Bottom line

Jason Goepfert
2020-08-26
  • Weight of the evidence has been suggesting flat/lower stock prices short- to medium-term again; still suggesting higher prices long-term
  • Indicators show high optimism, with Dumb Money Confidence above 80% with signs of reckless speculation during what appears to be an unhealthy market environment, historically a bad combination, though it's easing somewhat and so far the dangerous / odd conditions have not mattered to the major indexes
  • Active Studies show a heavy positive skew over the medium- to long-term; breadth thrusts, recoveries, and trend changes have an almost unblemished record at preceding higher prices over a 6-12 month time frame
  • Signs of extremely skewed preference for tech stocks neared exhaustion by late June, especially relative to industrials and financials (here and here)
  • Indicators and studies for other markets are showing less consistent forward results, though it's not a great sign for Treasuries that hedgers are net short and optimism on metals recently became extreme with concerning 100-day analogs, with "perfect" breadth among miners recently dipping a bit.