednesday's session on news that the minutes from the January FOMC meeting were more than a little hawkish. From where we were sitting, the selloff looked like a brazen shakedown. It amounted to a 475-point reversal in the Dow, but that's the kind of plunge that Wall Street's thimble-riggers engineer whenever they are hungry for shares at bargain prices. For their part, the Fed governors seem convinced that U.S. economic growth is strong enough to handle who-knows-how-many more rate hikes without trouble. The Masters of the Universe no longer seem to care about dosage levels, but it seems predictable that this attitude will be validated shortly when stocks reverse after having fallen on news that was all too obviously 'bad'. When observing the ceaseless, criminally manipulated ups and downs of stocks, it is wise to keep Oscar Wilde's famous quote in mind: “One must have a heart of stone to read the death of little Nell without laughing.”  Similarly, one must be an imbecile to think that the spectacle of stocks falling on 'bad' news is bearish.

A few days ago I provided precise benchmarks for judging whether the Dow Average is about to embark on a thousand-point rally.  Today I present an  alternative scenario, one in which the Dow could fall by as much as 3000 points. This would be the equivalent to a drop of more than 300 points in the S&P 500, to around 2400.  My gut feeling is bearish, but it wouldn't surprise me if the broad averages climb first to new record highs, the better for Mr. Market to set the hook in a way that bulls and bears alike get demolished.  Whatever happens, I will continue to monitor the hourly charts of several market bellwethers, since it is impossible for the big trend to reverse without the change being signaled initially on charts of lesser degree.