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The steep rally that occurred between March 2020 and August created an impulse leg with sufficient power that the likelihood of a second rally leg to as high as 40.085 should not be doubted. However, buyers' digestion pains have rankled us for nearly a year, and there can be no guarantees they will end any time soon.  There is still a presumption nevertheless that the futures will achieve a minimum 30.95 (p) without stopping out the 'c' low of the bullish pattern. In the meantime, the best we can do is stake out a long position on the lesser charts when a good opportunity arises. That would allow us to keep half for a swing at the fences. _______ UPDATE (Jul 27, 9:17 p.m. ET): The gnarly pattern shown in this chart predicted the low precisely. But how long will it last? It took the futures six weeks to get there, so the bounce should be more than just an overnighter.  If not, then the next logical step-down would be to 24.04, a Hidden Pivot support that can be bottom-fished in any of the usual ways, including with a bid and a very tight stop-loss.

My astute friend Greg Hunter at USA Watchdog weighed in recently with such a despairing outlook for the dollar that it's probably a good time to determine whether the charts support this view. Here’s the post from his site, which over the years has featured my own thoughts on deflation, the global economy and other topics: The Fed keeps telling us that inflation is going to be transitory, and things will fall in price and go back to normal soon. Nobody is buying this in the real world where people are watching their dollars fall in value and are paying more for just about everything. In simple terms, the dollar is tanking. Maybe this is why JP Morgan is the first big bank (with many to follow) that is putting high-net-worth clients into crypto currencies. Bo Polny says this is all part of a “Jubilee year which began in September of last year and ends in early September of this year.” Polny says, “Expect to see in the next four to five weeks a fall of the dollar, the world’s reserve currency. This could start as early as next week causing a run into tangible asset that include gold, silver and crypto currencies like Bitcoin. All hell is about to break loose on evil.” Sounds ominous, for sure. However, it flatly contradicts a forecast I’ve held to for decades – that deflation would ultimately wreck the global economy, driving the dollar into such scarcity that many, if not most, Americans would have to barter to survive. This may seem hard to believe at the moment, given the Fed’s unprecedented monetary blowout and the illusory prosperity it has created. Most of the digital cash has gone into investable assets, triggering a seemingly unlikely run-up in stocks during a year of Covid

We're taking long odds on a major top here, attempting to buy Sep 30 250/270/290 put butterfly spreads.  The 0.22-0.25 price range I'd suggested became increasingly inadequate as the week wore on, since a moderate decline in QQQ pushed the spread's mid-price up to around 0.31. Continue to probe the market, being careful to avoid paying up.  However, you should also consider the somewhat riskier strategy I'd outlined at the same time: legging into the spreads, first by buying 290/270 put spreads 1:1.  In the Trading Room, I'd suggested bidding 0.62 initially with QQQ at 362.50, but adjusting by 0.03 deltas. This means raising your bid by a penny for each 33-cent decline in QQQ, or lowering the bid by one cent for every 33-cent rise from 362.50.  To update using the same 0.03 delta adjustment, start with a 0.74-0.75 bid and QQQ at 357.29. The second leg of the spread would entail selling 270/250 put spreads 1:1 if and when QQQ drops. Whatever we receive for them will effectively decrease the cost of the resulting butterfly dollar for dollar. If QQQ were to fall sharply after we've got the first leg on, we could conceivably get the price of the butterfly down to zero or lower, meaning no loss would be possible.  A detailed lesson on butterfly spreads is available free to all subscribers and can be accessed via your account dashboard. Butterfly spreading is the cheapest and least risky way to leverage distant strikes. In this instance, spreads that cost you $50 to $70 apiece have the potential to widen to as much as $2000 if QQQ is at 270 when the options expire in ten weeks.  Please report any fills or failed attempts in the chat room so that I can adjust the bid to suit changing

