Rick Ackerman

China is easy to hate, since their leadership is at heart a bunch of double-dealing, lying commie rats. (And yes, the evidence is more than a little persuasive not only that they unleashed a deadly virus on the world, but that they took clandestine steps to protect themselves from it before going public with the bad news). There is nonetheless something to admire and even envy in the way China's leaders have been going about economic reform. For starters, Xi Jinping has declared war on tech companies perceived as having little to contribute to China's goal of economic, geopolitical, financial and cultural dominance. Not coincidentally, most of the targeted companies are in the same businesses as America's hottest firms: consumer goods, advertising, real estate, ride-sharing, finance, gaming and entertainment. Xi's denying Chinese firms in these sectors access to U.S. capital markets is akin to Biden's issuing a fatwah against glorified ad agencies like Google and Facebook, banning Twitter for incitement and casting out the moneylenders at Morgan Stanley. The CCP's clean-up campaign took an interesting -- some might say promising -- turn last week when they banned effeminate men from TV. It remains to be seen how a generation of children will fare in the relative absence of yin-saturated popular culture, but if it eventually produces a Chinese John Wayne, the West will face an even tougher adversary down the road. Terminal-Stage Consumerism It's not simply a matter of targeting the kinds of companies we associate with America's terminal-stage consumerism, income inequality and decadence. The CCP's reforms are also designed to shift investment capital toward industries positioned to provide a brighter economic future for the Chinese people, and to grow an economically robust middle class. This policy implicitly rejects and rebukes an American-style capitalism that has atrophied to the point

AAPL and QQQ are a micron from hitting MAJOR 'D' targets simultaneously. The QQQ chart is in the current tout. The AAPL chart is here: https://bit.ly/38wCGn3 I'd suggest Oct 1 135/140/145 put 'flies, paying no more than 0.30, but lowering the bid by a penny for each 20-cent rise above 153.90. That's where you should start trying to buy the spread (eight times, officially). If you can leg in for under 0.20 at any time over the next two weeks, put it on 50x.

A secondary (p2) Hidden Pivot at 4515.56 remains all but certain to be achieved, as advertised in the chat room Friday. You can use this target and the pattern that produced it with confidence, given the way short-covering impaled p=4459 on the way up, then used it later to base. The pattern is sufficiently gnarly to obscure p2, and that's why I've suggested shorting there, either with a 'camouflage' set-up or a tight rABC. D=4571.50 is likely to work equally well if and when ES gets there. This seems probable, again because of the decisive push past p on the first attempt. The chart is tongue-and-cheek, a hopeful projection of a p2 reversal such as the world has never seen before. As always, our goal is not to nail the Mother of All Tops, but to get short in an opportune place with little at risk, and to be holding a partial position for a potential four-bagger. _______ UPDATE (Aug 30, 11:39 a.m.): This morning's lunatic leap through p=4525.38 has all but guaranteed more upside to at least the D=4588.50 target shown in this chart.  Since a one- or two-level pullback seems unlikely, any 'mechanical' set-ups to get long will need to come from the smaller ABC that began with A= 4473.75 at 10:00 a.m. Friday on the hourly chart. ______ UPDATE (Aug 31, 7:30 p.m.): I like either of the two 'mechanical' possibilities shown in this chart: long or short, depending on what is offered us. Shoot for a one-level ride regardless, since price action looks too turgid at the moment to deliver anything more dramatic.

Bertie took off after I pulled the 'mechanical' bid at the green line, rebuking me for the unpardonable sin of gutlessness. Even so, I won't start the new week feeling remorseful, since this vehicle has been very good to us whenever we've employed 'mechanical' bids on nasty pullbacks. This one simply wasn't nasty enough or we'd have elected the trade. Looking just ahead, bulls will face supply of geometrically increasing density above 50,000, although that will only slow the rally down somewhat, not reverse it decisively. 'Mechanical' buying opportunities are spent for the time being, although a pullback to the red line after p2=50,875 has been touched (but not exceeded by much) could be bought with a 46,953 stop-loss and a target at D=53,228. _______ UPDATE (Sep 2, 8:01 p.m.): The yo-yos and algos seem to be working "our" HP levels to death. Look at how studiously Bertie has avoided touching every line relevant to what would have become winning 'mechanical' trades. (We passed up one such trade ourselves when a pullback missed the green line by a millimeter on Aug 26). I am going to have to be more careful about whom I admit to the Wednesday tutorial sessions, since I don't want Goldman and Morgan Stanley riff-raff learning how we keep two steps ahead of their trading computers and math whizzes. _______ UPDATE (Sep 7, 10:01 p.m.): No sooner do I mention that the wack-jobs who flog this hoax have "figured out" ABCD levels and begun to use them ineffectually, than it dives 19% in the blink of an eye from within an inch of a too-clear 'D' target they'd fallen in love with. The news-media geniuses who pretend to make sense of such things embarrassed themselves as usual with an account that tied the plunge to El

