Thursday, September 12, 2013

Pre-Market

Futures are relatively flat, I can see some of the movement that I kind of suspected last night that could be responsible for near term chop in the market, that's the reason I'd personally play these recent positions like yesterday's IWM puts and VXX calls in the "Hit and Run" style we've had to use in choppy markets before.

Russell 2000 overnight futures are little changed since yesterday's 4 p.m. close.

What I see that looks like it could bring chop is the changes in currencies or at least the start of them that could send markets lower one day and higher the next, whether there's a general trend to the chop or not and how long it would last would be data we'd have to gather as the signals appear. I'm not saying the changes needed to move the market in currencies will be easy, but they appear to be moving.

 $AUD overnight collapsed on a bad jobs report, it was a pretty substantial miss sending the $AUD lower, however it looks like it's trying to find its footing, this doesn't mean rally, but a base is the first step ion that procedure.

This 5 min chart of the Euro shows what looks to be more downside coming, thus this won't be easy.

The $USD looks like it could put together a base, I think it needs one more run up and down to form a "W", otherwise it will likely just make another low so I'll be watching the charts there.

The best thing any currency driven gains that may come, have on their side is the Yen looking tired and this is the main thrust of the evidence for any currency driven gains
If the Yen falls hard enough (and it looks like its coming in to a top), then it can drive any of the 3 carry trades and help the market as we saw earlier in the week.

While we're looking at the Yen, global markets haven't been performing with much gusto, take the Nikkei 225.
This is a 5 min chart of the Nikkei, the negative divergence has sent it lower, but it looks like it's searching for a bottom in this area which is convenient with the Yen looking tired, thus we would have "CHOP".

I'm not sure of what the actual cause was, but another thing that may contribute to chop looks to be nervousness in front of the 2-day meeting between John Kerry and his Russian counterpart on the Syria issue.

Here's crude futures overnight.
Around 4 a.m. they were sent sharply higher, again this is another component in near term CHOP.

I suspect the spike around 4 a.m. EDT may be linked to a story of a couple of shells falling in the Golan Heights, Israel.

As far as market jitters that seem to be expressed in oil and a flat overnight session...
 Gold fell closer to the European open , but seems to be accumulating a bit down there. I didn't take any positions in GLD because I don't see the signals rto support a position, this is another reason I suspect market chop in the very near term, perhaps the next couple-several days, the evidence isn't strong (more of a gut feeling from what I see), but it's early still.

Silver has this small positive divergence, but right now I don't think it's enough to move silver much without carving out a larger base.

Otherwise there's not much of interest right now from the overnight session. I suspect the near term sessions will be largely defined by market jitters over the Kerry meeting on Syria the next two days.

We do have Initial Claims this morning so that could be a bit of a market mover.

I'd personally stay on the toes in this area of the market, at least until we see what develops today.

I have the back Dr. appointment in 30 mins. so I'll miss the Initial Claims, but I should be back as usual (no pun intended) around the open.





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