Sean and I have known each other for over a decade but there are still things he's interested in learning about my experiences. In this video, Sean asks me how playing baseball made me a better trader or investor. The key takeaways here are:
1) Hard Work and Mental Toughness
2) Preparation and knowing what you will do under any circumstance
3) Learning how to lose. If you fail 70% of the time on the diamond, you get inducted into the Hall of Fame.
Being able to take a loss and move on is part of the path to success.
One of the topics I spoke about during my Chart Summit presentation on breadth last month was the relative performance of Equally-Weighted versus Cap-Weighted Indexes.
I always hear that the market cannot go higher on an absolute basis if the Equally-Weighted S&P 500 is underperforming the Cap-Weighted.
It's been about three weeks since I wrote this post looking at breadth across various Equity markets since January 2018.
JC wrote a post today about "The Cards We've Been Dealt" which references some of these stats, so I wanted to update some of them and highlight another way we use them to measure breadth.
We have to play the cards we're dealt. Like it or not, this is the environment we're forced to invest in, but only if you want to. You don't have to invest. Cash has been a viable option for 6 months. It's worked out great. Most stocks, sectors, US and International Indexes are still below their January 2018 highs. I can give you the exact numbers like we provide for our Institutional Customers, but just take my word for it. It's not even close. We've been in a 14-month sideways range, or downtrend, depending on who you ask. Either way, it's not an uptrend for most stocks.
Now, this 14-month nothing burger comes within the context of a major bull market in stocks, that arguably started in 2016. After a monster run throughout 2016 and 2017, the stock market, both U.S. and abroad, has consolidated those gains. It seems perfectly normal, and well deserved, if you ask me.
I received a ton of great responses via Twitter and email for this week's Mystery Chart, so thank you for that.
Most said you'd be buying the breakout at current levels or on a successful retest, but a few skeptics were staying away. Let's get into the actual chart.
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.
For those new to the exercise, we take a chart of interest and eliminate the x and y-axes and and all labels eliminated to minimize bias. The chart can be any security in any asset class on any timeframe on an absolute or relative basis. It can even be inverted or a custom index.
The point here is to not guess what it is, but instead to think about what you would do right now.Buy,Sell, or Do Nothing?
If the US Dollar is falling, International Equities trading via US listed ETFs should outperform US Stocks. When the US Dollar is rising, International Equities should underperform US Stocks.
Sounds like a logical relationship, but as usual, it's not that simple.
The Mystery Chart I posted Tuesday was a bit different because I told you what type of security it was and that it wasn't inverted. My objective with this chart was similar to what it always is, but more nuanced in that I was trying to get a feel for people's willingness to buy breakouts in stocks right now, or if there was any apprehension.
I received a ton of great responses via Twitter and email, so thank you for that. Let's get into those answers and the actual chart.
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.