I find myself on Zoom calls all the time. How about you?
Did you notice that the Communications Index is pushing up against new all-time highs? Did you notice that during the March decline, communications held above their late 2018 lows?
I think all of this points to us paying a little more attention to what's going on in the space.
First of all, check out the Communications Services Index holding above former resistance the past 2 years. That alone is impressive. If we're above 272, there is no reason to be pessimistic about Communications Stocks:
In early May we outlined the "Five Bull Market Barometers" we're watching to identify the beginning of a new bull market in stocks.
If you haven't read our initial post linked above, we'd encourage you to check it out so you understand what the rationale behind these five indicators is.
Now, let's see where these indicators ended the week.
One of the things that really caught my attention during our Monthly Chart Review for June was that the Nifty Auto Sector is approaching resistance on an absolute basis, as are some of the sector's largest components.
In this post, I want to dig into the sector and identify if there's still opportunity in the sector on the long side.
First, let's take a look at the Nifty Auto Index weekly chart on an absolute basis. Prices briefly broke below support at 5,200 in March and quickly reversed, sparking a rally towards resistance near 7,000 where we sit today.
This is a multi-year level of resistance, so we're likely to see some consolidation after a 57% rally off the March lows. For now, 7,000 is the line in the sand. If prices are above that, then Auto's can see further upside towards 9,300, but below 7,000 then there's too much downside risk and opportunity cost in being aggressively long the sector.
We haven't talked much about Real Estate $XLRE lately because there really hasn't been much to say. Over just about any timeframe, it's underperformed the S&P 500 $SPY, which we'll illustrate with a ratio chart below.
Price is basically unchanged over the trailing year. The only sectors that have performed worse are Industrials $XLI, Financials $XLF, and Energy $XLE. This is not a group you want to be associated with.
Looking at the chart, you'll notice it's gone nowhere for much longer than just the past year. XLRE has actually been chopping around in a messy range for the better part of four years now!
This is the third edition of our new "Under The Hood" column. Read more about it here.
We are already getting positive feedback on this new strategy from "Mr. Market" as both of our trade ideas from last week's post are now in the top 5 of this week's most popular stocks (measured by the net increase in ownership, week-over-week).
In other words, Robinhood investors have been buying these names hand-over-fist since we wrote about them last week. They've been rewarded for it too as they've both performed very well.
Workhorse $WKHS has really lived up to its name as it hit our price target in a matter of days, and then went on to double again from there. The stock is up about 4-fold since it broke above our risk level near 5 early last week.
Here is a look at the updated chart, with the same exact annotations from last week's post.
The stocks that worked well in the second quarter should continue to lead the market higher. We still want to be buyers.
On Tuesday afternoon I had a chat with Catherine Murray over at BNN Bloomberg about which stocks we're most focused on. As it turns out, the same stocks and sectors showing up on our buy scans in early to mid-March are the same ones showing the most positive momentum and relative strength now.
It's working. We're sticking with it. Here's the interview in full:
As July gets under way, it’s time to review positions with July options that remain open (haven’t already hit profit targets or been stopped out).
Most trades I put on for All Star Options tend to have a minimum duration of 30 days (short premium plays) and often as long as 6-8 months (for long premium plays). As options approach expiration, greeks like theta and gamma start to become my enemy and whipsaw my P/L. Therefore, as options and spreads get into the expiration month, my best practice is to put each position on notice — it’s time to take action.
What's with all this talk about weak breadth lately?
A lot of market participants have been pointing out the divergences or lower highs in popular breadth indicators such as the percent of S&P 500 stocks at new 52-week highs or the percent above their 200-day moving average.
In many cases, these actually aren't divergences at all as the S&P is yet to make a new year-to-date high itself.
Just like we look at different breadth indicators to identify market tops than the ones we look at to signal bottoms, we should use different items in our breadth toolkit depending on the market environment we're in.
Using the current rally as an example, it makes little sense to give weight to the percent of stocks making new 52-week highs considering most indexes and sectors haven't been able to achieve the same.
What do we know about all-time highs? We know we don't usually see them happen in downtrends. As obvious as this might seem to some, you'd be surprised how many people don't realize that new all-time highs are a classic characteristic of uptrends.
I encourage you to go back and study the greatest uptrends of all-time. Along the way, do you see new lows being made? Or do you see a lot of new highs in those uptrends?
Well, here is the Nasdaq Composite closing at new all-time highs for the second consecutive month. I've done the work, these are things we usually find in uptrends:
