All the way back to late November 2009, to find a bar that’s remotely similar to the one just posted last week.
Even then, there are key differences.
The reversal during the week of November 30th, 2009 was after a breakout and run-up of about 20%; from the resistance/support area around GLD, @ 100.
Last week’s bar was within a trading range not outside it. Also, we had to wait until this morning’s open to get a new weekly low.
Volume (blow-off) characteristics were similar:
Week-ending 11/30/09, volume 93% higher than the week before; week-ending 3/11/22, volume 43% higher than the week before.
GLD, Weekly Chart
The chart gives us a feel for just how far back we have to go to find similar price action.
The prior update said at this juncture, longer term momentum indicators are pointing higher. Thus, suggesting there will be some kind of upward test either today or this week (Fed meeting?).
Junior Miners GDXJ, Weekly
Earlier this month, this post said to expect GDXJ, to up-thrust in the 48 – 50, area.
That does not guarantee a downside reversal. It just shows us price action repeats these behaviors; doing so for decades, if not hundreds of years.
What happens now?
Longer term momentum indicators point higher and give the bias to the upside.
However, something that can be done is to use that upward bias to position short at the lowest risk possible (not advice, not a recommendation).
Positioning via JDST
Junior Miners GDXJ, could come back to test the trendline break shown below starting today, through Wednesday.
If it does, the difference between being correct (about going short) and continued bull side action may be narrowed as much as possible (not advice, not a recommendation).
If that happens, the JDST stop will be very tight.
Note: Posts on this site are for education purposes only. They provide one firm’s insight on the markets. Not investment advice. See additional disclaimer here.
One hour, and fifteen minutes after this post was released, gold and the miners topped-out.
Depending on the close for today, gold futures prices may post a weekly reversal bar.
If it happens, that’s an important nuance.
The prior reversal from all-time highs … back in early August of 2020, did not happen on weekly reversal bar or even a daily bar.
What does that mean or what could it mean?
Unlike last time where gold (GLD), hovered around its all-time highs for a couple of weeks, this time, it looks like it can’t even do that.
We’re at the danger point.
For the gold tracking fund GLD, the price to watch is Monday’s open at 184.45. Closing below that level, indicates trouble for the bulls.
Gold (GLD), Daily Chart
Twelve months of daily price action shows the build-up, to the blow-off.
Below, we have a ‘measured move’ target completed.
Then, we have a volume climax.
Changing of hands from strong to weak.
Such volume spikes typically indicate the potential for a long-term, sustained reversal.
Contrary View
This analysis isn’t contrary just to be contrary.
We’re looking for market truth. Meaning, ‘what’s the market saying about itself?’
Once that truth is found or at least probabilities identified, then it’s incorporated into a strategic plan.
Go-Forward Strategy
At this point, it’s more than obvious, food and the food supply, is literally going to be the choke-point.
As nations world-wide, scramble to secure reliable food sources, anything can happen. They can even resort to selling-off their gold reserves en-masse, to pay for the insane commodity prices.
Don’t think that can happen?
Well, oil futures couldn’t go negative either, right? Nickel couldn’t surge to record highs on the largest single-day jump ever, right?
London Metal Exchange (LME) would never cancel trades and fudge their numbers, right?
What couldn’t happen then, is likely to happen now.
There’s a chance gold will not post a weekly reversal at the end of this session (currently, 12:53 p.m., EST). If so, it holds open the probability for an upward test or series of tests in the coming week.
Note: Posts on this site are for education purposes only. They provide one firm’s insight on the markets. Not investment advice. See additional disclaimer here.
Momentum indicators are pointing higher for both gold and the miners … that does not mean it’s a buy (not advice, not a recommendation).
For both GDX, and GDXJ, they’re entering up-thrust (potential reversal) territory as discussed in a previous post.
It’s time to monitor the sector for potential exhaustion and change of momentum.
That momentum could take a while to bleed-off … being patient is just one requirement for successful speculation.
