Holy Schmolee!! Friday's action may be memorable for the range but for me today makes that pale in comparison. Why you ask? I'll get to that in a minute.
First a short run down of notables today. Sentiment wise, the market is very bullish. The non-scientific poll at RM.com today had almost double the number of bulls to bears. Another thing that made me raise my eyebrow was that the biggest pan was gold stocks!!
http://www.elitetrader.com/vb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=13959&perpage=6&pagenumber=1
[scroll down a bit]
As well, Cramer was frothing at the mouth and polluting the site with post after post that this is "it". Here is a short excerpt from the gems that he subjects his readers to:
"James J. Cramer
He's Bullish and He's Proud
By James J. Cramer
Giddy. Check the giddiness. Exciting. Check the excitement. Wammin and Jammin. Check the wamma-jamma.
That's the schematic of my brain right now. I see things like Ford (F:NYSE - news - commentary) going from 10 to 15, but I have no fundamental reason for the gain. I know this isn't an O'Henry novella and we can't invest in irony, but when Colgate is among the biggest Janus positions and Helen Hayes, the queen of who-cares-about-valuations, hits the road, can you not want to nibble at Broadcom (BRCM:Nasdaq - news - commentary) ?(I know I did.) I recognize that people don't want to cover their investment shorts, like Capital One (COF:NYSE - news - commentary) , so they stay short COF and go long the S&P and they have a classically poor unmatched book.
You want to get carried away on the long side. You want to read, as I read in USA Today, that the "Tech fund vanishing act picks up steam, with 21% of the tech funds pronounced dead or merged," and just close your eyes and buy the type of tech that these firms have had to liquidate.
I see people who hate the SOX covering the SOX and then shorting it again because it has "moved too much."
Giddy. Too giddy.
I see the short interest moving to untenable positions in the past two months even as the market has run!
Exciting. Too exciting.
And I have to pinch myself. I have to do everything I can to restrain myself so that I don't get too bullish."
Too late Jim. You're already there. Oh and thanks Jim
Now the already mentioned indicators are hitting the red line. The NYSE/Nadaq Summation Indices are screaming to historic levels. The VXN and VIX are like a rubber band stretched taut from their long term MA. The internals are screaming themselves hoarse. As well the only fly in our ointment, the BP indices are starting to cooperate in a BIG way. The NDX and COMPQ are at 76 and 54.67 respectively. Their historic red lines are at 80 and 55 respectively. Furthermore, TrimTabs' has turned bearish due to their fund flows studies (seemingly an about face after an April 25 'new bull' call).
Alan Newman, a crusty Wall Street curmudgeon is saying that the market's internals right now are at the same levels as March 2000! He has a great site with some amazing graphs at
www.cross-currents.net (check out archives)
Now I wanted to touch on the Transports since a lot of attention has been directed at them recently (due to their performance, Dow Theory role, SARS and oil price effects). But the Transports are the highest BP sector out there right now!
Their BP is 75 right now (with red lines in the 80-85 area). Be mindful that when the market as a whole turns and takes a dive, the transports will be very hard hit. The index itself and many of its components are hitting resistance and will be met with selling pressure as a result. Furthermore, there will be an avalanche of selling for those that were lucky enough to ride the recent updraft. So watch out, this sector could fall in a big and nasty way soon. I am thinking of playing this through already weak stocks like RYAAY. You can make up your own mind.
ok so back to my first point (above) Why did I go into epileptic shock when I looked at today's action?
Well, vhehn was kind enough to post this link earlier today:
http://www.dailyduediligence.com/Midday/nylow.html
It touches on an internal metric that I spoke about before (new high and new lows). I mentioned that it was at a historic level and pointing to a top. The article says basically the same thing pointing out that the recent low reading of 3 is VERY low.
Well, if you thought that graph was interesting then check the one below!! It shows a reading of 1. Yes a 1. I don't know if that is a typo but unless it is....
...the new high to new low ratio for NYSE is at 222 (or 222 new highs for one new low). Do I have to point out how ridiculous that number is?
For the Nasdaq, it is at 19. Not off the charts like its NYSE cousin, but it has only been above 15 five times since 1991. Right now is another. I don't want to give this one indicator more merit than it deserves, but when such an internal metric spikes to historic levels, one has to stand up and take notice. If only because it doesn't happen often.
Conclusion? time to bring out the big guns, no more pussy footing around. This market is going to tank and tank in a bad way.
But then again...I could be wrong!

And I'm sure if I am, you won't let me forget it. :eek: