Terrible Tuesday – Children Murdered, Markets Make All-Time Highs

22 dead and 56 injured.  

For those who don’t have teenagers, Ariana Grande is a former Disney Star who has a very wide appeal with young kids and about 2M people have seen her recent tour.  There’s almost no one in the World with high-school children or grandchildren who can’t imagine their kids standing next to the terrorist when the bomb went off at the concert.

Yet the machines that move the markets are mindlessly oblivious to the danger and, as it is Tuesday, they are pushing the S&P back to 2,400, which is fine for us as we predicted this, waited for it and now we’ll make money shorting the S&P Futures (/ES) for the 5th week in a row:

• May 16th: Toppy Tuesday – S&P 2,400 – Again
• May 9th: Toppy Tuesday – Yet Again
• May 2nd: Toppy Tuesday – Can Earnings Sustain S&P 2,400?
• April 25th: Terrific Tuesday – Markets go Through the Roof

The fact that the S&P STILL can’t get over 2,400 DESPITE the weaker Dollar and the stronger Apple does not give me the warm fuzzies about the strength of this weekly rally so, once again – we are going to be shorting the indexes at the levels we keep shorting them at and once again, later in the week, I will tell you how much money we made and you will say: “why can’t I ever catch trades like that.”  It’s a vicious cycle…

Remember, I can only tell you what the market is going to do and how to make money trading it – that is the extent of my powers

At this point I’m just cutting and pasting what I said last Tuesday into this Tuesday since the same programs are running and, to save time, on Thursday we’ll be looking for the following bounce levels after the drop:

• Dow (/YM) 20,500 with 20,600 (weak) and 20,700 (strong) bounce lines.
• S&P (/ES) 2,350 with 2,360 (weak) and 2,370 (strong)
• Nasdaq (/NQ) 5,550 with 5,580 (weak) and 5,610 (strong) 
• NYSE (no futures) 11,400 with 11,450 (weak) and 11,500 (strong) 
• Russell (/TF) 1,350 with 1,360 (weak) and 1,370 (strong)

There – can I go on vacation now because, frankly I’m pretty disgusted by the way CNBC is just doing their usual morning interviews and cheerleading the market back to all-time highs in the aftermath of such a terrible attack.  As a New Yorker, I went through 9/11 but the entire World ground to a halt that day (that week, for that matter) so it felt like people cared.  I can’t even imagine how I’d feel if I lived in Manchester and woke up to see the markets essentially celebrating yet another terror attack.  Is terrorism so acceptable now that it doesn’t even factor into our investing decisions?  

Speaking of terrorists, just because Donald Trump is in the Middle East doesn’t mean he can’t destroy the lives of millions of Americans here at home.  Trump will literally kill thousands of starving children and adults by cutting 25% of the Food Stamp program in order to hand bigger tax breaks to his Billionaire Buddies.  Trump’s 2018 budget request to Congress seeks massive cuts in spending on health programs, including medical research, disease prevention programs and health insurance for children of the working poor.  THAT is what Wall Street is celebrating – Billions will be redistriubted from the poor to the rich!  

Not only that but, like a super-villain who finally gains access to the governments’ treasures, Trump’s budget plans to sell HALF of the United State’s Strategic Petroleum Reserves to raise $16.5Bn, which he will then give to his Billionaire Buddies.   Do you remember the Republican outrage when Obama wanted to release reserves for an actual emergency (when oil prices rose to $100 due to Iran sanctions)?

Republicans generally oppose the idea, saying oil reserves should only be used for an emergency. Plus, with the President taking so much heat for rising gas prices, lower prices wouldn’t help Republican chances going into the election. Seven in ten Americans said rising prices have caused hardship for them and their families, according to a recent CNN poll.

“Everyone wants to help the American people and lower prices the pump – especially now, in tough economic times. And it is good that the Obama Administration is conceding that increased supply will lower those costs. But by tapping the Strategic Petroleum Reserve, the President is using a national security instrument to address his domestic political problems. The SPR was created to mitigate sudden supply disruptions. This action threatens our ability to respond to a genuine national security crisis and means we must ultimately find the resources to replenish the reserve – at significant cost to taxpayers.

I don’t care what you ideology is – how can you support a party that is so obviously self-serving and full of  crap?  They have no real positions other than take more of the people’s money for their rich friends/donors.  

Unless the heroic few remaining Democrats are able to stop Trump’s evil scheme in time, the sale of 350M barrels of oil, even if it were done over 5 years, would add more than 1.5Mb per week to our already swollen inventories.  This does not bode well for long-term oil prices and effectively negates OPEC’s entire oil cut and, as a bonus, leaves us vulnerable to supply shocks in the future.  Obama proposed releasing 30M barrels when oil was $100 to STRATEGICALLY reduce the price and the Republicans freaked out and blocked it, costing US drivers Billions of Dollars in order to score the political upper hand.  What Trump is doing is total madness with no purpose whatsoever other than to rob the government of $16.5Bn.  

Meanwhile, the House committee that is investigating Russian interference in the presidential election will hear from John O. Brennan, the former director of the CIA, who was so troubled by Russia’s activities last summer that he arranged briefings with top lawmakers:

Mr. Brennan became so concerned last summer about signs of Russian election meddling that he held urgent, classified briefings for eight senior members of Congress, speaking with some of them over secure phone lines while they were away on recess. In those conversations, he told lawmakers there was evidence that Russia was specifically working to elect Mr. Trump as president.  

Unfortunately, the majority of those Congresspeople were Republicans and no actions were authorized and Trump, as soon as he took office, asked Brennan to resign his post.  A new report says that President Trump asked two intelligence officials to deny the existence of any evidence of collusion between his campaign and Russia. Both of those officials just happen to be scheduled to testify before lawmakers on Tuesday.

Is this really the environment under which you expect the markets to make new all-time highs?  Just like every other Tuesday we’re at these nose-bleed levels – the answer is no.  At the moment (8:45), the Dow (/YM) Futures are 20,921, the S&P (/ES) 2,396, the Nasdaq (/NQ) 5,714 and the Russell (/TF) 1,378 and our two favorites to short are the S&P and the Russell but only if the others are breaking lower (short the laggard) and very tight stops over 2,400 and 1,380.

Remember, this is the day the market tops out – tomorrow is the day it drops again so be very careful of trying to short too early though, given the global situation and the potential for explosive testimony this morning – it’s certainly worth a toss!  

Provided courtesy of Phil’s Stock World.