Rick’s Picks

The March contract struggled for a foothold all week and now looks likely to continue lower to at least p=152^05. A tradeable reversal at or very near this Hidden Pivot midpoint support is predictable, and bottom-fishing there will undoubtedly be easier than attempting to short the downtrend. Not that we can't try, but let's plan on using TLT for this task, and for bottom-fishing as well if preferred, since it's a cheaper way to play. In the unlikely event that sellers crush the red line, the secondary pivot (p2) at 144^21 would be in play. _______  UPDATE (Jan 11, 8:33 p.m.): The pattern shown here is too gnarly not to work in every possible way, so don't hesitate to try tightly stopped bottom-fishing if the futures swoon to x=155^20. Sideways action this evening appears to be a consolidation for a push to D=156^21. However high it goes, the rally will be corrective. ______ UPDATE (Jan 12, 5:16 p.m.): The futures fell to 155^21, missing our bid by a single tick before rallying moderately into the close. We'll just watch, since I am not recommending buying a relapse that touches the green line. _______ UPDATE (Jan 13, 8:56 p.m.): Today's spike exceeded the 156^21 target by seven ticks, enough to earn the uptrend the begrudging benefit of the doubt at least for the time being. _______ UPDATE (Jan 16, 4:21 p.m.):  So much for the benefit of the doubt. T-Bonds are way overdue for a bounce, but if last week's little dribbler is the best bulls can do, yields are going higher, and the blithe idiots who have been pumping stocks will eventually have to pay heed. _______ UPDATE (Jan 19, 10:58 p.m.): A rally to x=155^12 would trigger an appealing  'mechanical' short. This trade is only for subscribers who understand why 'x'

A 'mechanical' buy that had been two weeks in coming triggered on Friday after bouncing off the green line at 22.02 no fewer than three times. Numerous subscribers swore on a stack of Holy Bibles that they have been paying attention to my Silver touts, so I will establish a tracking position and see how it goes. I'll use a 22.10 cost basis, since Thursday's initial bounce from the green line would have been stopped out following a partial, profitable exit. The not-so-sloppy-seconds pattern we are left to trade is shown here, and it implies two contracts would have been exited at p=22.27. Cash out a third at d=22.59 and use a 22.03 stop-loss for the 25% that remains unless instructed otherwise. _______ UPDATE (Jan 10, 7:03 p.m.): The futures are closing on 22.59 this evening. Exit another 25% as suggested, but switch to an impulsive stop-loss on the 30-minute chart for the 25% that remains. This implies stopping out the trade if a presumably corrective down-leg exceeds two prior lows without correcting, At present, the stop would be at  22.36. ______ UPDATE (Jan 11, 8:41 p.m.): If you Bible-thumping supposed silver lovers followed my instructions, you are still long a single contract (or 25% of the original position), with a realized gain of $4150 and another $3400 of unrealized.  Use a 22.48 stop-loss for what remains, o-c-o with a closing offer at 23.20. An exit there would yield a total profit of around $9100. _______ UPDATE (Jan 12, 1:24 p.m.): Today's strong upthrust has hit 23.22, so we are officially out of the position with a theoretical profit of $9100.  The rally impaled the midpoint pivot of a larger pattern with such force that we can now use D=24.01 shown in this chart as a minimum upside objective.

Since there are no actual bears trading the cryptos, we have to assume that wrenching declines such as we've seen in this vehicle over the last two months have occurred simply because its institutional sponsors have stepped away to pick their teeth and have their nails done. They may not know it, but the chart says they will begin buying again at either the 39,805 'D' target of the pattern shown, or deep in the 'discomfort zone', a tad below 38,500.  There is no equivalent pattern in ETHE, only a jerry-rigged one with a 'D' target at 23.54 (daily chart, A= 47.08 on 12/1) and a too-vague discomfort zone. _______ UPDATE (Jan 10, 6:55 p.m.):  Ahem. The 39,805 Hidden Pivot support drum-rolled above caught the nearly exact low of a $2,454 rally. This feat -- just a cheap parlor trick, as you will already know by now -- seems to have been the proverbial tree falling silently in the forest, since no one noticed, much less inquired about how to trade it. ______ UPDATE (Jan 11, 8:46 p.m.): Several subscribers professed to have leveraged the target; however, because this vehicle is not tradeable and the subscribers did not say what they used as an alternative, I have not established a tracking position.

