What I'm looking at - breakouts, new highs, breadth thrusts, equity put/call, and Pound's surge

Troy Bombardia
2019-12-13

With global stocks rallying on trade war news, here's what I'm looking at:


Breakouts, new highs, breadth thrust

The U.S. stock market was among the first to breakout to new all-time highs this year. And now amidst a stream of positive trade war developments, indices that were more beaten down by the trade war (e.g. emerging markets) are also making new all-time highs. For example, the MSCI ACWI Index, which includes emerging and developed markets, has broken out:

What I'm looking at - breakouts, new highs, breadth thrusts, equity put/call, and Pound's surge

When this index made a new 2 year high for the first time in more than 400 days, it typically pushed higher over the next 3-6 months, even if it struggled in the short term:

What I'm looking at - breakouts, new highs, breadth thrusts, equity put/call, and Pound's surge

Since the U.S. accounts for such a large portion of this index (56%), here's what the S&P 500 did next:

What I'm looking at - breakouts, new highs, breadth thrusts, equity put/call, and Pound's surge

Similarly, the NYSE Index broke out yesterday:

What I'm looking at - breakouts, new highs, breadth thrusts, equity put/call, and Pound's surge

When it did so in the past, the NYSE Index typically rallied over the next 3 months and 1 year:

What I'm looking at - breakouts, new highs, breadth thrusts, equity put/call, and Pound's surge

....as did the S&P 500:

What I'm looking at - breakouts, new highs, breadth thrusts, equity put/call, and Pound's surge

And as Robert Lesnicki pointed out, there has been a surge in new highs-new lows on the NYSE:

What I'm looking at - breakouts, new highs, breadth thrusts, equity put/call, and Pound's surge

This was usually bullish for the S&P 500 over the next 6 months:

What I'm looking at - breakouts, new highs, breadth thrusts, equity put/call, and Pound's surge

Meanwhile, the S&P 500 financial sector broke out above its January 2018 high last week:

What I'm looking at - breakouts, new highs, breadth thrusts, equity put/call, and Pound's surge

The history of breakouts for the financial sector is limited, but it did usually lead to more gains (with the exception of 2011).

What I'm looking at - breakouts, new highs, breadth thrusts, equity put/call, and Pound's surge

As a result of the financial sector's recent rally and breakout, the % of members at a new 52 week high has surged above 40% for the first time since the sector last peaked in January 2018:

What I'm looking at - breakouts, new highs, breadth thrusts, equity put/call, and Pound's surge

Here's a longer term look at this indicator:

What I'm looking at - breakouts, new highs, breadth thrusts, equity put/call, and Pound's surge

As one would expect, such breadth surges typically led to more gains for the sector over the next year:

What I'm looking at - breakouts, new highs, breadth thrusts, equity put/call, and Pound's surge


Equity Put/Call

The Equity Put/Call ratio plunged yesterday on the stock market's rally.

What I'm looking at - breakouts, new highs, breadth thrusts, equity put/call, and Pound's surge

This pushed the Equity Put/Call ratio to more than -30% below its 1 year average. When this happened while the stock market was at or close to a 1 year high, the S&P typically struggled over the next 1-2 weeks:

What I'm looking at - breakouts, new highs, breadth thrusts, equity put/call, and Pound's surge


British Pound

And lastly, the Pound broke out to a 1 year high on yesterday's election.

What I'm looking at - breakouts, new highs, breadth thrusts, equity put/call, and Pound's surge

When this happened in the past, the Pound usually continued to rally over the next 3 months:

What I'm looking at - breakouts, new highs, breadth thrusts, equity put/call, and Pound's surge


My trading portfolio

I've been moving countries and changing residencies over the past half year, so I haven't done much trading up until a month ago. Now that I've settled down, I've reopened trading accounts. In the interest of transparency, I'm going to show you what my own trading portfolio is doing, similar to what Jason does.

From October 25 (when I started to trade again) - present:

  1. My account is up 2.64%
  2. Currently 100% in bonds

I don't place discretionary trades - these are purely based on my quantitative models.