Blog: Market Analysis

Stocks declined after January’s producer price index, which is another inflation gauge, increased by 0.7% in the month, higher than the expected 0.4%.

This follows reports that January’s consumer price index and retail sales were both higher than anticipated, suggesting that the Federal Reserve may need to do more to curb inflation.

In addition, initial jobless claims unexpectedly dropped in the week ending Feb. 11, according to the Labor Department’s report.

The decline in jobless claims indicates a tight labor market, while comments from Federal Reserve Presidents James Bullard and Loretta Mester advocating for an interest rate hike in March also weighed on stocks.

Investors should be aware that inflation may not return to normal levels quickly, which could result in more volatility in the market.

Stay tuned for real-time trading opportunities in our “Daily Trading Signals” Telegram channel!

[Photo: Khujand, Tajikistan – See my full travel photo log!]

For our weekly market wrap, we go through some of the trade calls and analysis from last week, which gives us valuable insights for the week ahead.

We cover 3 main markets with a total of 200+ counters, so we will never run out of trading opportunities:

Forex, CFDs, commodities, bonds
US stocks, ETFs, global stock indices
Cryptocurrencies, crypto indices

By covering a broad range of markets, we can focus our attention (and capital) on whichever market currently gives the best returns.

Click here to receive all these signals in real-time for only $67 a month! You will get several signals a day, and even taking just 1 trade the whole month can easily cover the fee, so what are you waiting for?

Weekly Market Outlook Video

Weekly Market Outlook (12 February 2023)

After December’s inflation data was adjusted upwards, the market has been extra jittery, so next week’s CPI date release on Tuesday is going to have a very large significance on the stance of the Fed.

Portfolio Highlights

Weekly Portfolio Updates (12 February 2023)

Not much changes in allocation since last week.

Forex & Commodities Market Highlights

ERUCAD – Following up on this trade, congrats to all those who followed and shorted! The profit is currently about 200+ pips. 💰🔥💪🏻

The current price momentum looks very strong, and has a good chance of going further.

EURCHF – After the false breakout, the bears are back in control. This looks like a good shorting opportunity.

NZDCAD – Took longer than expected, but it finally hit the TP for about 300+ pips profit! 💰🔥💪🏻

USDSGD – Formed a small bull flag, which means good chance of another bullish leg.

Congrats to those who took this rebound trade! 💰🔥💪🏻

Gold (XAUUSD) – Following up on Gold, this is how it could play out. Wait for a good pullback to take a low risk short with the tight stop.

Stock & Bond Market Highlights

Wow the 6-month T-bills have hit 5% returns. This means the expected terminal rate of interest rates have gone up.

This was the smallest 12-month increase since the period ending October 2021.

Dow closes 400 points lower as hot inflation report, comments from Fed’s Bullard raise rate hike fears.

Cryptocurrency Highlights

Ethereum (ETHUSD) – How it breaks out of this most recent consolidation will most likely determine its fate for the rest of the year.

Click here to receive all these signals in real-time for only $67 a month! You will get several signals a day, and even taking just 1 trade the whole month can easily cover the fee, so what are you waiting for?

Good luck, and may next week bring more excellent profits!

Spencer is an avid globetrotter who achieved financial freedom in his 20s, while trading & teaching across 70+ countries. As a former professional trader in private equity and proprietary funds, he has over 15 years of market experience, and has been featured on more than 20 occasions in the media.

Weekly Market Wrap: Market Rebound is Currently Overbought?

The United States is considering sanctions on Chinese firms for their involvement in Iran’s surveillance buildup.

Despite international sanctions, Chinese state-owned companies have been shipping navigation equipment and jamming technology to Russian government-owned companies.

The United States and Brazil are joining India’s efforts to increase demand for biofuels.

Elon Musk was found not liable in a trial over his tweets about taking Tesla private, and the Federal Trade Commission is preparing a potential antitrust suit against Amazon.

Disney plans to cut 7,000 jobs and $5.5 billion in costs. Commodity trader Trafigura faces a $577 million loss after uncovering nickel fraud.

Adani plans to repay a $1.1 billion loan, while the United Kingdom’s National Health Service is in crisis due to budget cuts and the impact of Covid-19.