The 'reverse' pattern shown triggered a 'mechanical' buy on Friday slightly above the green line I'd flagged at 1783.20. A subscriber who reported doing the trade didn't say how, but I'll assume a tight 'camo' set-up was used that might have triggered as low as 1783.90 (for instance: 60-minute, reverse a= 1785.40 on 1/6 at 9 a.m.). I'll recommend exiting half the position on the opening Sunday night, since gold's rallies have been balky and short-lived.  Thereupon, implement a trailing stop that would put half of any profits booked up to that point at risk. A third contract should be offered $10 higher, but check back, since that could change depending on how this vehicle opens on Sunday. ______ UPDATE (Jan 10, 7:13 a.m.): Exiting two contracts at 1796.40, Sunday evening's opening price, leaves two contracts (or 50% of the original position) with an effective cost basis of 1770.00. Offer half of what remains at 1813.30, just below the pattern's midpoint Hidden Pivot, with an o-c-o order stopping out the entire position at 1785.60. (This is an 'impulsive' stop on the 30-minute chart that references two very recent, external lows.) _______ UPDATE (Jan 11, 8:55 p.m.):  If you followed my instructions, you're sitting on realized gains of $4,300 and are still long a single contract (or 25% of the original position) with an unrealized gain of $5,000. Use an 1801.00 stop-loss for now, O-C-O with an order to exit the remainder of the position at 1839.  A 'dynamic' trailing stop can be substituted above 1828. ______ UPDATE (Jan 12, 5:23 p.m.): The dynamic stop suggested above triggered at 1825.40 after the futures topped at 1828.20.  The total profit on the position would have been around $8000. Do nothing further for now.

Happy New Year and welcome back!  Things are beginning to return to normal at Rick's Picks following the disastrous rollout of a new web site earlier this month by a company that had been working on this project for ten months.  I've restored the old Rick's Picks pages and replaced the firm with the highly capable Brian 'Catman' Catalucci, who previously worked as my system administrator. I will keep my comments brief, since there is still some troubleshooting to do this evening to make certain this essay displays properly on the home page and reaches you via email. Mainly, I want to mention two no-brainers that should help you start 2022 with zero confusion about the global economic picture.  The first is the dollar, whose chart is displayed above. You don't have to be a technician to see that this picture is bullish. And even if the greenback is about to work its way lower in order to build a base for the next big rally, there is nothing to suggest that a collapse is even remotely possible, let alone imminent. With that in mind, you can safely tune out all the yo-yos who have been screaming for your attention with predictions of a horrendous inflation. It's not going to happen, and the real challenge for us all, including the charlatans who run the central bank, will be dealing with the catastrophic deflation that is coming with the next bear market. There's Still Time The good news is that the Papa Bear has not yet arrived, and there is still time to shift your money into Treasury paper and bullion assets. Both remain unpopular, which quite often is sufficient reason to invest in a particular asset. You can raise cash for this by dumping bull-market effluvia, including FAANG stocks, private

AAPL still looks like a no-brainer -- not only to achieve the 187.93 bull market target shown, but to provide a tradeable pullback from it that we can short profitably. It is comforting to have such a predictable bellwether. It is better than that, actually, since the stock provides an unobstructed view into the chimp brains of those who get paid to throw huge quantities of Other People's money at a relative handful of ridiculously overvalued stocks. Get AAPL right, as I have always said, and you get stock the market right. ______ UPDATE (Jan 5, 8:43 p.m.)' The stock has turned down sharply after getting within 2.6% of the 187.93 target. This is interesting, since the E- Mini Dow came even closer to a 36,890 target I was eager to short before it, too, took a steep dive. The yellow flag is out.

