Silver's daily chart looks even less disturbed than gold's following last week's hit-job on bullion. The commercials reportedly were heavily short, and they used an extremely volatile day in the stock market to make traders think news of a Pfizer vaccine was somehow bearish for precious metals. Their ploy worked for all of a day, but buyers were back at it the next, struggling to recoup lost ground. A theoretical buy signal remains in effect, predicated on minimum expected upside to p=28.22. We'll have to see how the uptrend interacts with that Hidden Pivot if and when it is reached, but an easy move through it on first contact would shorten the odds of a further rally to as high as D=34.62. ________ UPDATE (Nov 18, 8:44 p.m. ET): There's a midpoint Hidden Pivot support at 23.93 that looks opportune for bottom-fishing with a tight stop loss. To reduce the entry risk, I'd suggest using an rABC set-up with the coordinates shown to do the trade. Initial risk would be about $700 per contract. A comparable support in SIL lies at 41.62. _______ UPDATE (Nov 19, 10:13 a.m.): Using the rABC pattern sketched out above, you'd be up about $1300 per contract at the moment. The first entry stopped out for a $700 loss; the second, for a $700 gain; and the third is still live, just shy of p2=24.07. Based on four contracts, the third should be exited at p2, and the fourth at D=24.215 of the rABC. I would NOT be swinging for the fences here because p=23.93 of the big pattern -- my original 'buy' level -- has been badly mauled. This implies SI will fall o at least p2=23.318 of the big, bearish pattern against which we are trading; or even to D=22.70.
Tech stocks have hit a wall, unable to remain afloat on a tide of stressful news. Although Wall Street would have us believe investors shouldn't care who wins the election, this idea is preposterous. There is simply no way that a takeover of Capitol Hill by the Democrats could be perceived as good for business and the economy. But there's a Catch-22 if Trump succeeds, since a court decision paving the way for a second term could gravely unsettle America for years to come. A vaccine remains a bullish wild card, as the mindless herd demonstrated on Monday. Pfizer announced a drug that supposedly has been 90% effective in trials, touching off the most powerful one-day rally in stock-market history. The clinical basis for the drug maker's claim went largely unexplored at first, presumably because the stock market's canny masters had every reason to avoid hard questions that might queer the celebratory mood . But doubts surfaced on Tuesday nonetheless, causing shares to extend Monday's tech-led retreat. Tiredness seems likely to remain the market's theme until after the election is settled, which could take as long as two months. Small-cap stocks may be raring to go because that is the 'story' the stock market's masters have been hyping non-stop, but they will not get very far with the FAANGs and other insanely overbought lockdown winners weighing them down. Conclusive news of a truly effective vaccine could goose stocks into a parabola at any time of day or night. However, even a truly miraculous vaccine would not suffice to justify the sensational earnings multiples achieved by many stocks after the lockdown. This could present as promising an opportunity to "buy the rumor and sell the news" as a trader could hope for. _______ UPDATE (Nov 11, 6:35 p.m.): Stocks showed no
The acrid aroma of voter fraud has grown so strong that even Biden supporters must smell it. To them, however, it undoubtedly has a fragrance as sweet as lilacs in August. Unfortunately for America, no matter how deep, wide and ugly the scandal might become, it may not be enough to overturn the election result. The news media have demonstrated their ability to control the narrative so completely, and to snuff those who would challenge it so brutally, that it's possible nothing short of a new election can change the outcome. That is not to say Trump's all-out effort to prove widespread fraud is just so much tilting at windmills. In Wisconsin, for example, there is evidence of tampering so brazen that it recalls the days when the Kansas City mafia ran a wide swath of Las Vegas. They were skimming one casino's profits so greedily that a New York capo stepped in to warn KC's wiseguys to leave a little profit for the house. In Milwaukee, and conceivably many other places, Democrats seem to have departed recklessly from the don's call for moderation when stealing, Here's some damning analysis of the city's vote from Jack Cashill of AmericanThinker.com: "The most striking feature of the data is a fact that cries out for clarification: In seven wards, voter turnout appears to have exceeded [registrations by] 100 percent. In two of those wards, turnout exceeded 200 percent. In another 15 wards, voter turnout exceeded 95 percent. Joe Biden carried 21 of the 22 wards of the 95-plus-percent wards. But then again, he carried all but one of the 67 additional wards in which the turnout was above 90 percent and won 80 percent of the vote citywide. In 25 wards, Biden received 97 percent or more of the vote, none higher
