From the desk of Steve Strazza @sstrazza

At the beginning of each week, we publish performance tables for a variety of different asset classes and categories along with commentary on each.

Looking at the past helps put the future into context. In this post, we review the absolute and relative trends at play and preview some of the things we’re watching to profit in the weeks and months ahead.

The weight of the evidence still suggests it's prudent to be a buyer, not a seller, of risk assets for more meaningful time horizons.

Shorter-term, the market looks increasingly messy. For the first time in over a year, defensive assets are beginning to stabilize at logical levels of support, while stocks and major risk groups achieve our upside targets. Even a handful of some key Intermarket ratios are potentially diverging from the broader averages.

From the desk of Steve Strazza @Sstrazza and Grant Hawkridge @GrantHawkridge

The credit market is overflowing with information. 

We haven’t discussed it too much lately… but that doesn’t mean we aren’t paying close attention.

It would be foolish to overlook it. After all, they call Bond traders the “smart money” for a reason... Right?

We’ve recently discussed the theme and likely implications of how so many major stock market indexes - in both the US and abroad, are hitting very logical levels of overhead supply right now.

We think it’s no coincidence that all of this is occurring at the same time. And you’ll never guess what else…

We’re also seeing this very same behavior from some of the most important Bond Market ratios we track, as many are currently running into crucial inflection points.

This is the video recording of the April 2021 Conference Call.

From the desk of Steve Strazza @sstrazza

At the beginning of each week, we publish performance tables for a variety of different asset classes and categories along with commentary on each.

Looking at the past helps put the future into context. In this post, we review the absolute and relative trends at play and preview some of the things we’re watching to profit in the weeks and months ahead.

The same themes that we've been pounding the table on more or less continue to drive primary trends.

In recent weeks, we've seen some rotation back into Large and Mega-Caps, which has propelled the major indices to new highs, while SMIDs are still resiliently consolidating. While the list of negative data points has grown, it's still not close to anything that warrants concern.

Last night I popped into BNN Bloomberg to talk about what's going on in the market.

We're seeing new highs across a lot of major indexes, but what's happening underneath the surface?

We've been seeing the price of lumber soaring along with things like Steel and Rebar futures. It's the whole demand/building/growth theme that continues to stand out.

One thing that's definitely worth watching is the All Country World Index Ex-U.S., which is basically a snapshot of what the rest of the world looks like. And you'll notice that the index ETF $ACWX is stuck right between its 2008 highs and 2018 highs.

This puts the global stock market in quite a predicament. If you're bullish equities, you're going to want to see a breakout through those historic 2008 highs. If you're bearish equities, this is one you want to see break back below those 2018 highs.

Check out the video in full. This was fun:

Several areas of the market have reached key levels of support or resistance. 

Crude Oil continues to digest recent gains just below overhead supply near its former 2019 highs. 

The Euro/Dollar is finding support at the recently violated 12-year downtrend line. 

And the Emerging Markets ETF $EEM continues to consolidate near its 2007 highs.

Meanwhile, the US Dollar is also testing key levels. 

USD strength has become a major market theme over the last couple of months -- along with the potential effects it could have on global risk assets. A strong US Dollar could apply pressure to Emerging Markets, Commodities, and cyclical assets in general. This would challenge the global growth thesis and the rotation into cyclical areas we have seen play out over recent months.

In a market environment where Financials and Natural Resources have become leadership groups, how do we not have a conversation about Canada? Taking that one step further, we need to talk about how any investor, whether living in Canada or not, can take advantage of a potential structural swing in the trend for Canadian Equities.

There's always information in the Currency markets, even if trading currencies isn't something you do.

There is wisdom in some of the world's largest markets like forex and fixed income. To ignore it would be irresponsible.

One thing that's been hard to ignore is the strength in the US Dollar Index throughout the first quarter of 2021. This could be a potential wrecking ball to the global growth, rotation into cyclical and commodity supercycle themes.

But is it?

When we look at several G-10 Currencies relative to the Dollar, the Commodity-centric currencies have held up the best, which is interesting, isn't it?

From the desk of Steven Strazza @Sstrazza and Ian Culley @Ianculley

Many of the same themes that we came across in last week's Commodity Report continue to play out.

Overhead supply keeps demand at bay while price churns sideways, offering mixed signals.

Like many areas of the market, Commodities are a bit messy.

While sideways price action and choppy market conditions are the norms at the moment, there is one consolidation in the Commodity space that demands our close attention.

As JC pointed out in last night's Monthly Strategy Session, one of the most important charts right now is the Copper/Gold ratio as its intermarket implications span far and wide.

This is the video recording of our April 1, 2021 Monthly Charts Live Strategy Session

From the desk of Steven Strazza @Sstrazza and Ian Culley @Ianculley

I think we can all agree that the market is an absolute hot mess right now.

The Precious Metals complex is as good an example of this as any right now.

In this post, we’ll use this shiny group of commodities as a case study to illustrate the mixed signals we see not just here but in asset classes all over the globe these days. 

It’s a major development, to say the least - so we’d be irresponsible not to monitor it closely as the way things resolve from here will likely have implications that span across markets, far and wide. 

We’ll also provide an update of our post from earlier in the month whereby we outlined a trade idea in Gold Miners.

From the desk of Steve Strazza @sstrazza

At the beginning of each week, we publish performance tables for a variety of different asset classes and categories along with commentary on each.

Looking at the past helps put the future into context. In this post, we review the absolute and relative trends at play and preview some of the things we’re watching to profit in the weeks and months ahead.

While the same themes we've laid out in previous reports continue to hold strong, we have seen some recent deterioration, particularly in the large-cap sectors and indexes.

Despite an increase in bearish developments, the overall weight of the evidence is still firmly in the bull camp, and we remain aggressive buyers of stocks and risk assets, particularly over any longer-term timeframe.