Disqus - Latest Comments for MacroMeister

Re: Don't ask McDonald's CEO this. He's not talking

MacroMeister — Sat, 07 Nov 2015 18:59:06 -0000

Good for them. Even if McD's food is not healthy (and does not purport it to be such) at least they are using butter. Margarine is processed junk that's typically loaded with trans fats. My dad was knowledgeable on food processing, and when margarine first appeared he inquired. "Why would I want to eat vegetable oil that's been so adulterated as to make it solid at room temperature?"

Re: Charts of the week: Crude oil move may not be over

MacroMeister — Sun, 25 Jan 2015 18:21:22 -0000

Nice charts Dan. I typically don't use plain trend lines on longer term trends, but these seem particularly well grounded. Thanks.

Re: The profitable power of confluence

MacroMeister — Fri, 26 Sep 2014 22:05:01 -0000

Dan- I have long used the confluence concept in both my active analysis and training others. What an excellent articulation of the concept. This should be required reading for all fledgling technicians. Well done.

Re: Waterfall event in stocks inevitable

MacroMeister — Mon, 21 Jul 2014 13:24:14 -0000

Excellent observation. There is no system or pattern to spot a crash... it's more contextual than that. On the Monday before the first Fed intervention three days later in August 2007 I was on CNBC telling Becky Quick there was more downside potential than most realized, and the US equities had topped. Yet for the next full year the markets had to be treated as trading affairs until the final debacle bit in SEP-OCT 2008. It is always more so about being positioned properly once a trend change occurs than trying to spot the exact moment when a market is going to plunge. Thanks for the extended insight Jeff... especially about those who haven't been around through multiple cycles and always want to assert, "It's different this time."

Re: U.S. May Join Germany of 1933 in Pantheon of Defaults

MacroMeister — Thu, 17 Oct 2013 15:11:25 -0000

If you want to put political spin on it, that's fine. It was still elective, and has accelerated under Obama and Dems. Yeah, I know, it was necessary due to depth of Bush cock-up... but Obama's been in for 5 years now, and it looks like more spending is his only solution... still elective at this point, not forced on the US as war reparations.

Re: Nobel Needs Grounding in Reality-Based Economics

MacroMeister — Thu, 17 Oct 2013 15:07:20 -0000

Yeah, well these are the same folks who gave Mr. Obama the Nobel Peace Prize prior to his establishing any sort of real record, and he turns out to be one of the major serial assassins in history through the drone program.
What a joke Nobel has become. They need real-world grounding in almost everything... don't hold your breath. Someone should get them a copy of Soros' 'Alchemy of Finance' from 1987(?), where he laid out market 'reflexivity' for everyone. That hasn't stopped the 'efficient market' follks from costing the whole world a huge fortune in needless losses since that time.

Re: U.S. May Join Germany of 1933 in Pantheon of Defaults

MacroMeister — Mon, 14 Oct 2013 18:38:50 -0000

As the article points out, the headline comparison is bogus... Germany had those debts thrust onto it as WWI reparations. The US has been proactive in its spend-a-thon.

Re: Do you think the next 5% move in the SP500 will be higher or lower?

MacroMeister — Thu, 31 Jan 2013 15:37:42 -0000

Nice timing on the question Phil... Lower.

The equities have been ignoring a lot of weak data, specious stats and continued risk in Europe on the way up. Today's US Income number indicates just how much early year strength is 'feel good factor' spillover from last year. And that could now be getting stale.

A lot of well-to-do borrowed tax-advantaged income from the future, while the average slob is living paycheck to tax-diminished paycheck. And Larry McDonald was very clever today in posting the Home Builder Idx versus Sentiment. Like he said, something's gotta give, and there is a bigger historic tendency at work. Will have another blog post on that later.

Even so, oscillators tell me $ES_F might still squeak in 1525 high prior to the bigger downturn... which will likely be quite a bit more than 5%. 1350 would fit in very nicely with all classic retracement support projections. We shall see.

Re: You Are The Worst Trader Of All-Time If You Made Money Off This Buyout

MacroMeister — Fri, 23 Nov 2012 08:52:20 -0000

Great post... and the ultimate message is that the money could have been more sensibly and effectively applied elsewhere... capital allocation. Thx for the reminder.

Re: Cliff diving

MacroMeister — Sat, 17 Nov 2012 09:25:08 -0000

Great summary Dan. Thanks for the concise scenarios and extending the perpsective to the other key issues not even covered by the Fascal Cliff. And very few folks have come to appreciate just how much consumer discretionary spending is going to be hit next year by things that are net even in play after the Preseident's re-election victory. Like the health care reform micro-taxation of anything that moves. Look forward to more on this and other topics.

Re: Welcome to the new bitly!

MacroMeister — Tue, 29 May 2012 13:49:31 -0000

Horrible. Who was your focus group? Programmers? Was doing something on the fly today, and was totally tripped up by this very confusing new interface. Gave a short link a title, and it surely did not come up quickly in the subsequent search. If that had worked, I might have gone for it, but this seems totally erratic and unreliable.