Summary
From the panic, you would think no one’s ever seen a down market. On top of that, we’re potentially just getting underway.
This is the exact environment where Wycoff analysis comes to the fore: ‘What’s the market saying about itself?’
That analysis says, gold and the miners could still push a bit higher but there are huge disconnects under the surface; not the least of which, silver’s also not confirming the move.
Note: Posts on this site are for education purposes only. They provide one firm’s insight on the markets. Not investment advice. See additional disclaimer here.
The usual suspects, ‘geopolitical tensions‘, are being trotted out as the reason for gold’s latest breakout move.
Junior Miners GDXJ, have pushed past the trendline highlighted in the last report, negating the ‘short-squeeze’ analysis … for now.
So, gold’s up, markets are down, and bonds are up … all in an apparent ‘flight to safety’.
To the casual observer, it might look like pandemonium.
Let’s step back and let the price action speak for itself. However, we’re going to approach it differently this time.
The charts below of GLD, show a trend-line study that’s unbiased … the lines are there. We’ll let them tell us what’s the next likely outcome.
Gold (GLD) Weekly Chart:
First, clean and un-marked
The objective is to look at this price action and see if there are relationships not immediately discernable.
How about this one:
Looks like there’s some type of ‘axis’ trend line.
Price action’s been oscillating around this line for about two years.
What about this one:
Let’s take that last trend line and see if there’s a trading channel of some type:
Ruh, Roh Scooby … looks like there might be trouble ahead for the rabid bulls; at least temporarily.
How about putting the first axis line back in and see what we have:
Zoom in on the ‘confluence’ area below.
Valid Or Not
The big question is, if these lines are ‘in effect’.
That is, we’ll have to watch subsequent price action to see if the market’s respecting these lines … enough to precipitate a reversal.
This week’s action in GLD, has pushed past established resistance from mid-November, last year.
Doing so, has put GLD in Up-Thrust (potential reversal) position.
Momentum indicators, MACD, monthly, weekly and daily, are pointing higher.
Summary:
We’re between resistance and momentum.
Opposing forces.
Let’s throw in, major indices had their all-time highs between November last year, and January, this year; excluding biotech IBB, which peaked way back in August.
Mining sectors GDX and GDXJ, are a whole other story … their all-time highs were long ago; back in 2010 – 2011.
At the close, GDX is near up-thrust and GDXJ, is already in up-thrust position. We’ll cover that in a subsequent update.
Note: Posts on this site are for education purposes only. They provide one firm’s insight on the markets. Not investment advice. See additional disclaimer here.
With gold sector pundits bloviating, the ever-present challenge is to cut through the bilge and see what price action’s actually doing.
Stepping away for a few days, then taking another look at the charts, has yielded some potential insight into what’s really going on.
Junior Miners, GDXJ:
The first chart shows GDXJ, in the top panel with Force Index, in the lower.
Note the Force/Volume spikes … after the demand is satisfied, price collapses … at least on the first spike; we can’t say for sure the outcome of current action.
Price spikes and volume that subsequently collapse; the textbook definition of a short-squeeze.
There’s no real bullish demand or price would launch into a bull run.
The second chart highlights the areas in question.
The last chart gives one more clue that price may reverse from current levels.
Not only do we have a potential squeeze, but we’re also contacting an established trend line.
It looks like the squeeze is over. Volume has dropped significantly and price is up against established (trend) resistance.
Gold Higher, Miners Lower
Discussed many times, it (almost) doesn’t matter what gold is doing. It can go higher and yet the miners go lower.
We won’t know exactly why until it’s all over; one possible explanation’s that corporate collapse is already baked into the cake of the major equities …
Summary:
Remember their tagline, “We’re all in this together”.
So they are.
All major corporations implementing self-destruct (sustainability) policies … all of them doing it, ‘together’.
Note: Posts on this site are for education purposes only. They provide one firm’s insight on the markets. Not investment advice. See additional disclaimer here.
