We interrupt this raging bull market to update you on some historic positioning in the bond market that is sure to impact your portfolio, whether you like it or not.
Even if you don't trade bonds, this is really really important.
You see, I know it's easy to sit back and chill out with the S&P500 making new 52-week highs, the Dow Jones Industrial Average and Dow Transportation Average making new 52-week highs and, of course, the Nasdaq100 making new 52-week highs after posting its best first half to a year EVER.
Market breadth continues to expand and sector rotation is frustrating the hell out of anyone trying to short this market.
The thing is, what even changed?
What happened that stocks have absolutely been ripping higher since last year?
Positioning.
It's not the economy that drives stocks. It certainly isn't fundamentals.
It's hard for me to have a conversation about the stock market without bringing up what's happening in bonds.
Think about it like this, the market cap of all US Stocks is somewhere around $40 Trillion. For the bond market it's over $120 Trillion.
Volatility in bonds tends to trickle down to other asset classes, especially stocks.
US Stocks really got going in the 4th quarter last year, once the US 10-year Note stopped falling in price.
I don't believe that was a coincidence.
But at this point, Large Speculators have on their most aggressive short position in bonds ever.
So in other words, what is historically the "dumb money", particularly at turning points, are betting more aggressively than ever that bond prices are going to fall and rates will now continue higher:
Throughout the call we discussed how we want to continue to profit from this raging bull market in stocks.
The list of participants in this bull keeps getting longer, not shorter. We're seeing more and more stocks going up, more sectors and more countries around the world participating to the upside.
Everyone is talking about an imminent economic downturn and the next stock market crash.
You hear it on the news and in the streets – talk of the banking crisis, the Fed, inflation, and China pervades the narrative. Even my doctor assured me the world is headed for dark times during a routine appointment earlier this week.
Bearish sentiment is obviously alive and well.
But, as a chartist, I prefer to visualize these rumblings...
Investors had second thoughts about stocks last week, with sentiment dropping across the board. This week’s Investors Intelligence survey shows a healthy return to optimism as bears dropped to their lowest level in over a year and the bull-bear spread moved back above its August high.
When the Fed raised rates to 4.50% in early February, the market was expecting that any additional tightening this Spring would be taken back (and then some) and that by the end of the year the Fed Funds Rate would be at 4.25%. Now, the market is pricing in a year-end Fed Funds Rate of at least 5.25%. Over the course of a month, market expectations for rates have shifted higher by a full percentage point.