Chinese tech giant Alibaba is working on a rival to OpenAI’s ChatGPT.

Apple is promoting its high-end iPhones and there are signs that a stronger rebound in China will boost oil prices.

Stay tuned for more real-time updates in our “Daily Trading Signals” Telegram channel!

[Photo: Fann Mountains, Tajikistan – See my full travel photo log!]

For our weekly market wrap, we go through some of the trade calls and analysis from last week, which gives us valuable insights for the week ahead.

We cover 3 main markets with a total of 200+ counters, so we will never run out of trading opportunities:

Forex, CFDs, commodities, bonds
US stocks, ETFs, global stock indices
Cryptocurrencies, crypto indices

By covering a broad range of markets, we can focus our attention (and capital) on whichever market currently gives the best returns.

Click here to receive all these signals in real-time for only $67 a month! You will get several signals a day, and even taking just 1 trade the whole month can easily cover the fee, so what are you waiting for?

Weekly Market Outlook Video

Weekly Market Outlook (05 February 2023)

Explained more about the 4 main data points:
📌 Interest rates (FOMC)
📌 Jobs data (NFP)
📌 Inflation (CPI)
📌 Company earnings

Portfolio Highlights

Weekly Portfolio Updates (05 February 2023)

Added the breakdown for stocks.

Positive numbers are net long and negative numbers are net short. I have a mix of both to provide some hedging.

Forex & Commodities Market Highlights

AUDCAD – Following up, congrats to all those who took this trade, it is now deeply in the money! 💰🔥💪🏻

CADJPY – Watch to see if any setups develop here.

CHFJPY – Watch to see if any setups develop here.

USDSGD (weekly chart) – Rebound off strong support after heading into oversold zone on the weekly chart.

Good reward/risk ratio to go long here.

Gold (XAUUSD) – Strong selldown after the recent NFP jobs report, and the short-term momentum has swung to the bearish side.

Not advisable to go long now, as there might be a second leg of selldown.

Stock & Bond Market Highlights

Apple (AAPL) – After its poor earnings last week, the fundamentals show a decline in revenue for the first time in many years.

Can consider taking a medium/long-term short position and scale in.

NASDAQ 100 (US100) – Currently in the overbought zone based on RSI, so it is not a good time to be buying now.

Will be expecting some correction or pullback next week.

Inflation Forecasts 2023

The chart above shows the TMC’s Market Regime Scrutinizer.

It measures the market-implied odds assigned to a US recession, soft landing or strong growth regime ahead.
It is derived by scrutinizing option markets in fixed income, equity, and currencies and blending the resulting market-implied probabilities in this flagship TMC indicator.

Look for stocks to lose 30% from here, says strategist David Rosenberg. And don’t even think about turning bullish until 2024.

Click here to receive all these signals in real-time for only $67 a month! You will get several signals a day, and even taking just 1 trade the whole month can easily cover the fee, so what are you waiting for?

Good luck, and may next week bring more excellent profits!

Weekly Market Wrap: Rate Hikes, Big Tech Earnings, Crypto Surge!

In last week’s NFP (non-farm payroll) report, the US added 517,000 jobs in January, higher than expected and pushing the unemployment rate down to 3.4%, its lowest since 1969.

Job growth was revised higher for November and December, adding an additional 71,000 jobs.

The strong job growth may not be welcomed by the Federal Reserve, which is looking to slow job gains and wage growth to reduce inflation and pause its interest rate hike campaign.

The Federal Reserve raised its interest rate target by 0.25% last week, and plans to continue raising rates with the aim of bringing inflation down to 2%.

However, investors believe the Fed may cut rates back to current levels by the end of next year.

The recent surge in crypto saw a rebound in Bitcoin and Ether by 51% and 47% respectively.

The shift in trading patterns shows a pullback from retail investors and a rise in the influence of institutions such as hedge funds.

The Big Tech Earnings Season saw a decline in revenue growth compared to 2021 with combined growth of only 7% for Apple, Amazon, Alphabet, Microsoft, and Facebook, compared to 28% in 2021.

The companies are engaged in significant headcount reductions, costing more than 50,000 jobs.

The time for a correction or pullback may be as soon as next week.

Stay tuned for more real-time updates in our “Daily Trading Signals” Telegram channel!