Even though technical conditions show we’re at least in a correction, if not outright reversal or collapse, record inflows for 2022, vs. 2021, present the herd-driven behavior of the public (and funds), to go long.
According to the link above, flows have been out of bonds and lesser performing equities, into equities that have gone down less.
In addition, you can see some of that flow (not addressed in the article) going into gold and the mining sector.
Stepping Back
Pulling away from charts and indicators for a moment, figuratively closing one’s eyes to get a ‘feel’ for what’s happening, it looks like the following:
We’re in a (potential) massive juggernaut reversal that’s been decades in the making; possibly having origins going all the way back to the ’87, crash, the ’95, bull market and then, repeated bubbles of 2000, ’07, and now.
At this point, it looks like the ‘average investor’ is doing the only thing they know how to do … that is, go long.
Those with at least some market knowledge, just got decisively whacked with their ‘put buying‘ strategy as the market has rallied strongly off the lows.
Pavlovian Panic
We’re witnessing the knee-jerk reactions of a public that’s been conditioned for decades, not to ‘think’, but only ‘do’.
Expect this type of behavior to go parabolic if the markets really do turn lower on a sustained, long-term basis.
Prechter has written extensively about crowds or the herd; especially in his text The Wave Principle of Human Social Behavior.
We can see this visceral behavior real-time, in other seemingly unrelated markets. Two examples below:
First, we had oil futures going negative for the first time in history; then we have LNG tanker rates going negative first time as well.
The model seems to be:
“Everybody wants it, and then, they don’t”.
The crowd runs to and fro, effectively leaderless.
With that said, one can make a case we’re just beginning, or already in an economic collapse; now being followed by the early stages of a market collapse.
Meanwhile, The Elephant Gets Bigger
Let’s not forget the massive elephant that’s just now getting so large, it can’t be ignored (time stamp 2:40).
Recall the example at this link … disparate crowds have a tendency to come to the same decision and modify behavior, all-at-once.
You have to wonder, when that crowd is going to simultaneously press the Sell, button.
Hit, In The SOXX
Unprecedented events are everywhere. That includes the massive, ‘never before seen‘, thrust lower in the SOXX.
The uptrend shown in the weekly chart of SOXX, has been decisively broken and with enormous volume.
The week ending Friday January 28th, saw 16.7-million shares traded … the most ever for the index (ETF).
More detail on trend break
Then, There’s Elliott Wave
Before the ‘Elliotticians’ get miffed by the previous (cookie cutter) comments, here’s this:
When this method works … it’s great.
It provides good projection areas and the useful ‘Fourth Wave of Lesser Degree’, targeting.
Note: A quick internet search for this Fourth Wave method (authored by Prechter) turns up nothing.
Logging onto ‘Club EWI‘, putting in ‘Fourth Wave’ has no items found.
One can try contacting Elliott Wave International, to request a copy of this targeting method. It may still be available (for a price).
The data used by this author to target the 4th wave retrace (shown below), is from a hard copy, dated, 1/8/2003. That information was excerpted from The Elliott Wave Theorist, July 9th, 2002.
First, the 2-Hour chart from Thursday’s update is repeated below with the ‘lesser degree’, added in magenta font:
Getting closer-in on the 4th-wave area below:
It’s subtle and difficult to spot. The price action congestion area is the ‘4th wave of lesser degree’.
Summary:
The previous update showed entry points for what is now SOXS-22-01 (not advice, not a recommendation).
Friday’s price action put this position well in the green; getting it to +24%, based on the close.
The table below are the ETFs being tracked along with the leveraged inverse fund tickers.
The percentage gain/loss, is for this past Friday’s action and shown for the inverse funds.
Obviously, the semiconductors were hit the hardest on Friday and so, SOXS, had the largest gain.
A good stop level for SOXS would naturally be Friday’s low (not advice not a recommendation). If we really are in an Elliott Wave 3, down … price action’s expected to continue its decline with haste.
