Saturday, August 30, 2008

Check out the Financial Sense Newshour from today, August 30, 2008

Jim Kunstler speaks on the 2nd half of their Internet radio show. If you've never heard him before you should listen in...
The link is :

http://www.financialsense.com/fsn/main.html


If you have listened to folks on the Financial Sense website before, you know that Climate Change and Peak Oil are game changers for the world and threaten the very foundations of our civilization,

I encourage you to join one of the two organizations whose links I provide here:

http://www.wecansolveit.org/

http://www.pickensplan.com/

The top one is affiliated loosely with Al Gore
and the second one is (Obviously) T. Boone Pickens's attempt at solving the energy/climate crisis....

I have signed up personally with both.

For those of you who have missed it, please check out this 10 year oil price chart and explanation, it provides the backdrop for today's posting, and the references above:

http://marketmathematics.blogspot.com/2008/08/how-i-see-oil-markets-long-term.html#links

As always, click on the charts to see them better (make them bigger)

Wednesday, August 27, 2008

One thing holding the markets up...




One thing that may be supporting the markets is this wedge structure, which could eventually be Bullish on some time frame in the future, hard as that is to understand (even by me!)

S-L-O-W Market...




Not sure what's holding this market up..most of my breadth indicators are in agreement with the exponential charts that the rally is over...It might take Gustav and a rise in oil prices to start something really moving...

Tuesday, August 26, 2008

Watch for Gustav...

Is it my imagination, or does Gustav sound vaguely Russian? In any event, Gustav in the Gulf of Mexico next week could start the fireworks to raise oil prices, and sink everything else. In my view the equities markets are hanging by a thread...

Friday, August 22, 2008

Energy gathers momentum while major indexes loose steam..

I don't know how many noticed, but energy is doing fairly well now, even as the main indexes are showing signs of strain. In the coming years probably the only stocks to do well, will either be firms producing energy, or managing it or conserving it..

Thursday, August 21, 2008

$NDX is definitely in decline...Thursday A.M.



Hard to argue with this chart. Although the crossover is technically tomarrow, I think the $NDX has already made it's decision. Looking at the chart, the decline has started pretty close to the crossover, it takes fine eyes to see much difference, and it's now fallen clearly below the ascending curved support lines (thin blue and thin brown on this chart) so it looks like the $NDX is leading the charge downward..and it's probably a long way down from here..

Click on the chart to magnify...

Tuesday, August 19, 2008

Flip a coin...




The $SPX is now right on the trendlines I pointed out yesterday (compare todays chart with yesterday's), so there could be some support there, and the $NDX has fallen back on top of one of it's major trendlines, could be support there as well. But $Trin has actually gotten LESS bearish even as $CPC rises. By eye, on another $NDX chart it "looks" like the big trendline cross I've been talking about has already happened, although mathematically it's not due 'till Friday. So truthfully I can't say what will happen tomarrow, although we all know that a big decline is getting ready to happen at some point, or may, in fact, already have started. But is it really now? Not sure. All I can say is we're in the window for it..

As always, remember to click on the charts to "blow them up" so you can see them better...

Monday, August 18, 2008

Bobbing around the top



Recently, declines have met the smaller ascending curved trendlines and then bounced, in order to make another run higher, as shown by the arrows. Will it do it again to give us a final top, near the end of the week, or is it already over, i.e. will a failure take prices below the ascending curved trendlines?

I noticed $TRIN got rather high today, which argues, I believe, for another bounce...

Friday, August 15, 2008

$NDX and $NASI and the $SPX





Little changed from yesterday, I have added a slightly different view of the $SPX (the one from yesterday is still valid, it also shows an overhanging blue trendline), showing it's proximity to a 1.00 node even as the $NDX approaches a Crossover of it's main trendlines within 1 trading day of the $SPX hitting that 1.00 node.....

Notice I have updated the $NASI chart. The green up bars have caught up with the upper down-sloping purple line, and by this criteria, the top could happen at any time, although I'm betting it's towards the 22nd through 26th, as I have said...

One other possible scenario is that we have reached a top Friday, spend some time dropping away from the upper daily Bollinger Band (remember, a bunch of Fibonacci ratios line up on Monday, the 18th), and spend the end of this coming week or first part of the following week retesting the same level at the upper Bollinger Band...before we start the autumn decline...