CHANGE IT BACK NOW or I'll be migrating to other service!!!

Definitely missing all of my shortened links for the month of May with the string "persp" included in the longform URL. This sucks!!! You have perpetrated a major failure on an otherwise loyal and entuhsiastic base. Now I'll need to go and apologize to all the folks I have strongly recommended use bit.ly.

Re: Are you a Technician? | All Star Charts

MacroMeister — Mon, 14 Nov 2011 14:58:40 -0000

Strongly, if respectfully, disagree with Ed that J.C. jumps straight to econometric analysis, which is applying real world statistical projections to economic theory. Even if he's jumping into an extended subset of tech, he's not using economic analysis outside of pure price. There's no model for FX, energy, gold or bond economic analysis in what J.C. suggested; just the price movement.

Admittedly there is no doubt whatsoever that savvy techs still get back to assessing the actual price activity in each instrument its own right. Yet Ed's stricture, "But 'pure' technical analysts only look at a single trading vehicle and price, volume and open interest" is as unreasonably rigid as J.C.'s is (possibly just a bit too) broad.

Let's not take my word for it. Murphy also wrote the excellent 'Intermarket Analysis' on when major signals from one market are a driver for the trend psychology of another (i.e. equities DOWN Break is bullish for govvies, etc.) I'm pretty confident any bona fide econometric analysts would cringe at the notion that's what they're doing.

It's more so about psychology of price movement in its own right, even if between different markets or asset classes... and on that level J.C. is spot on, even if it's based upon 'assumptions' of economic 'influences'. What people 'surmise' in that regard is psychology and not economics, and therefore mostly within the technical realm.

Re: Technicians Say The Market is Broken

MacroMeister — Thu, 08 Sep 2011 14:31:48 -0000

The technicians you know must be real cry babies and not very talented... these are the best trading markets since the 1970's into the 1980's. If they didn't live through that (or cut their teeth trading the dear departed Pork Bellies), then that's their problem. It's about knowing where the key levels are, and having the discipline to wait for them to get there. Sorry, but complaining about 'broken markets" is just a sign they don't know how to adapt. Other than that, you're right about volatility scaring the regular investors out there. That much is on target.

Re: Weekend Radar StockTwits FX

MacroMeister — Fri, 18 Dec 2009 18:30:48 -0000

Excuse my misunderstanding, as I thought my profile would link readers to my StockTwits desktop profile, not my website. Here are some of those posts from today... "Maybe someone else has mentioned this, but are we possibly on the verge of a US Dollar Carry Trade Crisis?... http://bit.ly/6BDxpQ" "...for extended background on factors that might trigger more US dollar driven EQs weakness (& Gold analysis), get into GROUP: MacroBlast"

Re: Weekend Radar StockTwits FX

MacroMeister — Fri, 18 Dec 2009 18:15:17 -0000

I especially like the EUR potential, as the news is worsening there and the UK in addition to the sovereign debt troubles in Greece, etc. If it worsens USD improves by default, not b/c we are doing anything so very right; just a shift in risk perception. See my posts from today.

Re: Ratings Aiki14

MacroMeister — Sun, 30 Aug 2009 22:11:23 -0000

Yeah, it's almost insane how this particular aspect of the system (dys)functions.

But the Devil is certainly in the details: how do you prevent the inherent issuer-funded rating conflict of interest? It seems that can only be supplanted by some elaborate system of buy-side funded rating, with some sort of sliding scale cost-sharing by the potential buyers and penalties on the issuer if the rating agency finds the security lacking, etc., etc.; and it'll be amazing if anyone can ever work that out and get everyone to partcipate.

Until then, biz as usual with sporadic bouts of contrition the only times we all get an honest assessment. Sad, but likely true. The only saving grace is at least now the raters can't rely on implicit GSE guarantees to automatucally award toxic crap a AAA rating.

Re: Oil as Money and the Decline of Energy Earnings

MacroMeister — Mon, 06 Apr 2009 15:25:32 -0000

As always, a fascinating perspective and interesting extension of Cook’s ideas.

I must admit to being in a bit over my head in the primary discussion, yet can not help but comment on the extended implications of the long term DJIA/Oil chart. It speak volumes about how overdone US equities were at the Dot.Com Bubble ‘financial engineering’ high versus the real world. And the degree to which the entire recovery from the 2002-2003 lows was not a ‘real’ new high at all into 2007 (more of that nasty 'engineering' again instead) is such an elegant summary of what really transpired.

The implication from here in light of all the government and central bank largesse would seem to rest with whether last month was ‘the’ low or just ‘a’ low in equities. As much as it might be too much of a ‘micro’ technical analytic view, the recent increments on the chart certainly put the modest euphoria over the current equity market rally into perspective, and reinforce your views on the primacy of the ex-energy profit picture.

