The incessant march upward has run into a bit of a roadblock. The 1850 level on the Standard & Poors 500 Index ($SPX) has proven to be stiff resistance. The failure of the market to clearly break through to new all-time highs has put the bears (temporarily?) in charge. There is most likely going to be a challenge of support at the 1810 level (see Figure 1) soon.
Equity-only put-call ratios have both rolled over to sell signals.
If there is a theme to this market, it's this: it's overbought, but continuing to rise. There is strong support for $SPX at 1810. Moreover, there is now resistance near 1850.
Now for the litany of bullish, but overbought indicators: Equity- only put-call ratios are typical of this group. Both ratios are declining, and that is bullish. In addition, both ratios are at the lowest levels on their chart and that means they're overbought.
Forecasting this market with the Fed doing what they’re doing is really a very inexact chore. However, there are some historic parallels that can be drawn.
Stocks have been fairly dull so far in 2014, but some movement is probably setting up soon. Not much has changed with respect to the indicators that we follow, but let's review them anyway.
The Standard & Poors 500 index ($SPX) has pulled back modestly. As long as the support at 1810 remains intact, the trend is bullish for $SPX.
Equity-only put-call ratios continue to remain near the lower regions of their charts (Figures 2 and 3). This means they are in an overbought state.
The new year started with a thud, as selling pressure that had been building up over the past few days was released. Even after the selling, the $SPX chart is bullish, as long as it remains above 1810.
Equity-only put-call ratios have rolled over to sell signals, from very low (overbought) levels on their charts.
Market breadth had been quite strong -- until January 2nd. Breadth was so negative today that the breadth indicators are just barely clinging to buy signals at this time.
The rally that began last week with the Fed announcing tapering has broken out strongly to new highs. The fact that this occurred during a seasonally bullish period has certainly helped, too. $SPX will remain bullish as long as it holds above support at 1810.
Equity-only put-call ratios are shown Figure 2 & 3. Both are at new lows now, and as such they are both on buy signals (because they are declining) and they are overbought (because they are so low on their charts).
Even with the volatiilty following the FOMC meeting, SPX still has not broken out of the 1775-1812 range on a closing basis. If it DOES break out to the upside, the positive year-end seasonality should help.
The equity-only put-call ratios moved to sell signals about a week ago, but those signals are now wavering.
Market breadth gave buy signals earlier this week, but now those two breadth indicators are mixed: one on a buy; the other on a sell.
The feature article was designed to be a piece about the January Effect (the period of time when small-caps outperform big-caps, after tax loss selling has ended). But the study revealed some new facts about seasonality, and we make a modification to our Post- Thanksgiving trade because of it.
The market -- as measured by the S&P 500 Index ($SPX) -- has declined on eight of the last ten days, and that has taken a toll on the technical indicators. However, $SPX is sitting right on support at or just below 1780 (see Figure 1). Hence, shorting the market now could be a mistake.