[Photo: Bukhara, Uzbekistan – See my full travel photo log!]

For our weekly market wrap, we go through some of the trade calls and analysis from last week, which gives us valuable insights for the week ahead.

We cover 3 main markets with a total of 200+ counters, so we will never run out of trading opportunities:

Forex, CFDs, commodities, bonds
US stocks, ETFs, global stock indices
Cryptocurrencies, crypto indices

By covering a broad range of markets, we can focus our attention (and capital) on whichever market currently gives the best returns.

Click here to receive all these signals in real-time for only $67 a month! You will get several signals a day, and even taking just 1 trade the whole month can easily cover the fee, so what are you waiting for?

Weekly Market Outlook Video

Weekly Market Outlook (29 January 2023)

📌 Wednesday: FOMC
📌 Friday: NFP

Portfolio Highlights

Weekly Portfolio Updates (29 January 2023)

Not much changes, since the market has not moved much.

Forex & Commodities Market Highlights

AUDCAD – rebounding off strong resistance, good for a short trade with SL above the prior swing high.

AUDCHF – Also another short trade after running into strong resistance.

Stock & Bond Market Highlights

Stock sector comparisons for 2022

The Federal Reserve raised rates. Chair Powell says it’s ‘premature’ to declare victory against inflation.

In 2007. the Fed and major banks were predicting a soft landing. We all know how that turned out. Will this time be different?

Wow quite a large deviation from expectations!

Wonder if this will lead to a more aggressive stance on rate hikes.

Traders have never been this bearish on Treasuries.

Crypto Market Highlights

ETHUSD Crossing 1694.81
Break swing high

(Charts posted in Telegram channel)

Click here to receive all these signals in real-time for only $67 a month! You will get several signals a day, and even taking just 1 trade the whole month can easily cover the fee, so what are you waiting for?

Good luck, and may next week bring more excellent profits!

Fed Hikes Rates by 0.25%: What’s Next for the Markets?

The Federal Reserve recently raised its interest rates by a quarter point, signaling that more rate increases are on the horizon.

Despite this stance, investors are betting on only one more quarter-point increase, with some suggesting that the Fed may even cut its target range back to its current level by the end of next year.

This disconnect between the Fed’s message and what investors believe it will do poses a problem, as a drop in long-term interest rates and a stock market rally could hamper the Fed’s efforts to control inflation.

The Fed’s past behavior is partly to blame for this disconnect, as in previous cycles, it has tended to start cutting rates shortly after it finished raising them.

However, the Fed’s actions will depend on inflation and employment in the coming months.

There is a risk that investors may see the central bank’s hawkish talk as mere jawboning and that the Fed itself doesn’t believe its own message.

Despite the Fed’s recent rate hike, the S&P 500 and Nasdaq Composite closed 1.1% and 2% higher, respectively.

The stock market has been rallying since October 2022, with the S&P 500 up 17% since then and 8% since the start of the year.

There are conflicting opinions among experts on what this means for the future of the market.

Michael Burry predicts a second round of inflation spike when the Fed cuts interest rates again, while Nassim Taleb believes that the next 15 years will be harder than the previous 15 due to higher interest rates.

On the other hand, Mark Spitznagel predicts a major market crash as bad as the Great Depression.

A deeper market crash may be possible, but it is not visible at this point in time.

Historically, US midterms have resulted in positive S&P 500 performance, with a 7.3% increase after three months, a 15.1% increase after six months, and a 16.3% increase after 12 months.

Additionally, a recession is not correlated with S&P 500 performance and stock market performance after a recession is usually bullish.

The Fed has hiked rates by 450 basis points in just 10 months, far more than what was initially expected.

Ongoing rate increases will be necessary to get inflation back to the 2% target over time, with at least two more rate hikes projected in the future.

If the economy performs as expected, there will be no rate cuts this year.

The Chairman of the Fed, Powell, emphasized that there is still more work to be done with respect to inflation control and monetary policy.

The risk of doing too little is difficult to manage, while over-tightening can be addressed with available tools.

The labor market remains extremely tight, and reducing inflation is likely to require a period of below-trend growth and softening of labor market conditions.

Financial conditions have been loosening since mid-October after tightening earlier in the year, and the Fed is cautious about declaring victory in controlling inflation, viewing the job as ongoing.

