Friday on X (Twitter) I noted that the 3-day pullback for SPX would be the 1st one since early January. SPX had gone 48 days since the last time it had a 3-day pullback. I looked back at other times SPX went at least 2 months without a 3-day pullback, and examined performance after it finally arrived. This can be seen in the table below. Results over the next 1-5 days are compelling, and suggest a strong bullish tendency. Traders may want to keep this in mind when setting their short-term market bias ..read more

I was honored to be interviewed by Brian McAboy last week on the Consistent Profits Podcast. You can find it using the link below. It is also available on all the typical podcast platforms. Consistent Profits Podcast episode 55 – Rob Hanna I hope you enjoy it! Note you can also find Brian on X. His handle is @TheTraderBrian ..read more

Joe Biden will be giving his State of the Union Address tonight, and people are wondering how his talk might impact the market over the next several days. I have looked at performance following State of the Union before and decided to update that research today. The data table below looks back to 1982. There were a few instances, such as 2001 and 2009 where the speech was not an official “State of the Union”, but was delivered under a different name. I have included those speeches in the results as well. The stats do not suggest much of an edge. But the profit curves seem to tell a more inter ..read more

Especially notable about Friday’s action was that the Quantifiable Edges Capitulative Breadth Indicator (CBI) rose to 11. This is the highest level it has been at since September of 2022. Below is a quick look at CBI readings over the last 2 years. I have shown dotted lines each time that it reached as high as 9. I have generally viewed 10+ as strongly bullish over the years. I have also shown in the past that readings of 11 or higher have been a bullish intermediate-term indication. This can be seen in the study below. Looking out over the next several weeks, the stats are (almost) all very ..read more

Note: This article is a reprint. It first appeared on 12/15 at the Capital Advisors 360 blog. QQQ, on a dividend-adjust basis, is now up over 52% on the year and just made new highs. This can be seen in the monthly chart below. Meanwhile, TQQQ, which is the 3x version of QQQ, is up over 185% ytd (through 12/13/23). That’s a huge run, and on the surface it would seem to be an enticing long-term holding. But here is the TQQQ chart. As you can see, TQQQ is still nearly 46% below its all-time (dividend-adjusted) high of $90.08. To get back to a new high, it is going to need to make another 85 ..read more

Wednesday is a Fed Day. Fed Days have historically shown an upside tendency. I have documented this tendency in great detail over the years. A higher close today would not be the most favorable Fed Day setup. A big reason for this is that it would mark a 20-day high close. Fed Day bullishness has often occurred when a Fed announcement has helped to alleviate market stress. When the market closes at a 20-day high, it typically means there isn’t a lot of worry present. Under these circumstances, the upside inclination has also not been present. This can be seen in the study below. Neither the s ..read more

This year we have seen strong upward momentum heading into Thanksgiving, with SPX closing at a new intermediate-term high on Wednesday. I decided to look back at other times SPX closed at a 50-day high on the day before Thanksgiving. Results over the next 1-3 days appear quite bearish. I will note that there were a couple instances that occurred just prior to the sample set that were mildly positive over the 2-day period. But the poor performance over the last 30 years (9 instances) is notable and interesting. Below is the list of instances. Traders may want to take this under consideration ..read more

On Thursday November 16th (and again on Monday) I will provide followers with a webinar on “Enhanced Portfolio Construction”. I will be discussing usage of diversification, leverage, and margin, and how I incorporate them into portfolios for my clients.   On Thursday 11/16 at 1pm EST, and then again Monday the 20th at noon I will be hosting this special free webinar. Details can be found below. Date and time: 11/16/23 at 1pm (Eastern Time) & again 11/20/2023 – noon (Eastern Time) If you would like a link to the recording of the webinar, simply register here. Duration: 3 ..read more

This past week was the 4th week in a row that the SPX declined. It is quite unusual to see SPX close down for 4 weeks in a row, but still remain above its 40-week moving average. Below is a look at other times since 1975 that this action has occurred. These results are suggestive of an upside edge over the next several weeks. Below I have listed all 15 non-overlapping instances using a 10-week exit strategy. The 2011 instance did not work out at all. Most everything else looks encouraging. Based on this narrow look, it appears we are reaching a point where an SPX rally might be expected in t ..read more

One particularly notable indicator change that occurred at the close on Friday is that out NASDAQ/SPX Relative Leadership indicator flipped so that it is now showing the SPX as leading and the NASDAQ as lagging. This can be seen in the chart below. Whenever the solid (green/red) line is above the blue dashed line that means the NASDAQ is leading. When it drops below (and turns red as it is about to do), that means the NASDAQ is lagging the SPX. The market has performed substantially better over the years when the NASDAQ has been leading. You can see in the chart above that the NASDAQ has been ..read more