Note: Posts on this site are for education purposes only. They provide one firm’s insight on the markets. Not investment advice. See additional disclaimer here.
This link to an article where lawmakers (using that term loosely) are attempting to limit the export of natural gas.
We’ve already discussed the likelihood of some type of corn or grain embargo as prices continue higher.
Now, we have a similar (limit export) event but in the energy sector.
Recall, the statement from that prior (corn) post:
“What we’re looking for here, is some kind of Jimmy Carter type stunt where corn exports are halted in the name of ‘national security’ or some such thing.”
And this, from the same post:
“Of course, if that happens, corn is likely to crash (like it did last time) if only temporarily.”
So, let’s take a look at what happened to natural gas (UNG), when our lawmaking geniuses proposed to limit exports.
Daily Chart Natural Gas, UNG:
So, when this type of announcement comes out, the market takes a major hit … just like it’s forecast to do if we get something similar in corn (not advice, not a recommendation).
Now, if the overall long-term objective, is to wipe-out the food supply, wouldn’t you want some kind of dry run to make sure markets are going to respond as expected?
So, let’s try natural gas first, shall we?
Remember that with corn, it will (if it happens) be different.
Because of the elevated fertilizer prices, a forced lowering of the corn market may be all that’s needed to make sure very little-to-no corn gets planted … and Voila!
For a reminder on just what exactly we’re dealing with here, please reference this link.
Moving on to other markets, we have some housekeeping in the gold mining sector.
Junior Miners, GDXJ:
As stated in the pre-market update yesterday, the finger was on the sell trigger.
After the first hour of trade, it was obvious higher prices were in the offing.
Not willing to wait through a correction to a higher retrace level, the short position was closed-out (not advice, not a recommendation).
The table below summarizes the entire round-trip. It should be somewhat self-explanatory.
A hypothetical $10,000 was used as the starting amount. Any additions to the position used margin.
The end result as shown, approximately, +21%, gain.
Note: Posts on this site are for education purposes only. They provide one firm’s insight on the markets. Not investment advice. See additional disclaimer here.
The magenta arrow and bar show pre-market action in Junior Miners GDXJ, about 25-minutes before the open.
Fibonacci retrace levels as noted.
The zoom chart shows a gap that action may be trying to fill and then? Is there something more?
Sated earlier, a 23.6%, retrace is rare and 38.2%, more common.
Summary:
The market looks to open higher.
If so, typical behavior is to come down for a test and then continue upward if that’s the overriding direction.
If the expected test fails, action may continue lower.
Once again, we’re at the danger point. The action itself defines the trading response.
Friday saw a partial exit of the short JDST-22-01, position in anticipation of higher prices (not advice not a recommendation)
Today may see the rest of the exit if the pivot higher is confirmed (typically within the first hour).
The fact pre-market trading is subdued with just (so far) a half-point or about 1.0% gain, still suggests weakness.
We can see price action penetrated support (bottom blue line) on the chart and so GDXJ, is in ‘spring position’. However, thus far that spring appears to be weak.
There’s a lot going on at this juncture.
JDST-22-01, Position Table to be updated and posted later.
Note: Posts on this site are for education purposes only. They provide one firm’s insight on the markets. Not investment advice. See additional disclaimer here.
For all of us serfs in the banana republic proletariat, it’s near if not impossible, to keep up with the lies.
The latest ‘employment‘ report is just one example.
This video from Jerimiah Babe, posted a few days ago has a different story. Check out the intro and then farther on at time stamp: 9:00.
For a second opinion, we can go to Dan, at i-Allegedly.
On his latest post, fast-forward to time stamp 7:00, where he walks through an outdoor restaurant area that’s completely vacant.
The ’employment’ report is vapor. Judging from the comments (at ZeroHedge) most everyone seems to be aware of the fakery.
Naturally, with all of this uncertainty and rampant inflation, the logical place to go would be the gold market.
