From the desk of Steve Strazza @Sstrazza

For the week ended Friday, July 10, 2020:

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

This week we're going to highlight our US Index and Sector ETF tables, and focus on the laggards as they are giving us the most important information for the current market environment. Let's dive into it.

No surprises here... The Nasdaq $QQQ outperformed aggressively once again last week, booking a +4.7% gain while Mid, Small, and Micro-Caps were all lower. The Nasdaq is the only US Index that is higher over the trailing month.

This is our ASC Research Q3 Playbook.

The first section dives deep into the US Stock Market, and the second half covers International Stock Markets and FICC (Fixed Income, Commodities & Currencies).

You can skip right to the trade ideas here if you'd like, or give the full report a read!

Yesterday's post on "Pulling The Weeds" from our portfolios got some great feedback, so thank you for that.

It also prompted a question about whether we should be adding Equity exposure as the indexes go higher or if we should be lightening up and trying to add back on weakness.

This is a very personal question that'll look different for everyone in practice. In this post, I want to provide a framework to use when thinking about this so you can identify what's most appropriate for your portfolio.

Remember, our job as Market Technicians is to ask the right questions and then allow the market to tell us the answer.

From the desk of Steve Strazza @Sstrazza

For the week ended Thursday, July 2, 2020:

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

Being Independence Day weekend, we're going to highlight the continued structural outperformance from the US vs rest of the world in this week's post. As a good patriot and technician, I would be remiss not to take this opportunity to reflect on how grateful US investors should be.

Here are our US Index ETF and Global Index tables.

From the desk of Steve Strazza @Sstrazza.

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.

Click chart to enlarge view.

This is the video recording of our July 1, 2020 Monthly Charts Live Strategy Session

From the desk of Steve Strazza @Sstrazza

For the week ended Friday, June 26, 2020:

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

"It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness."

It sounds like Charles Dickens could have been writing about today's market in his famous passage from A Tale of Two Cities.

Many areas of Growth and Technology are trading at or near record highs, and it's sure felt like the "best of times" for anyone who's been overweight these stocks in recent years.

On the other hand, cyclicals and Value were already hurting coming into the year and then endured serious structural damage during the Q1 crash. If you've been invested in these areas, particularly those groups directly impacted by Covid-19, it might just seem like the "worst of times."

From the desk of Steve Strazza @Sstrazza

When going over some of this week's content ideas with JC, I told him "I can't possibly write another post about Tech stocks, but I want to."

His response was simple: "That's information."

In other words, based on the thousands of US Equities charts I'm looking at each week, the strongest uptrends continue to be in Technology $XLK. The fact that it almost seems too good to be true, or that I feel like I'm beating a dead horse about "tech, tech, and more tech" - is all the more reason to remain bullish.

We can't change the fact that there's a lot of good stuff going on in the space right now. We can only interpret the data in front of us, and right now, it's saying we should keep buying Tech.

So is this.

From the desk of Steve Strazza @Sstrazza.

Last week, we introduced our new weekly column called "Under The Hood." You can read more about it here.

Basically, we are looking at a universe of the most popular stocks on Robinhood measured by the net increase in accounts holding them week-over-week. Then we're drilling into the charts to find opportunities to either join in and ride the momentum in these names higher, or bet against those that get too frothy.

Here is this week's list. It represents the top 60 stocks that experienced net increases in ownership among Robinhood users last week. We've also included their weekly performance.

Click table to enlarge view.

From the desk of Steve Strazza @Sstrazza

For the week ended Friday, June 19, 2020:

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

Despite some volatility in the second half, risk assets continued their steady march higher last week. The broadening participation from Equities was again evident as every major US and Global Index was higher with the exception of Dow Utilities $DJU.

We've written extensively about the strongest areas and those first to reclaim their highs. In this post, we'll highlight a handful of Equity ETFs/Indexes which are at or just beneath fresh highs. Whether these areas work through their overhead supply or get rejected at these key levels will provide important information into the strength and durability of the current rally.

Let's dive right in and take a look at our Sector SPDR ETF table.

From the desk of Steve Strazza @Sstrazza

A few week's ago we profiled the strength in Biotech and highlighted the Genomics space as one of the top-performing industry groups. We said we were looking for some consolidation in these areas in the coming weeks and that if and when prices resolved higher these would be areas we'd look to for long opportunities.

It appears the weight of the evidence has spoken with Biotechs pressing back towards fresh highs after consolidating in a tight flag for over a month.

In this post, we'll highlight our top-down approach to look into the Biotech space and offer some trade ideas. Then we'll drill further down into Genomics, provide an update on what we're seeing there, and share some setups in holdings of the ARK Genomic Revolution ETF $ARKG.

Here's the iShares Nasdaq Biotech ETF $IBB.

From the desk of Steve Strazza @Sstrazza

In mid-April, we posted a list of 20 key chart levels we were monitoring in some of the most important assets around the world. We've used this as a risk-gauge to measure the internal strength or weakness of the market in the time since.

The list started at 60% bullish, never fell below 50%, and has been stuck at 90% with the same two bearish hold-outs for the past month now. The list has grown consistently more bullish since we began tracking it as more charts continued to break above our levels.

Since the end of May, 18 of the 20 items have been in bullish territory and many have run a good amount from our risk-levels. With the strongest stocks and indexes making new all-time highs and confirming this bullish outlook, prices have spoken and it's time we retire our bull market checklist.