Silver has lagged gold lately and may need to grope its way lower to find good footing. The chart shown is intended to exploit that scenario with an rABC set-up and a point 'c' low positioned at p=25.46.  This Hidden Pivot support is nicely situated in a 'discomfort zone', since, if you look to the left, there are no prior lows that the hoi-polloi would be referencing for structural support. Because we're playing for a turn from p precisely, I've somewhat shortened the a-b interval of the reverse bullish-pattern.  If you don't trade futures and prefer to use SLV, try a tightly stopped bid at 23.46, a midpoint support equivalent to the one in the futures chart. You could also use 'camouflage', call options or rABC to initiate the trade, but don't stick with it if it goes against you more than a little. _______ UPDATE (Jul 19, 6:14 p.m.): Sellers crushed the midpoint pivot at 25.46, negating our plan to position a point 'c' low there for an rABC buying set-up.  A point 'a' anchored at 25.03, the intraday low, would have triggered a buy at 25.22, with p=25.41, but unless I hear from at least two subscribers who elected the trade, I won't provide tracking guidance. _______ UPDATE (Jul 22, 4:38): Buyers took out one internal peak and two 'externals' on the hourly chart, imply bulls are likely to dominate at least till Sunday evening.

Bitcoin's fat-cat sponsors show no eagerness to let it fall, perhaps because they are loaded up to the gills already and don't want more even at 'bargain' prices.  A test of support at the red line, a midpoint Hidden Pivot at p=27,789, seems likely in any event, and anyone who trades this rabid badger should plan on bottom-fishing there with whatever flavor of 'camouflage' feels comfortable. The tactic itself implies using minor abc patterns to get long or short in places where entry has been signaled on charts of much larger degree. 'Camouflage' can be combined with virtually any other trading system you use in order to further reduce entry risk. For information concerning the mini-course on 'camouflage' set-ups, click here. _______ UPDATE (Jul 21, 12:43 p.m. ET): Buyers have pushed past a minor midpoint resistance, so I've switched to a pattern of larger degree with a 34,335 target where p=31,820. The pattern shows promise if you want to get long 'mechanically' on a nasty swoon.  Here's the chart. _______ UPDATE (Jul 27, 12:51 a.m.): Bitcoin has rallied opportunistically through a no-supply zone extending up to around 40,000, but it will face real sellers from here on up -- all losers from the last run-up. The short squeeze tells us that bitcoins handlers are every bit as skillful and vicious as the best and brightest at Goldman, JP Morgan and Morgan Stanley. (Actually, they are all bitcoin stakeholders themselves.) In mere hours on Sunday, when most sellers were on the beach, a rally snatched back every penny anyone who had been patiently short for the last month would have made. This will effectively neutralize bears, putting fear in their hearts when DaBoyz decide it's time to take BTC again to new record highs. ______ UPDATE (Jul 27, 9:28 p.m.): Use p=40,963

The latest attempt to move the global economy away from the dollar’s dominance involves a plan by Biden to issue $650 billion of Special Drawing Rights (SDRs) through the IMF. Ardent fans of the greenback needn't worry, however, since this sum, as large as it seems, is just a drop in the bucket compared to a derivatives market that supplies more than $2 quadrillion to the world’s biggest financial players. The dollar is the only currency big enough to handle their action, which dwarfs global trade in actual goods and services of no more than $90 trillion. Under the circumstances, it’s unlikely the dollar will be replaced any time soon. The $650 billion supposedly will enhance global liquidity, as though more liquidity were needed in a world where financiers can borrow practically unlimited quantities of money for next to nothing.  China’s communist government is backing the SDR expansion, although for reasons that are doubtless different from Biden’s. One suspects that globalists have Biden’s ear and that he is unwittingly going along with them because, well, because he was witless to begin with. For its part, China undoubtedly thinks more funny-money loosed in the ether can only be a good thing, since the CCP's main enterprise these days is helping poor countries go deeper into hock for Belt & Road projects. Pinto Beans for the Poor The SDR initiative is being touted as a way to make the world more “green” and “sustainable,” which is another way of saying that anyone who opposes it is trying to make life even more miserable for the poor. Arguably, they will in fact be better off, since even if $600 billion of Biden’s giveaway goes toward purchasing fleets of Bentleys and sumptuous vacation homes for Third World dictators, the $50 billion that eventually trickles