Weekly Market Wrap: Is this Finally a New Bull Market?

Investors’ views on inflation, recession risk, and monetary policy were fickle throughout much of 2022.

Recently, a positive bias has emerged, reflected in the downward shift in interest rate expectations and upward move in securities prices since mid-October.

Investors appear to be interpreting economic data as evidence that a dovish pivot (Fed stopping interest rate hikes and possibly cutting them) is imminent.

Bad news (slowing job growth, dismal economic survey data, falling property values, negative real wage growth) is seen as good news when viewed through the lens of inflation and monetary policy.

But what is missing in this discussion is the real economy and what may have to happen to it for this market narrative to play out.

The dovish pivot narrative is driven by the expectation that U.S. inflation will continue to decline at a fairly rapid rate.

However, it’s also noteworthy that the Fed’s success in slowing inflation thus far has occurred while China, the world’s second-largest economy, has been hampered by pandemic-related restrictions.

The Fed is typically prone to keeping policy either too tight or too loose for too long.

Fed officials only have to look back at “the great inflation” of 1965 to 1982 to see what can happen when policy is loosened too quickly.

The market’s optimism could make it more likely that the Fed keeps tightening policy.

So, all things considered, the risk of over-tightening seems to be higher than the likelihood of a premature pivot.

What would cause the Fed to make a significant shift in policy?

Most likely a meaningful recession or market crisis – risks that aren’t being reflected in today’s earnings expectations or credit spreads.

Investors are focusing far more on what negative economic data means for interest rates than the potential implications for the real economy.

Join our “Daily Trading Signals” for real-time trading opportunities!

[Photo: Lake Aydarkul, Uzbekistan – See my full travel photo log!]

For our weekly market wrap, we go through some of the trade calls and analysis from last week, which gives us valuable insights for the week ahead.

We cover 3 main markets with a total of 200+ counters, so we will never run out of trading opportunities:

Forex, CFDs, commodities, bonds
US stocks, ETFs, global stock indices
Cryptocurrencies, crypto indices

By covering a broad range of markets, we can focus our attention (and capital) on whichever market currently gives the best returns.

Click here to receive all these signals in real-time for only $67 a month! You will get several signals a day, and even taking just 1 trade the whole month can easily cover the fee, so what are you waiting for?

Weekly Market Outlook Video

Weekly Market Outlook (22 January 2023)

CNY week will see slow markets
Watch out for tech layoffs and earnings

Portfolio Highlights

Weekly Portfolio Updates (22 January 2023)

Not much changes, since the market has not moved much.

Forex & Commodities Market Highlights

AUDCHF – Excellent short entry, and trade is now in the money. Can consider trailing SL to breakeven to reduce risk.

EURAUD – Great entry near the support level, and the trade is now in the money. Can continue to hold for more profits since the trend is still bullish.

EURCHF – Excellent entry near support, after pulling back from an ascending triangle breakout.

USDJPY (H4 chart) – Congrats to those who managed catch this short!

Gold (XAUUSD) – Still going strong, after some small profit-taking. I have circled the previous buying/consolidation points.

Probably heading up to test the previous swing highs.

The Periodic Table of Commodities Returns 2022

Stock & Bond Market Highlights

S&P 500 (US500) – The major trendline is back in play, after the recent rally failed to break past it.

If it takes out the previous swing low (~3750), then the bears will start stepping in full force and we will probably see new lows.

Now that we are more or less certain that inflation is coming down, the next major concern is slowing growth and worse company earnings.

S&P 500 Calendar Year Returns: 1928-2022

200,000+ laid off in tech since the beginning of 2022. And for no reason other than “everyone else is doing it”.

Tech workers need a union.

Crypto Market Highlights

Bitcoin (BTCUSD) – After an impressive rally the last few weeks, prices are now consolidating.

If prices can break out of the small bull flag, this could spark more buyers coming in and start an uptrend.

However, if volumes falter, then traders could end up taking the chance to dump their holdings on this rally.

Click here to receive all these signals in real-time for only $67 a month! You will get several signals a day, and even taking just 1 trade the whole month can easily cover the fee, so what are you waiting for?

Good luck, and may next week bring more excellent profits!