Based upon the recent highs stalling into 218(+/-), any slippage from current levels looks pretty weak, with the recent recovery consisting of some very ugly bearish candles. That is thoroughly consistent with DJIA likely ranging only so far above 8,000 prior to a full correction back toward 7,000, and the highest recent volume occurring on lower Closes. The technical challenges to the DJIA moving much higher without a subsequent sizable correction are certainly daunting; a picture is worth a thousand words: http://bit.ly/126to.

Thanks Gregor; yet again making the big pic meaningful for the current trend evolution.

Re: StockTwits has been acquired by CNBC*

MacroMeister — Wed, 01 Apr 2009 10:53:37 -0000

Ahhhhh... now the truly insidious nature of the April Fool's Worm becomes apparent: it has co-opted the StockTwits Blog. Yikes!!

And after the LOL (and minor heart attack), how's this?... What if all the cheerleaders over there actually get creamed again on a major violation of the March lows after a lengthy summer basing attempt, and economic weakness means GE needs to spin off NBC-Universal for a song?

White knight wants Howard to take over CNBC, and gives total autonomy for re-organization so public gets real picture of wazzup financially, and to bust balls when US-G proposes useless waste of taxpayer money instead of real solutions. Are ya ready? LMAO (except it actually would clear up a blemish on the face of real financial reporting.) We shall see.

Re: StockTwits and the Death of the Delphic Oracle

MacroMeister — Fri, 20 Mar 2009 13:43:35 -0000

As I have said before, those can who trade do; those who are quality analysts put their ass on the line with very specific and (especially important) timely projections; and those that can't either bluff or commentate.

Re: trouble leaving DISQUS profile comments on blogs

MacroMeister — Fri, 20 Mar 2009 12:46:30 -0000

haven't really looked; I discovered if I go out to DISQUS and sign in, then I am on when I return to the blog. cumbersome yet effective 'work around' for now.

Re: Sunday Morning Mood Induction

MacroMeister — Sun, 15 Mar 2009 16:33:24 -0000

Veyr uplifting & happy. And yes, I love this market.

Hope we can infuse some sense of dire threats at MacroTwits tonite so you don't get hit with complaints from folks who bought Monday's opening 'cause you sent 'em off so cheery.

Of course, we can likely count on the G-20 meeting analysis to save you from that in any event. LOL

Re: Hug a Pilot and Smack a Banker

MacroMeister — Sun, 15 Mar 2009 13:21:31 -0000

Y'know, you really need to come out of your shell. That said, excellent perspective on how little workers have benefitted from booms of past two decades while CEO's got to play hog at the trough via perverted short term returns incentives.

While I would normally be appalled by the pure populist aspect of going after some of the bonus monies, if they were from bogus MBS & other toxic asset generation, for once Congress might be righter than not. Why not if Madoff investors are being destroyed by up to six years of 'claw-backs'??

The one distinction I would make is between the fools who saddle us with these sexy "different this time" vehicles every few years and the true traders who work at those firms. There are folks at all the major firms who are/were talented analysts and were compensatred for doing on a big scale what StockTwits is attemtping to assist individuals with accomplishing in their more limited accounts. Honest 'traders' who manage risk effectively for sustained yuear-after-year profit generation should not be lumped in with toxic asset spinning bankers.

Re: Brief Comments on Market Sentiment (Much More Coming)

MacroMeister — Fri, 06 Mar 2009 12:41:53 -0000

Doubted your "animal expertise and trading interest would ever intersect"?

LOL... You've obviously never traded in the pits.

Re: Brief Comments on Market Sentiment (Much More Coming)

MacroMeister — Fri, 06 Mar 2009 12:37:43 -0000

Excellent observation on market tone & stressful environment. In addition to any volatility, there is also a more 'erratic' componenet to s.t. swings affecting active traders' success ratio and psyche.

My totally self-serving comment is to be aware of the big levels as a trend guide, and only plug in s.t. finesse once the market has communicated its decision at those 'inflection' points. Allowing that I have the huge advantage of mostly avoiding individual stocks, the gap lower for the broader US equity indices at the start of this week set up some very clear decision levels for the general market swings.

That should reinforce truly professional traders' advantage from 'stepping back' and taking being more selective on top of tighter risk managemnt to prevent their vulnerabilities from screwing up their psych. All the more important as we transition from the big whipsaw crisis phases into what may become quite a bit more of an eroding down trend overall.

Don't STOP TRADING (LOL); maybe just stop looking for the big pops on the violation of every interim level that we were able to take advantage of at higher prices. That's reinforced in real time by the muted reaction to the abysmal OECD CLI's and US jobs report, and on the FX side by the US dollar's seeming loss of its 'haven' bid right into equities slippage late this week.

Looking forward to your further observations next week on how to handle this unsettled transitional market. Thanks Phil.

Re: Is this the bottom?

MacroMeister — Tue, 03 Mar 2009 12:52:16 -0000

Interesting this comes right in front of Geithner testimony w/2 more days to follow; equity market consistent verdict has been that budget, bank plan, stimulus are all lacking credibility to turn around banking system and economy.