Weekly Stock Market Commentary 1/12/2018

By Lawrence G. McMillan

The chart of $SPX could not be more bullish. It is in a strong uptrend, well above all of its meaningful trailing moving averages, and continually making new all-time highs. Other indices are in similar shape, as far as making new all-time highs, but $SPX has the strongest chart of them all, going back to the election in November 2016. That's when this monster rally was launched, and it's still in full force.

There are now six unfilled gaps on the $SPX chart. I have marked them with horizontal purple lines on the chart in Figure 1.

The support areas are not that close to current levels because of the sharp, recent advance. The first -- and probably now most important -- support area is shown as red rectangular box in Figure 1. It is in the 2680-2700 area, from which this current 2018 rally was launched.

Equity-only put-call ratios have given up on recent sell signals and are now racing lower, making new multi-year lows every day. That means they are on buy signals until they turn upward.

Market breadth has been modestly positive in 2018, and as such the breadth oscillators have remained on buy signals -- even rising into modestly overbought territory.

Volatility is quite tame, as it has been for a long time. As long as it is stumbling along at low levels, stocks can rise. Low volatility by itself is not a problem. The problem comes when volatility moves from a low level to a higher level.

In summary, things are bullish. As long as $SPX is above support at 2700 and $VIX is below 13, the intermediate-term uptrend is intact.

This Market Commentary is an abbreviated version of the commentary featured in The Option Strategist Newsletter.