Everything but the U.S. Dollar seems to be ramping higher these days. Bitcoin is back over $19k with HODLERs projecting it to be at $30k sometime next year. The smugness in the crypto waterholes I monitor is literally oozing out of everyone’s pores.

It has been four long months in the making but I am extremely proud to finally announce my long awaited course on trading butterflies. While Options 201 was mainly focused on ‘structure’ and how to create, price, and analyze vertical as well as diagonal spreads, this new course dives deep into the ‘criteria’ of trading butterfly spreads successfully on a weekly basis.

What is the first thing you look at on Monday morning before the trading session opens? Most traders attempt to get a ‘feel’ for the market by tracking one or more futures contracts related to equity indices. So most likely we’re talking about the ES, the NQ, or the RTY which is the new CME contract for the Russell 2000. I personally mainly focus on the former two but always keep an eye on the RTY as it sometimes provides early clues of divergence. But before doing any of that my first go-to charts are my weekly statistics. Why is that?

With the S&P 500 mostly treating water this week the big question in my mind was what the heck is driving the Russell to advance higher as if being juiced by a double dose of Martin Armstrong’s Tour de France special. Time to lift up the market’s skirt and dive in for a closer inspection.