We've been erring on the long side of stocks for the last 6 weeks, taking trades where the reward/risk is heavily skewed in our favor, but are still seeing mixed evidence regarding the market's ability to make new highs in the short-term.

From the desk of Tom Bruni @BruniCharting

Palladium. For the last 3 years, nobody cared a lick as it nearly quadrupled in price. Over the last month however, I'd seen more mentions* as the price trend accelerated than I did for the entire 3-year trend beforehand.

When most of us think of bank stocks, we're generally not saying positive things. We have a bad taste in our mouth, particularly since early last year. But that's not the case in India.

Look at this chart. Which one is different?

Yesterday during our Members-Only Conference Call we discussed a lot of themes and trade ideas, but I wanted to highlight two charts that remain an issue for our bullish Equities thesis.

It's been a frustrating period for stocks in Canada over the past decade. Up just 7% since their 2008 highs, Canadian equities have been consistently underperforming for almost 10 years. But are things now finally changing?

If there is one thing that has worked since October, it's cash. I feel like people are afraid of that word. Like you're doing something wrong for raising some (or a lot of) cash. Do you think it makes sense to always be fully invested? I don't.

I look at everything through the lens of potential opportunity cost. What else could we be doing with that money? In liquid markets, sometimes it's treasury bonds, other times it's gold, and of course all of the market neutral pair trades and options strategies to profit from sideways markets.

Cash is an investment too. Why do you always have to be all in? You want to think 50 years out? Go ahead. We're only concerned about the next couple of quarters. We'll worry about next year, next year. And 50 years from now? I only hope to be around sipping wine and ripping through charts. We'll see...

So about today.

From the desk of Tom Bruni @BruniCharting

Last night I was working on an International and Fixed Income ETF Report that went out to our Institutional Clients, but I wanted to highlight an important theme that I saw during my analysis.

In our February Conference Call we outlined the potential for some mean reversion in the Mid and Smallcap Indexes as they retested their 2018 lows, as well as the implications of a breadth and momentum improvement if we got it. We did, so let's take a look and see what it means.

One of the most valuable parts of my entire process is going through my workbook of Monthly Charts (only) at the end of each month. It's easy to get lost in the day-to-day noise, but this exercise forces us to identify the direction of the primary trend.

During my review, there are always a few of them that stand out. Today I want to point out what’s happening in Americas largest sector. This is a chart of the Technology Index Fund $XLK successfully retesting those March 2000 highs and trying to rip higher:

Today we got new Monthly Candlesticks and while updating the chartbook for our Premium Members, I couldn't help but think the chart below describes the environment we're currently in quite well.

Mid and Smallcap Indices in India are retesting their 2018 lows, leaving many wondering we're due for a new set of lows just 2 months into 2019.

Another day of weakness in small and mid-cap stocks while large-caps hold up well. Last week we discussed this two way market we're stuck in.