The futures have rolled down from a logical spot, a secondary Hidden Pivot at 4802.25 tied to our bullish lodestar at  4907.25. I've added a smaller 'reverse' pattern with a target at 4663.00 so that we can gauge the strength of correction and exploit it 'mechanically' for trading purposes. It tripped a short at 4756.50 on Friday, but I did not advise taking the trade ahead of the long weekend.  Sliding 'a' up to 4743.25 (12/16) produces a correction target as low as 4576.75, but we'll be better able to judge its validity and usefulness once we've seen how sellers handle the respective midpoint supports at 4731.25 and 4688.25. ______ UPDATE (Jan 3, 9:19):  Although sellers were spent on the opening bar, DaBoyz failed to take advantage. Even so, it is bullish that the downward spike that began the session couldn't even reach the midpoint Hidden Pivot support at 4731.25.   _______ UPDATE (Jan 5, 8:46 p.m.):  Very suspicious. The futures dove today after stopping out a hypothetical short last week from p2=4802.25 by a hair. 'Matt's Curse' is in effect, so we shouldn't be surprised if the downtrend accelerates into week's end. _______ UPDATE (Jan 6, 7:57 p.m.): 'Matt's Curse' implies that very sharp reversals become more likely when they begin precisely at the p2 secondary pivot. In this case, the trend did in fact fail just a hair from p2=4803.75 of the bullish ABCD pattern shown, and we should therefore be prepared to see sellers take out the pattern's point 'C' low at 4485.75.  I have drawn in a secondary 'reverse' pattern for trading purposes -- in this case, a potential 'mechanical' short on a rally touching x=4752.50,;or a bottom-fishing attempt at d=4585.25.

I still expect the futures to fall to the 'D' target at 158^14 before the correction ends. That's because the downtrend's first contact with p=160^01 crushed the support.  The implication is that a rally to x=160^26 would trigger a 'mechanical' short with the potential to achieve 'D'. I am not advising the trade, however, unless you know how to initiate it with a 'camouflage' set-up that would reduce the theoretical entry risk per contract to no more than about six ticks. Alternatively, if the bounce stops out C=161^19 of the corrective pattern, that would be bullish for T-bonds. _______ UPDATE (Jan 3, 9:55 p.m. EST):  We bought into what turned out to be an avalanche, suffering a loss of about $220 per contract before stopping out. The futures went significantly lower thereafter -- no surprise, given the way they'd turned our robust-looking Hidden Pivot support into chop suey. I'm tempted to try again, assuming the futures fall into a void that will produce maximum discomfort at around 156^04. Go for it only if you've attended enough Wednesday tutorial sessions to understand what I'm talking about. _______ UPDATE (Jan 5, 8:55 p.m.): The 156^05 'magic number' flagged above caught the low within a single tick. Depending on what kind of set-up you used, the trade has gone on to produce a profit of as much as $1700 on four contracts with the futures currently trading at their high since bottoming at 115^05. If you still hold a fractional position, use D=156^21 as a price objective, implementing a trailing stop if and when it's hit. _______ UPDATE (Jan 6, 7:59 p.m.): The bounce went as high as 156^20, a single tick below where I'd suggested implementing a trailing stop. That's close enough to have kept you out of trouble and gotten you out

Bitcoin has lost its mojo for the moment. It's possible the Nasdaq and S&Ps will need to become white-hot  again before the cryptos resume their natural role as leaders of bull-market insanity. Lately, however, Bertie, ETHE et al. have been unable to convert even the smallest bullish patterns into winners. We bailed out of one last week for a minimal loss, and although it has yet to be stopped out, its struggle to avoid  this has been a sad spectacle. Let's see how the pattern shown plays out before we jump in again. The 'D' target at 56,456 will remain viable as long as C=45,491 is not exceeded to the downside. (The equivalent pattern in ETHE has already been stopped out.) _______ UPDATE (Jan 5, 9:16 p.m. EST): If the so-far tentative bounce from p2=42845 fails, look for more slippage to the 39,805 target of this pattern.