I'm out in Newport Beach, CA for a few days hanging out at an industry conference called Future Proof. 

I don't even know where to start with these guys.

I've had a front row seat to watch my good friend Josh Brown partner up with Barry Ritholtz, hire Michael Batnick and many others along the way, and turn a small advisory into a $5 Billion AUM firm - one of the fastest growing Financial Advisors in the United States.

It was awesome when they were first coming up and putting on conferences. They were big, but still small and intimate in their own ways.

Now they're just way too successful.

That band that was cool when just a few people knew about them has gone mainstream. 

There are way too many people here. It's absolutely insane.

My friends are rockstars. And I couldn't be happier to see all of their success.

I say there are too many people at this conference as a joke. But I'm not even kidding. There were like 20 open bars at happy hour last night and I still couldn't get a drink. 

It was nuts.

And today is actually the first full day.

From the Desk of Steve Strazza @Sstrazza.

Welcome back to Under the Hood, where we'll cover all the action for the two weeks ended September 14, 2024. This report is published bi-weekly, in rotation with The Minor Leaguers.

What we do here is analyze the most popular stocks during the week and find opportunities to either join in and ride these momentum names higher, or fade the crowd and bet against them.

We use a variety of sources to generate the list of most popular names.

There are so many new data sources available that all we need to do is organize and curate them in a way that shows us exactly what we want: a list of stocks that are seeing an unusual increase in investor interest.

A bank from one of the world's largest economies is breaking out. How bearish can the stock market be in an environment like that?

The breakout is a new all-time high, and you guys know how I feel about new all-time highs. (hint: I love them)

In today’s Daily Digest, we’ll review the following:

1. New position in XOP.
2. No adjustments are needed today.
3. No exits since the last report
4. Current status of open campaigns.
5. NEW: Volatility Snapshot.

Let’s dig in!

Heading into last week I shifted my short-term bias (weeks) from neutral to bullish.

This worked out rather nicely, with the S&P 500 closing every day in the green and crypto markets getting some relief from this recent selling.

I have flipped back my short-term bias (weeks) back to neutral with stocks pressing up to the highs. This fits into my intermediate bullish bias (months) as the market appears reserved heading into the election.

My longer-term bias (quarters) is still unequivocally bullish.

This is the weekly post that aggregates all the charts we put together throughout the week and organizes them all into one, easy to flip through deck.

We've been obnoxiously talking about soft commodities lately.

But, it's for a good reason! And it all comes down to relative strength.

Aside from a few pockets of strength, the trends have been a mess in the broader commodity complex.

Products like Natural gas and precious metals have been hard to ignore if you're involved in the commodities markets.

There's more though. 

Orange Juice futures made a new all-time high this week and look primed to begin a new leg higher.

Let's talk about how we're playing it:

First, some context: 

From the desk of Steve Strazza @Sstrazza

Our International Hall of Famers list is composed of the 100 largest US-listed international stocks, or ADRs.

We've also sprinkled in some of the largest ADRs from countries that did not make the market cap cut. 

These stocks range from some well-known mega-cap multinationals such as Toyota Motor and Royal Dutch Shell to some large-cap global disruptors such as Sea Ltd and Shopify.

It's got all the big names and more–but only those that are based outside the US. You can find all the largest US stocks on our original Hall of Famers list.

The beauty of these scans is really in their simplicity.

We take the largest names each week and then apply technical filters in a way that the strongest stocks with the most momentum rise to the top.

Based on the market environment, we can also flip the scan on its head and filter for weakness.

Market conditions feel to be improving and taking a shot on some high beta names might be well worth our effort in the coming weeks.

As such, today's trade is in a name that has the potential to 5x or more if I get the follow-through I'm betting on.

In today’s Daily Digest, we’ll review the following:

1. No new positions today.
2. Adjustment to XME position.
3. No exits since the last report
4. Current status of open campaigns.
5. NEW: Volatility Snapshot.

Let’s dig in!

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When Junk Bond traders jump ship, I’m out of stocks.

With all the talk about credit spreads “blowing out” since early August, this is an important discussion to have right now.

We always trust the bond market. Throughout history, bonds have done an impeccable job at alerting investors about problems in risk asset markets. 

When there is stress in other markets, it shows up in fixed income first.

However, as technical analysts, we are mindful of the math that is behind some of the relationships we study and give weight to.

What if I told you that industrials have been massive underperformers during this bull market? 

The absolute price chart looks incredible. How could that be?

We call it the denominator fallacy. 

Benchmarked against the S&P 500 or Nasdaq 100, of course they are underperforming. 

We think there is a similar situation playing out for our bond market ratios right now.