Not the Deal He Wanted

Thursday Aug 6, 2026 Iran and Oman are still apparenlty tlking ,yes the deal Tsy Secy ad Trump have promised would happen this week. But the outcome does not apepar to be the cone Trump wanted Crude oil closed up 2.80 to 78.02 today. I recommended exiting energy earlier this week ascrude fell to 75. With a deal to open Hormuz, it looked like more suppluy would lower price, well not yet! XLE the energy ETF rose 1.48% today. If this will be the case, Trump goes into the mid-terms with gasoline nationally at $4, here in San Antonio 87 octane is about 3.50. Since Aoril the INDU has soared from 46,00 to 54,500 or so, amazing, investors switching to the index with less not more tech stocks. The Parabolic Stop and Reverse indicator is another Wells Wilder idea of whether to ge in or out of an index or whatever. INDU is still on a buy. NDX is barely a sell as is the NASD Composite. SPX is on a buy. But as noted energy prices are higher. Markets go where they want not where we want. More tis weekend.

Energy on the Brink

8/5/2026 The XLE energy ETF dropped 2.07% today. Crude oil traded under 75 for several hours. It is now 75.22 down from the day high of 76.70. Trump's bunch kee[s talking up an Iran deal no matter how many times their Lucy snatches the football deal from them. Why? At any rate it does look like energy prices are set to drop. Energy service stocks dropped today. Patterson PTEN down 5.45%. I bought a few shares of bear energy DUG. NDX selling off but INDU spiking to a new high. SOX and NDX continues to look alike. No comment on stock direction. Still seeking solution for blog appearance.

The Stock Market Looks Like Jurassic Park

8/4/2026 3:12 CST after market close Recall that scene in Jurassic Park, richard Attenboroough is escorting Sam Neil and Laura Dern thru the park. laura is reading s a brochure in the jeep, Sam reaches and turns her head to the nearby full sized brontosaurus, Laura gapes, I feel that way looking at the end of day market numbers. NDX up 956, INDU up 907, 54,085 This is not just the reaction to AI and Hormuz, uh what Hormuz i would say but nore on that ina minute. This is the fifth of the fifth of the last read of an over heated market, see Ray Dalio previous post. SPX 7736, 8,000 is a given at this point, sure hop aboard if you can find anything at less than three digits per hundred shares. as said in the previous post, this is Oct 19807. March 2000, dotcom, and or Fall 2007 sub prime peak. All previous highs, and the following lows, have been forgotten, a socionomic feature of market highs. ______________ Energy The BPENER bullsih perent index for energy stocks has exhibited a series of lower highs sine, no surprise, the March highs following the Iran invasion. In hte last monthy the index bottomed at 15% late June, and topped at 67%, July 27. today it close dat 52.38, a big drop already. every energy stock on my page is down today. Oddly, some energy service stocks lik SLB are up, how cn this be, service is derivative of energy, not the driving force itself. So I watch from the sidelines. Oil's range today was 75.16 to 82.33, now 75.40, again taking out all recent 78 lows. The spread of junk bond yields versus AAA yields of the same maturity is widening, another sign of danger, no wonder given the billions of debt recently issued for AI 'investment.' Best guess is more new highs in stock indexes all aroound before a top is seen. It looks like Team Trump is so eager to claim some sort of Iran victory, lower oil and gasoline prices, they are likely to climb aboard any floating debris and declare victory. MOre tomorrow.

8/4/2026 Interesting article on Ray Dalio and Jeremy Grantham on the currect bubble conditions. Jsut what I have been discussing https://finance.yahoo.com/markets/stocks/articles/ray-dalio-ai-bubble-nearing-070000246.html

