Displaced Moving Average

It was bound to happen: after the Tuesday "winning" streak was lost 8 days ago on the 21st unlucky week, it was the turn of the "BTFD mentality" that had prevented a 3-day losing streak in the Dow Jones since December. And while today's selling was still somewhat contained, it did not prevent the DJIA from closing below the psychological 15,000 support level, driven according to some, by the breach in the 200DMA of the USD index.

The Analytics Group of IIROC performed a Trading Review and Analysis of High Frequency Trading on Canadian equity markets.  IIROC uses a methodology to identify user IDs exhibiting high order-to-trade ratios, or HOT User IDs, and covers the period from August 1, 2011 to October 31, 2011.

Another session in which the market continues to be "cautiously optimistic" about Europe, but is confused about Cyprus which keeps sending the wrong signals: in the aftermath of the Diesel-Boom fiasco, the announcement that the preciously announced reopening of banks was also subsequently "retracted" and pushed back to at least Thursday, did little to soothe fears that anyone in Europe has any idea what they are doing. Additional confusion comes from the fact that the Chairman of the Bank of Cyprus moments ago submitted his resignation: recall that this is the bank that is supposed to survive, unlike its unluckier Laiki competitor which was made into a sacrificial lamb. This confusion has so far prevented the arrival of the traditional post-Europe open ramp, as the EURUSD is locked in a range below its 200 DMA and it is unclear what if anything can push it higher, despite the Yen increasingly becoming the funding currency of choice.

Slowly things in Europe are starting to go bump in the night again, with the EURUSD down some 150 pips from Friday's multi-year 1.37 high, Spanish bond yields spiking 20 bps to over 5.41%, back over the declining 50 DMA, Italian BTPs getting slammed up some 10 bps to 4.42%, as both Spanish and Italian stocks are sharply down on the day, by 1.2% and 1.9% respectively, following yet another Monte Paschi halt lower earlier in trading. The reason goalseeked by the media for today's weakness is signs of upcoming "political turmoil", namely the escalating Monte Paschi incident out of Italy, which we have been following closely, as well as the Spanish graft scandal, in which the ruling PP party and Mariano Rajoy have been implicated in massive kickbacks, and which may cost Rajoy his leadership at this pace. Of course, none of the data above is new, and neither is France's Moscivi repeating for the second time in a week that the EUR has risen far too high, and to call it catalytic is very naive, but it merely goes to show how the manipulated market decides when and if to actually follow the newsflow. As a result, US futures are pointing to a mildly lower opening, which however may reverse quickly once today's $2.75-$3.5 billion POMO kicks in. Of course, if the Italian political turmoil drags Draghi further into the mud, all bets are suddenly off about Europe being "fixed."

As we recently noted, the US Macro picture is considerably less sanguine than every talking head would have you believe. Not only are earnings for Q4 coming in notably weak, but the top-down macro picture is its worst in almost five months - and turned negative this week. Of course, the fact that our 'market' is dislocated from any sense of reality will come as no surprise to anyone; but, the chart below provides some, perhaps useful, insight into how to trade this disconnect (and its inevitable convergence). To add a little more impetus to this decision, the past two weeks have seen the US macro picture drop at its fastest rate since June 2011 - right before the last debt-ceiling debate, which was followed by a quite notable decline in stocks.

Ironically, the very success of stock market manipulation only thins the market of legitimate participants and thus increases the probability that risk that has been suppressed for years will erupt uncontrollably. That the stock market is manipulated is no longer in question. One explicit goal in the Fed's zero-interest rate policy (ZIRP) is to drive capital into risk assets such as stocks. That is a first-order, transparent policy of manipulation, i.e. a centrally managed policy aimed at managing markets to meet a key central-planning goal: creating an illusion of prosperity via an elevated stock market and the resultant "wealth effect" for the 10% who own enough stocks to matter. Indirect manipulation is hidden from public view lest the rigging of the market taint the perception that a rising market is "proof" that Federal Reserve and Administration policies are "succeeding." Indirect manipulation is achieved via Federal Reserve quantitative easing operations, unlimited liquidity and lines of credit to fund bank speculations and masked buying of market futures. This multilevel manipulation creates a Boolean either/or for any Bear market: either it is a planned "panic" that profits the banks or a systemic failure of the orchestrated campaign of market manipulation.

More exiting than Christmas!

There are still plenty of opportunities out there.

No politics, no "death crosses" - just simple fundamentals.

What a roundtrip! After starting off November with a bang, and after nearly retracing all October losses in the aftermath of the NFP headfake in less than 2 trading sessions, the S&P futures literally imploded, and dropped 23 points from the intraday high, the same distance traveled as it crossed yesterday, only to the downside and on very strong volume for the second day in a row. While the 1400 support in ES is once again in play (ES closed literally on the lows of the session at 1405.5), as we suggested earlier, the far more ominous news is that the AAPL bubble appears to have popped (but, but, it is so cheap on forward multiple basis: guess what - forward multiples are based on forward earnings, which may very well never materialize! and thanks to the dividend, not even AAPL's cash hoard is the bastion it one was) and is now close to entering bear market territory, down just shy of 20% from its all time highs of $705.07 hit on September 12. Now with the 200 DMA taken out, the next support is the 20% retracement from the high which is at $564. After that it is freefall for a long time as a very deep gap needs filling. It is unclear just how much of the selling was there to cause max pain for Dick Bove and Rochdale, for whom every tick lower in the stock means a bigger margin call.Finally, news hitting literally seconds ago that MSFT may be launching its own phone if its partner strategy falters, means there go even more margins.

Moments ago AAPL broke the 200 DMA. Whether or not this was due to the earlier news from Rochdale getting caught with its pants down, and supposedly losing tons of money due to a rogue trader "buying" the stock as its proceeded to tumble from its all time highs less then 45 days ago (during which time it has lost more than 10 years worth of dividends in market cap), is unclear. What is quite clear, is the moment when the general market realized what had just happened. Sure enough, the jobs number came and want, and ES largely faded that move in under an hour. It remains to be seen if a technical indicator for the world's most widely held stock is more important to the general stock market than how many 60 year old workers the US economy added in October. Oh, and as for that whole iPad mini launch spectacle? Sorry. Time for the iPad Mini Magnum launch... or maybe even the maxiPad.

No celebrations for you. 

Sounds easier than it is.

Cautiously optimistic. Yes, really. 

Caution is the word of the day.