Rick Ackerman

The futures were  pussyfooting early Wednesday morning, reluctant to dive to the next Hidden Pivot target, 1605.75, unless pushed from the ledge. Judging from tonight's pathetic failure to climb back up to what had been a midpoint support, my guess is that the plunge, equivalent to 200 Dow points, will be over by the opening bell or not long thereafter. Night owls should therefore look for shortable patterns  on the 5-minute chart or less, but I'll also suggest bottom-fishing with 'camouflage' if 1605.75 is closely approached. If you want to see exactly the type of short-able ABC I'm talking about, check out this comely 'camo' pattern, which triggered on the 5-minute chart less than 20 minutes ago:  A=1632.50 (10:55 p.m. EDT); B=1628.75 (12:05 a.m.); and C=1630.75  (12:25 a.m.).

Price action yesterday in some key bullion vehicles has allowed for some ambitious Hidden Pivot projections that bulls are going to like. If you're looking for encouragement, you should check out today's touts for Silver Wheaton, which looks like it's setting up for a pop into the low  $30s; and December Gold, which, with just a little more upside, is going to re-train bulls' sights on $1500+.

Monday night's bullish stab stopped an inch shy of the 1408.00 midpoint pivot shown. Assuming Gold gets second wind -- a logical outcome, since there are a couple of larger, bullish ABC patterns driving the futures right now -- a move even slightly above p=1408.00 could be expected to generate sufficient thrust for a follow-through to the 1427.60 target shown.  It is close enough to the 1428.80 target given here two weeks ago, when the future were trading around 1311, that we  should expect to see some stopping power. If not and gold blasts through it, or closes above it for two consecutive days, we should take this as evidence that buyers have raised their sights to 1500.

Silver Wheaton's opening bar yesterday took out the midpoint resistance shown with plenty of room to spare, and the pullback that followed precisely used this erstwhile resistance as support. This implies a clear path to 29.57, the 'D' target of the pattern I've drawn (see inset). The number should evince tradable resistance, but if it gives way quickly -- say, within an hour or so of first being touched -- that would hold bullish implications for the days ahead. How bullish? If you zoom out to the daily chart, the next logical stop, a midpoint pivot at 29.67, is close enough that the two numbers should be considered as a single resistance zone. Once it has been decisively exceeded, a 'D' target at 33.13 would be in play.

I sometimes put Hidden Pivots aside and trade from the gut. Right now, my gut is telling me that the bull market in this stock is a Wall Street hoax that cries out to be shorted.  I'd suggested doing so a while back, but I'm ready to get serious now and will be looking for a good entry spot. For the time being, however, and to tide over traders who may be chomping on the bit, I'll recommend putting on put butterfly spreads well below the market. Specifically, I'm recommending that you buy the January 18-20-22 put spread 100 times for a slight (i.e., 2-3 cents, to pay for commissions) credit. For each spread done, this would entail shorting two January 20 puts, buying one January 18 put and one January 22 put for a net credit of a 2-3 cents. This is tough to do at the moment, and if the influx of orders resulting from this recommendation rattles the market makers too much, we can try to end-run them by legging into the spread at possibly even better prices.  The inset shows the relevant bids and offer for the options we seek.  If we're successful, maximum profit on the position would be $20,000, with no loss possible (even after commissions). So why am I down on Yahoo? I mentioned here earlier that I do not share the Street's reverence for the company's CEO, Marissa Mayer. She may have been a hotshot at Google, but that kind of talent -- any talent short of genius, in my opinion -- is not fungible in the dot-com business.  If she were the Steve Jobs of web-based marketing/advertising, I'd say Yahoo! has a chance to rule its world. Instead, far from innovating, Mayer went out and paid $1 billion for Tumblr, a

This Flying Pig succumbed to gravity late in yesterday's session, taking the nasty plunge we'd been expecting from the first. I opened an impromptu session at the start of the day after having suggested 45 minutes into it that traders short 1666.25, stop 1667.00. Alas, the three-tick stop-loss I'd advised missed the 1667.50 high by three tricks. A 13-point air-pocket eventually ensued, albeit after nearly five hours of screwing-the-pooch. In retrospect, because we were so confident that a tradable top was coming somewhere near 1667.00, it would have been appropriate to short the less-than-ideal 'camouflage' pattern that dropped in our lap just off the day's high.  This follows something I've repeated to Pivoteers many times --that the first 'camo' opportunity following a turn from a 'D' target (or from a p midpoint) will usually be the best, least risky and easiest opportunity we'll get to do the trade. Going forward, and bearish though we be, we'll still have to respect the fact that the impulsive rally from Friday's 1650.00 low remains somewhat more powerful than yesterday's barely impulsive downdraft (see inset). Predicting Tuesday's price action is going to be a coin-toss at the moment, but to gauge sellers' strength nonetheless, we should monitor price action at whatever 'p' support becomes manifest on the next leg down.  This could happen overnight -- may have happened by the time you read this -- but that would not diminish the predictive value of price action at the Hidden Pivot midpoint.  If you want to see everything I've said in this tout in graphical form, you should check out the chart, since it summarizes the information presented above.

October Crude is nearing the top of an apparent consolidation that has been rollercoastering for the last five weeks. It's not the kind of formation that looks capable of supporting a powerful thrust, but it will be tradable from the long side nonetheless once August 16's  107.95 peak is exceeded. Keep in mind that it is when other traders are at their craziest (or their most bored) that camouflage works best. Accordingly, you should switch to the one-minute chart to find your entry pattern on the breakout. It is not breakouts that we care about per se, but impulse legs. In that regard, camo traders are well equipped to make objective, tradable sense out of hysteria.

If you're a gold bull worried about whether the rally since late June is capable of getting legs, check out my tout today for GDXJ, the Junior Gold Miner ETF. The explosive move so far in August may need a stiff correction to set up for second thrust, but everything about the daily chart says it's coming.

This trading vehicle continues to perform beautifully and is now within pitching-wedge distance of the 53.20 rally target we've been using. Visually speaking, it's hard to believe that, strong as it is, GDXJ is capable of replicating the Howitzer shot that took it from 35 to 51 in just eight trading days. Regardless, the fact that the 51.16 peak achieved on August 16 slightly surpassed the key June 6 'external' at 50.76 attests to the brute strength of this rally.  We'll need to see a stiff pullback before we can gauge how much energy bulls have left, but as long as each new thrust on the daily chart continues to surpass a prior peak or two, bulls have little to worry about. ______UPDATE (August 27, 2:8 a.m.):  Yesterday's wicked selloff following a bull-trap opening is no more worrisome than the one that occurred in Silver Wheaton. It is not to be feared, and traders eager to climb back aboard need only look for the opportunity on charts of 5-minute degree or less. Many traders will have been freaked out by the steep drop, and that is what will make it easier for us to jump on the first impulsive pattern we see following a reversal from a p or D on the lesser charts.