Desperate for a Deal

Tuesday August 4, 2026 12:37 PM CST Desperate for a Deal Tuesday August 4, 2026 West Texas Intermediate crude oil has dropped from last week’s $84 to $75.98. This is below the price hit Monday at $78. Recommendations for energy and energy service stocks are negated and withdrawn. After some of their best earnings, both Chevron and Exxon Mobile are trading lower. Energy production stocks are down across the board while, oddly some energy service stocks rose today. Here is the recent timeline. Recall that Trump ran in 2024 specifically promising sub- $3 gasoline prices. With the mid-terms looming, he is desperate for a deal. Last Friday July 31. Trump was in attack mode for Iran. Saturday evening, he reversed position, saying Saudi Arabia had asked for a respite from the attacks. Sunday, he announced more talks with Iran, promising yet another deal. Monday morning at 6:32 AM CST, Iran denied there were any negotiations taking place with the US. Oil recovered to $80 by day’s end from $78 on the market open. On Truth Social Trump demands that, with Chevron earning record profits, they lower the gasoline price. This reflects a serious misunderstanding of how the retail gasoline supply chain works but when did Trump want to study detail? The irony is that the energy industry profits, are a result of Mid-East fighting, which is always the case. War raises the specter of supply interruption and price hikes. The Administration is complaining of higher energy prices their war brought about. With Iran still denying any negotiation, Treasury Secretary Bessent (what is he doing in this mix?) declared today a Hormuz deal is only a day or two away. Amidst billions of AI debt offerings, the stock market is soaring across all indexes, especially tech related. This is a vertical rise in prices after a long bull market. Such occurrences are rare. Usually these are seen in the final run-up to a market top. Examples include highs of October 1987, the dot.com high of March 2000, and the fall peak of 2007. Caution is advised in both energy and tech related markets Dennis.elam@att.net

Tech Explosion / Energy Markets Calm

8/3/2026 Forget all those comments about the tech sector beingover heated and too high. Today all the Mag 7 stocks took off as did the SOX stocks. NDX, SOX, you name it in tech looks ready to advance, the PMO is bottoming as is RSI aand prices have turned up. The SPX has soared hundreds of points the last few days. SPX was up 110 today. Start ofa new big move up or a final buying blow out, not sure, and again this is summer where markets are most volatile. We will report, I regret the site is still constrained. Friday Trump was going to attack Iran with whatever he has left ammunition wise. Saturday night he reverses saying the Saudis had asked he to relent, he said ok Oil opens down $7 Monday, Energy and service stocks back off but not that much. Iran announces 6 32 AM CSTthat there is no negotian with the US, only with Oman. Energy and serice sell off a bit and then come back today. Markets are alwasy subject to outside noise but this is getting old, every Friday Trump seems to reverse himself or does so over the weekend. I am not comfortable with the situation, wondering if Trump's aids worried over the mid-terms, will convince Trump to take some deal, any deal to get gasoline prices down, but really a bit late for that. MY daily charts of CVX Chevron, Exxon XOM, and APA are topping. CVX great earnings did not move the stocks. I think it best to exit energy positions. More every day this week.

A Narrow Few Lead the Market

8/2/2026 At the end of bull markets, investors, aka gamblers, crowd into fewer and fewer stocks. those stocks take on outsized weight, making it appear the over all averages are doing much better than they reall are. We are there now. The S & P 500, well here you go The S&P 500 (Standard and Poor's 500)[6] is a stock market index tracking the stock performance of 500 leading companies listed on stock exchanges in the United States. It is one of the most commonly followed equity indices and includes approximately 80% of the total market capitalization of U.S. public companies, with an aggregate market cap of more than $61.1 trillion as of December 31, 2025.[2] The S&P 500 index is a public-float-weighted/capitalization-weighted index. The index is associated with many ticker symbols, including ^GSPC,.[7] INX,[8] and SPX, depending on market or website.[9] The S&P 500 is maintained by S&P Dow Jones Indices, owned 73% by S&P Global and 27% by CME Group, and its components are selected by a committee.[4] But of tha 80% of the market cap of all public companies Half of that capitalization now consists of 5% or 25 SPX firms. As the index is capitalization weighted, the 25 now have an outsize influence on the over all index. The charts of hte bear funds like SH and PSQ have a way to go before looking like a buy. So here we are waitingfor summer to end and post Labor day to provide some clues. Of the eight major ETFs I don't see a real buy, I remain long a small number of energy service stocks. Again the big story is the increase in the ten- year treasury rate, now about 4.65%. This will eventuall weigh on stock prices as the cost of financing everything goes higher.