In the Trading Room on Friday, "Statman" spotlighted a breakout in this vehicle, waking me from a long slumber. His breakout indicator probably differs from mine, since I'm focused on an intraday high that exceeded mid-July's 226.81 'external' peak by all of 22 cents, or about a tenth of one percent.  But a breakout is a breakout, and so I've redrawn the chart to show what could happen if IWM is in fact beginning a big move in a very sneaky way. You can butterfly one-month calls near the 245 strike if that is your style, but we'll also look for intraday opportunities to board the underlying, provided there is a good show of interest in the chat room. (If you are new to Rick's Picks and butterfly spreads, use your account dashboard to access a free recorded lesson on how to do these spreads in our idiosyncratic, super-leveraged way.) _______ UPDATE (Sep 7, 10:06 p.m.): So far, price action has been garbage, with no even remotely interesting buying opportunities in more than a week._______ UPDATE (Sep 8, 9:02 p.m.): I've lost interest in attempting a 'mechanical' buy if IWM returns to  x=217.06, since it would amount to 'sloppy fifths'.

I've grown so skeptical of gold's rallies that I didn't even mention the textbook 'mechanical' buy the December contract triggered last week on the pullback to the green line. It was worth $5,000 to anyone who bought there, and more power to you if you did without waiting for me to confirm. Since the pattern has worked so nicely for bulls, let's use D=1829.60 as a minimum upside objective. If that Hidden Pivot is decisively exceeded, the new target would be 1851.50, calculated by shifting B-C up a rung. Either target is worth shorting if you've made money on the way up, but I'd risk no more than $80 per contract with a 'camouflage' set-up or rABC.

Short covering on Powell's speech ripped through midpoint resistance at 23.83 with such force that there can be little doubt the 24.35 target will be reached. A swoon to the green line (23.56), however unlikely, can be bought 'mechanically', provided the futures have traded no higher than  24.20 first. A red-line bid would be expert play, but I'll leave it up to you -- and an extra note  of caution if it triggers Sunday night. As always, a decisive move past D would imply a larger uptrend is at work with a correspondingly higher target. ______ UPDATE (Sep 1, 7:27 p..m): I'll go about three inches out on a limb with a prediction that December Silver will achieve the 24.70 target of this pattern sometime soon. It hasn't quite reached the 24.35 bigger-picture target of the pattern  referenced above, but it has nonetheless pushed past the midpoint Hidden Pivot of a lesser one, This is mildly bullish, as the chart tries to make clear. ______ UPDATE (Sep 2, 11:23 p.m.): So much for giving silver the slight benefit of the doubt. After penetrating 'p' to the upside, the December contract scuddled sideways for a while and then dove on the opening. It did not penetrate the 'C' low of the bullish pattern, but it did trigger a 'mechanical' buy at x=24.00 that I had not recommended; nor will I ahead of a three-day weekend.

The pattern shown, with a 363.15 rally target that differs slightly from the one we've been using for months, has exuded good karma all the way up. Notice that it triggered two fetching 'mechanical' buys in places where most bulls would have been paralyzed by fright. That's why these trades work, and why we should expect the rally to continue at least to D. As before, we will want to short the bejeezus out of a print at or near that Hidden Pivot, but without letting hubris cloud our judgment concerning whether we've seen The Top. If you butterflied calls a while back, please let me know in the chat room, since they should be coming home to roost shortly. ______ UPDATE (Aug 31, 11:05 p.m.): Although three weeks of patty-cake at p2 has somewhat dimmed our 363.15 lodestar, it hasn't quite snuffed it. A short there is still warranted in any event, but I wouldn't attempt a 'mechanical' buy unless DIA swoons precipitously to the green line. _______ UPDATE (Sep 4): Make that, four weeks of patty-cake at p2. _______ UPDATE (Sep 8, 9:06 p.m.): Bulls ran out of gas trying to stay aloft for yet more gratuitous head-butting of p2. Let's see if bears can seize the advantage by pounding DIA hard ahead of the weekend. If so, it would be behavior we haven't seen in a very long while.

Jackson Hole hubris was operating at full strength last week as investors around the world anxiously awaited the announcement on Friday that would send the markets into hyperdrive. The broad averages had in fact churned impassively for several days ahead of whatever lame twaddle concerning The Tapeworm lay in store. The question of when the Fed will begin to tighten following a loosening binge that has persisted more or less continuously for a hundred years is the focus of portfolio managers' tiny, febrile brains these days. How quickly they forget! For taken together, the last dozen or so Tapeworm utterances, hints and titillations would seem to imply that if tightening is coming at all -- which everyone knows it is not -- it's unlikely to commence before, oh, maybe the end of 2022 or, for good measure, 2023. Vague enough for you? This dovish meme has been recycled so many times that it's a wonder it can still send shares soaring. And yet it does, alternating with fleeting dips of feigned fear and dread whenever the Fed even whispers that it will someday be necessary to bring its surreal balance sheet into a semblance of control. Colloquially this is known as "taking away the punch bowl," an annoyingly dumb cliche coined by a benighted news media to make the somewhat esoteric concept of tightening go down easier with readers who are rightly confused about the bottom line. Getting High in August Still, you have to give the charlatans who manage our expectations their due, since they've riveted investors' attention whenever someone affiliated with the central bank farts, burps or clears his throat. On Friday, Fed Chairman Powell did all three, metaphorically speaking, in promising there would be some tapeworming of monthly bond purchases by  the end of this year. We've