Junior Miners, GDXJ
As this post is being created (mid-session), the Junior Miners are at the danger point. Price action’s at a location where it’s decision time.
So far, it’s an ‘inside day’. We don’t have a new daily high or low from the previous session.
The Fib retrace of 23.6%, discussed previously is holding for now. That weights action to the downside.
Posting a new daily high would begin to erode the set-up; potentially indicating GDXJ, is going to attempt a retrace to the Fib 38%, level.
If that higher retrace becomes a more favorable probability, the JDST-22-01, trade will likely be closed out (not advice not a recommendation).
The chart below shows the inside action thus far.
The table below has the current positioning JDST-22-01, via inverse fund JDST (not advice, not a recommendation).
As always, the sell finger is on the trigger. Description of color coding and table layout is in this post.
Summary:
Trade decisions posted on this site are defined by the price action itself (not advice, not a recommendation). Wyckoff analysis does not concern itself with what’s obviously fake.
Wyckoff focuses strictly on what the market is saying about itself.
At this juncture, price action’s saying that both bulls and bears, are at the danger point.
Note: Posts on this site are for education purposes only. They provide one firm’s insight on the markets. Not investment advice. See additional disclaimer here.
For the evening/overnight session, both gold and the S&P futures have opened lower.
The S&P is down 50-pts, nearly 1.10% (at about 8:15 p.m. Eastern) and already penetrating the last session’s low.
The number of technical factors concerning gold, the miners and especially the Junior Miners GDXJ, is significant.
We’ll cover just a few in this update.
Junior Miners, GDXJ: Daily
The un-marked daily chart shows GDXJ oscillating but in a general downward trend:
The next chart shows price action posted a reversal bar right at Fibonacci 23.6%, for the entire move; from the breakout highs in mid-November ’21, to the lows on January 28th, this year.
A ‘Fib’ retrace of 23.6%, is rare and if it holds, indicates significant weakness.
The next two charts present a case for why this shallow retrace may indeed hold and thus, indicate the start of the next leg lower.
On a print basis, it’s been a Fibonacci 55 (+1) days from the GDXJ print high on November 12th, 2021, to the high posted today (2/2/22).
The next chart shows that November 12th, 2021 was also the closing high of the breakout set-up.
The Important Part:
Yesterday, was the closing high of GDXJ (so far) and that makes it a perfect Fibonacci 55-Days, from peak-to-peak.
The last update on the miners showed significant down-pressure at support levels, unlike previous visits to the area.
Looks like we’ve had the rally that was forecast; that rally may now be fading.
“It’s reasonable to expect an attempt to rally in the coming week … but with this much down force, a successful rally is not the high-probability outcome.”
Gold Could Hold
Already discussed, is the idea, the actual price of gold may hold steady or even go higher and yet the mining sector collapses.
As Dan from i-Allegedly posts in this report, Italian wine makers are having a hard time getting corks for their bottles. That’s right, corks !!!
Does anyone really think a massive mining outfit is going to be able to source all they need to continue operations without interruption?
Let’s not even get started with the ‘sustainability’ corporate failure already baked into the cake 🙂
“For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places.”
Sorry for those who think it’s all a ‘myth‘. I’m with Good Patriot on this one (time stamp 17:09); that we’re in a battle surpassing all that’s come, since 33 AD.
Gold & Silver
Hard assets: Good to have for sure (ammunition, seeds and egg-laying hens may be better) … but if we’re really in a similar event to Genesis 41, that means the corn and grain come first, then gold and silver.
Summary:
This post started with the S&P down about -0.80% and it’s now down -1.10%, posting a new daily low.
Gold is down slightly, holding steady but that’s already been discussed above.
Remaining short the sector via JDST-22-01 (not advice not a recommendation).
Position size on JDST-22-01, has been increased. More on that in the next report.
Note: Posts on this site are for education purposes only. They provide one firm’s insight on the markets. Not investment advice. See additional disclaimer here.
The Danger Point® 