Crude Facts

I woke up this morning and the world had not yet descended into Sodom and Ghomorra. Which was a bit disappointing to me as I keep being promised doom and gloom in the financial MSM. Now look, I’m as guilty as the next guy (or gal – current year and all) when it comes to kicking up my adrenaline via a dose of infopørn at my favorite clickbait watering hole.

For one it does beat snorting crushed uppers along with my first cup of Kopi Luwak in the morning. Unfortunately it’s also a lot more addictive, plus it’s starting to show up in my monthly urine tests.

But in recent times the doom patrol has gotten completely out of hand. Don’t get me wrong, I enjoy being teased for a while but it’s been almost a year now and at some point someone’s got to deliver, even if it’s one of the late night rejects once the lights go on and everyone’s being told to GTFO.

Alright, let’s get serious for a moment. I know most of you guys are drooling at the chance of a market wipeout and it may surprise you to hear that I am not one of them. Maybe I’m starting to get soft at my advanced age but the thought of millions of Americans living in poverty and gangs of homeless digging through my trash to feed themselves does not bestow me with the same warm feelings of superiority it used to.

Let’s be clear on something: The period between 2009 and 2017 has been the most raging and profitable bull market in human history. At the same time it’s also been the most hated (for admittedly legitimate reasons), which perhaps explains why there appears to be so much lingering desire to see the world burn.

Count me out on that one, I may be evil (see blog theme) but my fire insurance doesn’t cover collective stupidity.

The situation we find ourselves in at the beginning of 2019 is a rather serious one. I just sent out an email to my intrepid VIXEN subs explaining why the damn thing hasn’t triggered for almost a month now.

Truth be told I’m glad it hasn’t as you don’t want to ever short IV in periods when the IVTS (shown above) continues to plot above the 1.0 mark for weeks on end. Which according to my records has not happened since the 2008 financial crisis.

It is difficult to remain an even keel in volatile times like this as the temptation is to swing for the fences by either going completely bear-tart or by robotically taking contrarian entries.

I did take a long entry as you know, but it came with much reservation full knowing that it was a low probability lottery ticket. Because trying to get a beat on this market is tantamount to nailing a curveball with a bent curtain rod.

Miraculously so far it’s survived the onslaught of daily drama and my ISL remains < ES 2400. If that one gets taken to the woodshed then we’re talking a completely new ballgame and it’s got plenty of claws and fangs in it. Let’s hope it won’t come to that.

Crude was an entry I featured to my subs the other day and it looks like it may be ready to play ball. I’m advancing my trail to b/e as soon as it touches the 1R mark which should be sometime today.

Here’s the LT panel which on the weekly (left) shows us two exhaustion gaps followed by a spike low. This is a common phenomenon I actually covered in the tape reading video series I produced last year. I haven’t put it up for sale at my new site yet but will make sure you guys get it at a special discount once I do.

The monthly has now produced a three point support cluster near the 40 mark, which I think has a decent chance of holding up but should it NOT then be prepared for a plunge to 35 or even lower.

Now if you happen to live in Europe then ask yourself why you’re still paying close to $6.50 per gallon of gasoline. Not even Californians are that stupid, and I should know as I used to be one 😉