DaBoyz goosed shorts Friday to kick off an unmistakable lurch toward a 363.15 target that has been beckoning for several weeks. (A similarly bullish target at 365.67 had teased bulls since May but was negated by mid-June's fake breakdown.) I see no particular opportunities at the moment and note that even the obvious one, a 'mechanical' buy on a pullback to x=340.30, was denied us when DIA's engineered plunge last Thursday failed to touch the green line where we like to position 'mechanical' bids.  We should expect little more generosity on the way up, but since we know where DIA is headed, it should be fairly easy to grab short hops along the way. Stay close to the chat room or activate 'Notifications' on your account page to stay apprised.

Rick's Picks subscribers ended the week transfixed by a powerful rally in the E-Mini S&Ps whose inevitable destination was 4362.25. Why inevitable? Mainly because a chat-room ace whose trading system has been getting the big swings exactly right lately had said so the day before. If he were a pistol sharpshooter, this trick would be akin to turning a Roosevelt dime into a pinky ring at fifty paces. For not only had he chiseled the 4362.25 target in stone, he also provided the time of day when a profitable short position he'd advised earlier was to be exited and reversed for a further gain of as much as $3000 per contract.  You'd have to have been there to believe all of this, but even allowing for a little hyperbole, the feat handily refutes 'fundamentalists' who think technical analysis is voodoo. Fools Well Equipped Surprising as it may seem, however, the ability to predict trend and target with seemingly uncanny precision does not guarantee easy profits.  On the contrary, the opposite sometimes obtains, since the violent countertrend swings that invariably punctuate rallies tend to shake the confidence of even the most fervent believers.  In technical terms, it is a matter of valleys exceeding peaks as a stock makes it way higher. Thus does each $3 leap beget a pullback of $2 or more, subjecting the trader to at least $2 of risk for each new $1 of profit gained at the next high. Since no prudent system for managing risk can survive this rollercoaster ride, it is mostly fools who get rich, at least for a while, staying with spectacular rallies. Experienced traders understand that corrections tend to be as vicious as trends are steep, a fact that impels them to take partial profits on the upswings.  One can always play

I've been tracking this heap because it once had a following, but the portfolio monkeys long ago moved on to more lucrative, invented themes, jettisoning humble 'value' for lunatic growthies that are easier to expand to a horizon set at infinity.  Not that there was ever much real value in the small-caps, only that they were less absurdly priced than the FAANGs. I'll keep IWM on the home page nonetheless but leave it to some sharp-eyed subscriber to wake me when opportunity knocks. The 237.72 target is still valid, by the way, and I wouldn't mind shorting there if the opportunity should arise, but we should have no illusions that this will happen soon. ______ UPDATE (Jul 13, 10:36 p.m. ET): The 215/220/225 butterfly spread I recommended on June 9 has nearly quadrupled in price, so it's time to exit if you haven't already. A subscriber reported he was in $ 0.35 and out today for 1.26.  Any others? ______ UPDATE (Jul 31, 4:35 p.m.): I am leaving this glue horse on the list as a placeholder, pending the day when the portfolio chimps who made it their absolutely favoritest flavor between March 2020 and February of this year return it to fashion. _______ UPDATE (Aug 5, 11:19 p.m.): A rising tide lifts all boats, as the saying goes, so don't be surprised if an explosive rally in QQQ that looks imminent hoists this garbage barge's gunnel above the water line. ______ UPDATE (Aug 14): The garbage barge has gone nowhere, other than gratuitously up and down to annoy everyone. IWM's behavior shows how DaBoyz are in complete control, owing in no small part to an almost complete absence of sellers. Although institutional demand for Russell 2000 stocks is effectively at zero and has been since March, it still doesn't