The 172.17 rally target we've been using to stay on the right side of the trend now has a companion target, a 'D' Hidden Pivot at 166.98. Together they should exert short-able stopping power, so we'll be looking to lay 'em out when IWM reaches the lower end of their approximately 5-point range. We still hold some Nov 6 130 puts that are no longer even a distant longshot to pay off. However, observing an inviolate rule of the Hidden Pivot Method, we cashed out of half of them when their price doubled, allowing us to hold onto the remainder of the position with zero risk. Some subscribers were able to do even better, since the puts quadrupled in price before IWM took off. This happened when the portfolio chimps began to hype a quite bullish small-cap story, presumably after they'd front-run it to the extent possible. _______ UPDATE (Nov 9, 8:35 a.m. ET): The overnight high in the E-Mini futures equates to 175.81. The futures exceeded their target at 1741.90, putting an 1813.30 target in play that is all but certain to be reached. This is equivalent to 181.33 in IWM. _______ UPDATE (Nov 9, 6:54 p.m.): I've redrawn the pattern to show a 184.73 target that is somewhat more ambitious than the one proffered this morning. I regard it as likely to be reached, but the huge price reversal will have sapped bulls of confidence that will take at least a week or two to return. Look for the gap between 165 and 169 to be filled. If the pullback touches the red line (163.44), it would trigger an enticing 'mechanical' buy. _______ UPDATE (Nov 10, 7:38 p.m.): I'll be interested myself to see who wins this one. On the one hand, Wall Street has been huckstering small-caps
It looks as though the Democrats will get nearly everything they've wanted -- except for control of the U.S. Senate. This means that turning the Supreme Court into a rubber stamp for new laws that would radically transform America will likely remain out of their reach for at least the next four years. That's the good news, but not just for the nearly 70 million voters who supported Trump. Biden's backers should be relieved as well, since this will spare them the historical notoriety of having trashed the separation of powers merely because they could. The bad news is that, as Obama demonstrated time and again, a president doesn't need Congress to enact a heavy-handed political agenda. Unfortunately, few expect Biden to be calling the shots for long. His mental acuity and physical stamina are all-too-obviously failing, and while it was possible for the news media to ignore his appalling lapses and gaffes during the campaign, putting him in charge of the most powerful nation on earth is not going to work. We can only pray that when Kamala Harris takes over, which she eventually will, she doesn't usher in a political Reign of Terror that comports with her take-no-prisoners brand of political extremism. An Unstable Economy The Democrats will soon own America's future, but they may come to regret it. The stock market is pumped so full of super-heated gas that it makes the Hindenburg look like a birthday balloon. Unprecedented levels of monetary stimulus have created a dangerously unstable economy dominated by a relative handful of giant, cloud-based companies that will have no jobs for displaced energy workers. There's also China, an implacable enemy that neither Biden nor his running mate has the guts or experience to confront. No less challenging will be protecting the promising but fragile
The map showed up in my email this afternoon, sent by a subscriber who, like me, simply cannot fathom polls that have Biden winning. This poll asked 373,000 people across America who they though their neighbors would vote for. Trump won in every state but Colorado, which has to mean something. If the many pollsters who have predicted Biden will romp turn out to have been wrong, I distrust the news media enough to assume that the encouraging numbers they provided to him were by design rather than error. Realize that if the major news outlets can fix things so that half of the nation has no clue what the Hunter Biden laptop scandal is all about, then they can easily fudge the results of a half-dozen surveys. I don't go quite so far, however, as to believe, as one friend does, that the CIA is capable of hacking computers used by Pennsylvania, Texas and a few other key states to tally votes uploaded from the precincts. I wouldn't deny that this is theoretically possible, only that the agency has shown the aptitude for staging such a coup without leaving elephant tracks. So what if Biden actually wins? At least half of us are praying it doesn't come to that. I've predicted Trump will bury Biden, but I must concede that this is just a gut feeling. I don't know anything more than you do, and even the news anchors don't know enough to make a better guess than you or I. But if Biden/Harris is our next president, I fear they will wreck much of what has made America great, starting with the Supreme Court. The founders set the third branch of government above politics, but it could not be more clear that the Democrats, vengeful over Amy Coney
A 100-point drop into the void would present an interesting 'rABC' opportunity to bottom-fish, but I'll wait for it to happen before I try to offer timely guidance in the chat room. In the meantime, we can divide our attention with the pattern shown, a 'reverse ABC' that can be traded just like its conventional cousin. I've sketched in a hypothetical 'mechanical' entry if the week should get off to a strong start. Ordinarily I'd say investors are too jittery to pull it off, but on Friday they tripped two theoretical buy signals with successive rallies to the green line, implying bulls were feisty enough to at least fake themselves out. ______ UDPATE (Nov 2,8:54 p.m. ET): The opening hour generated a bullish impulse leg on the hourly chart but no easy opportunities. I take the upbeat finishing stroke a day ahead of the election as a vote for Trump. _______ UPDATE (Nov 4, 9:47 p.m. ET): The 3435.50 target provided in the chart served well as a place to get short, as some subscribers evidently did. The 119-point plunge from within three points of the pivot could have been worth as much as more than $5900 per contract to night owls paying close attention. The subsequent rally was even more dramatic, pointing toward a move now to at least 3500.13. That's the midpoint resistance of a pattern on the daily chart that began with A= 2972.00 on 6/29. If the futures get by it, a push in to 'no man's land' around 3560 would be a good place to look for a short. Set it up with a 'reverse ABC' pattern on a chart of 15-minute degree or less. _____ UPDATE (Nov 15, 8:48 pm.): Today's powerful thrust slightly exceeded the 3500.13 target given above before pulling back just an