Thursday, August 14, 2008

$NDX and $SPX on 8-14-08




$NDX is poking it's head above the strong blue resistance line..along with daily indicators showing a rather overbought condition...This doesn't look sustainable.

For the $SPX the 11th of August did indeed turn out to be a short term top, as the numbers seemed to indicate.

Tuesday, August 12, 2008

Watching oil prices...



One thing to watch in the equity markets is the oil price. Here you can see the oil price descending close to a 1 year trendline. A bounce off of this line, though a short term thing, could psychologically impact the stock markets in a negative way. I am wondering if it bounces on or around the 25th....

Monday, August 11, 2008

Another piece of evidence...the breadth indicator $NASI...



Count in your mind how many green bars (after the current short one extends as this week progresses) will get to the top down-sloping purple line. I get one, personally. So I can see the rest of this week and another week to the top is a reasonable estimate...So the 25th, (+ or - 1 trading day) doesn't seem to far out of line...

Today's charts...




We may have hit a short term top today..certainly the candlestick for the $NDX (in particular) was consistent with that. Also put/call and $trin are consistent with a minor top. As seen on the $NDX chart, we reached up today and hit the blue trendline (only on that index), and backed off immediately...

Now what?

One scenario is we slide until the 18th, and then climb back up to the 25th or so (and make the final top).

That is only my speculation, don't become to strongly attached to it. Tomorrow is going to tell us a lot...

Saturday, August 9, 2008

Some convergence between August 22-26..

Digging deeper into the $SPX and $NDX charts I posted earlier, there is a major node (1.0) on the $SPX, and a major Crossover on the $NDX, both happen in the range of 8/22/08 (Friday) through 8/26/08 (Tuesday). This could be the final top before all hell breaks loose...and the bear comes back in force...Keep these dates in mind...

Friday, August 8, 2008

$NDX and $SPX charts





Note the heavy blue downsloping trendline(s), these are tough resistance and there's some chance the rally could stop at these next week sometime...

Also on the $NDX chart you can see the purple and blue heavy trendlines are near crossing...this sometimes also portends a trend change and could stop the rally....particularily if the price action strikes the heavy blue line at the same time the purple line hits it as well (although the day of their crossing may have this effect without in fact being touched by price) ...in any event, watch $Trin and $CPC values as the blue trendline is hit and slightly penetrated..that should tell us if these lines will be the top...

P.S. the Crossover occurs around the 22nd of August..

Wednesday, August 6, 2008

$NDX and $SPX charts




As you can see the markets have done what I said they would do, which is chop around without much progress...I haven't posted these charts for a few days because they're so boring right now...That will change however...

Thought I would add that we will lose steam on this rally, but it's probably a couple of weeks away. Not that it has that much steam now, mind you...

Oil stocks recovering...

After a false start a few days ago, the oils seem to be moving up now...The breadth indicator for the oils, $BPENER made a new low after yesterday's close, deep in oversold territory, even as the oils firmed up after the Fed non-announcement in the afternoon. There's still a chance for a pullback, but as of 9:30 CST, things look stronger....

Monday, August 4, 2008

How I see the Oil Markets long term...



Most of the corrections in the oil markets have been 50% or so, and rested on old tops for support...Thus this simple projection...Oil production didn't really peak and start falling in 1999, but that's the point where demand started to outrun supply, which is an early warning of flattening oil production...

The anticipated bottom in the price of crude on this chart historically coincided with a gasoline price in the range of $2.15 to $2.50 a gallon...I don't know and even doubt gasoline will fall that far, but we'll see....Either way, the price break will just be the calm before a much larger storm...

Energy had rough ride today...




Like you all didn't notice that....Anyway the Bullish percent index which roared from oversold to "buy" territory last week (from below 20 at the bottom to over 30 is the general rule for that on P&F charts), collapsed today with prices back to it's starting point. The good news is the energy markets are still oversold. The bad news is that it has undone it's buy signal. Generally speaking one wouldn't expect this index to stay oversold real long without a more sustainable rally. Truth is though, it _could_ go down a bit more before it does so...Use your judgement here...

Another factor is the tropical storm Edouard, moving through the oil patch for the next couple of days...

P.S. I have added a chart from BigCharts showing one of their little known volatility indicators applied against Conoco Phillips, as a representative oil stock, and you can see the "slow" volatility indicator is showing readings consistent with a bottom...