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Kevin McElroy submits:

• A company for boom or bust
• They sell copper AND gold
• Strong profits during the worst market in five years

If you were in Las Vegas, it would be cheating to bet one chip on two numbers of the roulette wheel. They'd kick you out of the casino after taking your money and maybe roughing you up a little. But today I'm going to reveal to you a publicly traded company that should benefit from boom times as well as bust. It's a way to put one poker chip on two numbers of the roulette wheel at the same time. And it won't get you kicked in the ribs.Complete Story »

Matthew Bradbard submits: Outside markets likely helped Crude oil trade higher today because the inventory report certainly wasn’t bullish. We maintain that if $71.50 can hold on a closing basis on the October contract, a bottom is in the making. Our upside target into next week is $77.25-$78.50. For the last four sessions natural gas has been back and forth in a 20 cent trading range. Like a coiled spring the longer this lasts the larger breakout we project. As most followers know we’re advising lightly scaling into November longs and to purchase November and December call spreads, expecting that move to be up. Don’t call it a correction; the Dow is higher by 240 points and the S&P by 30 points as of this post. On a further appreciation of 3% bearish plays in the S&P will be back on our radar for clients. Treasuries appear to be putting in a major top; both 30-year bonds and 10-year notes. As for traders start tracking the December contract as opposed to September. It will take a close below the 20 day MA for confirmation; in 30-year bonds 131’22 and 10-year notes at 124’22.Complete Story »

Hickey and Walters (Bespoke) submit:
August wasn't a very good month for risky asset classes. Of the 58 key ETFs highlighted below, fixed income, gold, silver, the yen, utilities, and Hong Kong were the only ones in the green during the month. The S&P 500 tracking SPY ETF declined 4.50% in August, the Midcap 400 ETF (IJH) declined 4.89%, and the Smallcap 600 ETF (IJR) declined 7.60%. Financials and Industrials were the worst performing sectors in August, while Utilities, Telecom, Health Care, and Consumer Staples held up the best. Italy (EWI) was the worst performing country ETF in August with a decline of 8.89%, and France (EWQ) and Germany (EWG) weren't far behind. The major emerging market ETF -- EEM -- actually outperformed most developed countries with an August decline of 3.24%. Oil (USO) got hit hard during the month with a decline of more than 9%, while the natural gas ETF (UNG) did much worse at -22.78%. Gold (GLD) was up 5.71% in August and Silver (SLV) was up 7.68%. Of the major Treasury ETFs, TLT (20-years+) was up a whopping 8.04%.Complete Story »

Matthew Bradbard submits: Mergers and Acquisitions are heating up, but that alone does not signal an all clear in my opinion. To see continued upside followthrough in Crude, the first hurdle we need to overcome is $75.85 in the October contract - the 38.2% Fibonacci retracement level. From current levels we anticipate a 5-8% appreciation in the coming weeks. We expect a move as such in Crude to lift the distillates 12-15 cents lifting prices back over $2/gallon. Talk of increased hurricane activity lifted natural gas prices today. We like the idea of bullish exposure in November but it has been tough to remain vigilant with our bullish stance, being prices have faltered 25% in recent weeks. Buying natural gas later this week and holding for 5 weeks has been a profitable proposition 12 out of the last 15 years. Past performance is not indicative of future results. As long as 1042 in the S&P and 9950 hold on a closing basis we expect a bounce out of here. Are we getting clients in bull mode? - not exactly, just expecting a rally to sell in the coming weeks. Treasuries recouped most of their losses from last week today. Some clients are positioned in put options in December 10-yr notes. This move will either be a re-test of the highs followed by the correction we’re calling for, or on a breakout to new highs we will advise cutting losses.Complete Story »

Matthew Bradbard submits: It’s tough taking investment advice from a man who dons overalls, sports a mohawk and wears gold chains, so maybe you should listen to MB Wealth. Oil has rallied 6.5% in the last three days and the interim bottom we alluded to appears to be in. From here as we’ve posted in recent blogs a move back near $80 should play out in the coming weeks. Those calling for $60 should be cutting their losses about now. Heating oil should find its way to $2.20 and RBOB to $2.05. Natural gas remains the laggard in the sector but clients still hold November call options. We would not advise futures as who knows where the bottom is. For those that have been long for several weeks we’ve started to advise buying back their upper legs on call spreads. Could we be correct again? A lower Q2 GDP was ignored as stocks close near their highs on the day. Those who follow us should see we advised exiting short indices this week and to get short the Treasury complex; short 10-year notes. Complete Story »

Wall Street Cheat Sheet submits: By Jordan Roy-Byrne, CMTBoth gold stocks and silver had big 3% gains yesterday. As you can see from the chart below, both markets are nearing a test of 2008 resistance.Complete Story »

Mark O'Byrne submits:

Gold US and German government bonds, gold and particularly silver rose in safe haven buying yesterday on growing concerns about the robustness of the US recovery. The two precious metals traded flat in Asian and early European trade but have moved up again this morning as the dollar has weakened. Risk aversion has returned due to the very poor housing data yesterday which suggests a double dip recession is increasingly possible. These concerns are not being helped by renewed jitters in sovereign debt markets on Ireland's downgrade with government bond spreads widening again and the spread between Ireland's and Germany's debt at new records.Complete Story »

Tom Lydon submits:

Everyone loves gold these days. Investor fear, market uncertainty and general safe-haven seeking has sent people scurrying to gold ETFs. But like most trends, this won’t last forever. For now, though, the trend is there. Gold moved higher today after it was reported that existing home sales plunged 27% in July, says Matt Whitaker for The Wall Street Journal.Complete Story »

Brooks McFeely submits:4:30 PM, Aug 20, 2010 --

• DJIA down 57.6 (-0.6%) to 10,214
• S&P 500 down 4 (-0.4%) to 1,072
• Nasdaq up 0.8 (+0.04%) to 2,180

GLOBAL SENTIMENT Complete Story »

Matthew Bradbard submits: Traders who have been around know this all too well: “plan your trade” and “trade your plan.” Crude will finish lower today but well off its lows on a bearish inventory report. On such a bearish report the fact that Crude was able to hold its own means, we think, a rally is in the making. As long as $75 holds on a closing basis we still expect a grind to $80/barrel in the coming weeks. At these levels of risk/reward we suggest bullish exposure in natural gas. Our suggestions include scaling into October futures and purchasing 50-70 cent November call spreads. We expect sideways sloppy action in the indices; a settlement below the 50 day MA at 1085 should mean 1035-1050, a settlement above the 20 day at 1103 should mean a challenge of 1125. Not too exciting but we view this as a tradable range. Comparing the current Treasury market to the Nasdaq tech bubble in my opinion is not a fair comparison. I do think it will end ugly, not because of greed but rather investors realizing that 2-4% over decades is a losing investment. A top could be in the making but I suggest waiting for evidence and being late to the trade.Complete Story »