For some time we have talked about 2 specific extremes in the S&P 500: Market Volatility & Investor Sentiment. But as a confluence of 3 key themes have transpired to reveal a more complex and dynamic risk environment so far in 2018 we are steadily seeing a reset of these stock market…
The equity market rallied for the second week in a row last week with the S&P 500 Index gaining more than 50 basis points. This week has started on a similar note for U.S. equities. The popular stock market averages have recovered more than 50% of the February correction. Investor…
Most traders worth their salt have used, or at least heard of covered calls. Covered calls are really easy to implement and are a proven long-term strategy. However, for some, the costs of implementing this strategy can be prohibitive. For a covered call trade, the investor needs to purchase 100…
Getting paid while you wait, I like the sound of that. A cash secured put is a conservative options strategy that can be used to purchase a stock for lower than the current price. Let’s say you’re happy to buy Apple (AAPL) at $173. You’re definitely going to be happy…
The much awaited and widely predicted correction (that no one really ended up predicting) has turned 2 weeks old now, and driven the S&P 500 down almost -12% top to bottom. So it’s timely to take a snapshot of where market sentiment is sitting across a number of key indicators…
THE BIG PICTURE Investors are operating in a volatile stock market climate for the first time in many months. And the reality of a stock market correction (whether brief or intermediate term) is setting in. The markets are set to rally for a second day in a row, and there…
This is an Intermarket Analysis chart review that I provided to my fishing club members this past weekend which graphically represents relationships (strong and weak) that can foretell how the currents are moving to better identify how stocks/sectors/indices will move! You can see my last Intermarket Chart Attack here. Note my caption was “careful”…
Investors read a lot about the persistence of low volatility in the markets throughout 2017. And just 3 trading days into 2018 and volatility is losing once more, slipping from 11.04 to 9.22. Market volatility remains suppressed with the VIX Index trading near the 9 handle. It’s good to note, however,…
The story of volatility has been very one-sided of late. There’s been low volatility despite various geopolitical headlines which in the past would have sparked a move lower for the stock market. So what’s going on? And are there other ways to assess risk for the equity markets? Despite low…
Last Wednesday, iShares 20+ year Treasury bond ETF (TLT) got rejected at the underside of a broken trend line from March this year. The intraday high of 128.23 in that session was hit well outside the daily upper Bollinger band. In the next session, the ETF dropped 0.8 percent (see…