By this time next month we may know who won. Just kidding, sort of. Earlier, I predicted that if Trump wins, endless legal disputes would ensue, along with violence in the streets. However, I also said Trump's margin of victory would be big enough to allay Wall Street's anxieties about not having a clear winner. I still see it that way, although given the heavy tilt of the polls toward Biden, I'd want at least 8-to-1 odds to bet on a big Trump win. A smart guy who thinks otherwise is Allan Lichtman, an American University historian with a supposedly perfect record picking presidential winners since Reagan. He has gotten every race right, we are told, including Trump's shocking victory over Hillary Clinton in 2016. It would seem that he also predicted the impeachment. Lichtman favors Biden this time, based on 14 'keys' he uses to determine which way notoriously fickle voters will veer. Incumbency is an important 'key' for Trump, Lichtman concedes, but the President loses out on too many others. He cites as negatives the Covid-depressed economy and the supposed Russian scandal. In my estimation, the professor has gotten these two 'keys' so badly wrong that his credibility should have taken a hit. Instead, he has become a big hit himself, a celebrity on Trump-fearing news shows. Voters Haven't Forgotten Concerning the two crucial negative keys that favor Biden over Trump, except for those afflicted with Trump Derangement System, most voters do not blame Trump for the spread of the virus, nor for its depressing effects on the economy. Moreover, it beggars belief to suggest that Biden could have done better or could do better in the future. Under Obama/Biden, the economy languished in the weakest recovery of the post-War period. But then Trump, with one hand tied
Stocks have gotten hit hard this week. Have investors perhaps caught a whiff of a possible Biden victory and the damage he and his socialist running mate would inflict on American businesses and the middle class? That's one explanation, and I raised the possibility here numerous times over the last several weeks that it could occur, even if it was highly unlikely. In any event, the stock market is a lot smarter than the pollsters, and therefore probably better at predicting Tuesday's winner. However, Wall Street is also a sleazy carnival midway on a giant scale, and so it can be assumed that regardless of which way shares are moving on a given day, there is a reason for it that suits the needs of the market's Masters. Covid Lie Helps So why would they want stocks to fall? My theory is that because they are pretty certain Trump is going to be re-elected, they've pulled their bids in order to accumulate shares at fire-sale prices. This would position them for the huge rally that is all but certain to follow a Trump victory. Manipulating the markets in this way is especially easy with the news media promoting the lie that Covid-19 has gone out of control. They've hammered this phony story lately because they think it will help defeat Trump. If it scares you, relax -- I am still predicting that Trump will win by a landslide, and as for the virus, cases are expanding simply because testing has greatly expanded. Rick's Picks subscribers will be getting ready for the big rally by laying in some cheap call spreads for spectacular leverage. If you don't subscribe, click the trial offer button near the top of this page and join the fun. See you in the chat room! _______ UPDATE
I suggested early last week to tune out this vehicle -- advice that turns out to have saved us some stress. The futures oscillated nervously within a relatively tight range, paralyzed, if not by fear, then by uncertainty. Not much will be required to turn the futures into a runaway helium balloon, however, and this could happen as early as mid-week on growing perceptions that Trump will win. This notion could conceivably have gained critical mass by the time you read this on Sunday night, since Biden's campaign was taking on serious water when last week ended. Even if his now well-documented decades of graft fail to gain traction with the news media, he has enough other problems, including, most recently, voters in Pennsylvania, Texas and Oklahoma who heard what he said about killing the oil industry during Thursday's debate. The news media's disgraceful state of dereliction is not going unnoticed either, and it could gain millions of votes for Trump from Americans who are nauseated by the extremely biased coverage the campaign has received. My commentary (see above) provides yet another big reason why pollsters who have picked Sleazy Joe are growing more wrong with each passing day. Concerning the E-Mini S&Ps, if they vault the 3571.50 target shown in the chart, we can confidently infer that investors have caught a whiff of the coming Trump victory. ______ UPDATE (Oct 26, 9:34 p.m. ET): A 100-point decline might have been a worrisome sign for Trump, but bears -- and therefore Biden partisans -- had to settle for much less by the time short-covering kicked in after-hours trading. Let's see now whether sellers can get second wind. ______ UPDATE (Oct 27, 9;27 p.m.): A pullback to the green line would trigger a weak 'mechanical' buy, stop 3198.00. The trade rates