In our Dec. 5 note, Hitting Resistance, we argued the case for continued caution.
With the S&P 500 $SPX testing its channel resistance, the US Dollar Index $DXY sitting on long-term support, and the correlations to legacy markets getting tighter, there was no conviction to be had in long positions.
In recent weeks, we've seen risk-off action persist, with the S&P closing the last two weeks down more than 5%. Further, altcoins have slumped, with many taking out their November lows.
This remains an incredibly sloppy tape, where high cash positions and patience provide the trading edge.
This market environment is not like others that came before it.
Remember people used to complain that only 5 stocks were driving the market?
Now they complain that those 5 stocks aren't working.
But many others are.
And that's the point.
With new environments comes new leadership. We've seen this happen over many decades.
And those 5 stocks that everyone used to complain were driving the market, have now been laggards for quite some time.
I think people just like to complain.
But if you're like us, and would rather look for opportunities to profit instead of just bitching all the time, then it's important to look underneath the surface.
A great way to visualize the broader leadership vs just a few names is in the equally-weighted chart of the S&P500. This eliminates those mega-caps from dominating the indexes.
Here's how that looks compared to the market-cap weighted version:
From the desk of Steve Strazza @Sstrazza and Alfonso Depablos @AlfCharts
Our Hall of Famers list is composed of the 150 largest US-based stocks.
These stocks range from the mega-cap growth behemoths like Apple and Microsoft – with market caps in excess of $2T – to some of the new-age large-cap disruptors such as Moderna, Square, and Snap.
It has all the big names and more.
It doesn’t include ADRs or any stock not domiciled in the US. But don’t worry; we developed a separate universe for that. You can click here to check it out.
The Hall of Famers is simple.
We take our list of 150 names and then apply our technical filters so the strongest stocks with the most momentum rise to the top.
Let’s dive right in and check out what these big boys are up to.