• 526 days Will The ECB Continue To Hike Rates?
  • 526 days Forbes: Aramco Remains Largest Company In The Middle East
  • 528 days Caltech Scientists Succesfully Beam Back Solar Power From Space
  • 928 days Could Crypto Overtake Traditional Investment?
  • 932 days Americans Still Quitting Jobs At Record Pace
  • 934 days FinTech Startups Tapping VC Money for ‘Immigrant Banking’
  • 937 days Is The Dollar Too Strong?
  • 938 days Big Tech Disappoints Investors on Earnings Calls
  • 939 days Fear And Celebration On Twitter as Musk Takes The Reins
  • 940 days China Is Quietly Trying To Distance Itself From Russia
  • 941 days Tech and Internet Giants’ Earnings In Focus After Netflix’s Stinker
  • 945 days Crypto Investors Won Big In 2021
  • 945 days The ‘Metaverse’ Economy Could be Worth $13 Trillion By 2030
  • 946 days Food Prices Are Skyrocketing As Putin’s War Persists
  • 948 days Pentagon Resignations Illustrate Our ‘Commercial’ Defense Dilemma
  • 948 days US Banks Shrug off Nearly $15 Billion In Russian Write-Offs
  • 952 days Cannabis Stocks in Holding Pattern Despite Positive Momentum
  • 952 days Is Musk A Bastion Of Free Speech Or Will His Absolutist Stance Backfire?
  • 953 days Two ETFs That Could Hedge Against Extreme Market Volatility
  • 955 days Are NFTs About To Take Over Gaming?
  1. Home
  2. Markets
  3. Other

Investor Sentiment: Time To Pay Attention!

After 8 months of indifference to the constant and persistent rise in stock prices, the "smart money" has finally turned bearish. It is time to pay attention.

The "Smart Money" indicator is shown in figure 1. The "smart money indicator is a composite of the following data: 1) public to specialist short ratio; 2) specialist short to total short ratio; 3) SP100 option traders. The "Smart Money" indicator is has turned bearish for the first time since January, 2009.

Figure 1. "Smart Money" Indicator/ weekly
Smart Money Indicicator

The "Dumb Money" indicator (see figure 2) looks for extremes in the data from 4 different groups of investors who historically have been wrong on the market: 1) Investor Intelligence; 2) Market Vane; 3) American Association of Individual Investors; and 4) the put call ratio. The "Dumb Money" indicator is bullish to an extreme degree, and this implies that a price move is either nearing its end or the ascent of prices is surely to show. This is our expectation 85% of the time.

Figure 2. "Dumb Money" Indicator/ weekly
Dumb Money Indicicator

Figure 3 is a weekly chart of the S&P500 with the InsiderScore "entire market" value in the lower panel. From the InsiderScore weekly report we get the following: "early signals indicate that insiders are not going to deviate from the path they've taken over the past year".

Figure 3. InsiderScore/ weekly "entire market" value
InsiderScore Entire Market

Figure 4 is a weekly chart of the S&P500. The indicator in the lower panel measures all the assets in the Rydex bullish oriented equity funds divided by the sum of assets in the bullish oriented equity funds plus the assets in the bearish oriented equity funds. When the indicator is green, the value is low and there is fear in the market; this is where market bottoms are forged. When the indicator is red, there is complacency in the market. There are too many bulls and this is when market advances stall.

Currently, the value of the indicator is 67.14%. Values greater than 58% (arbitrarily chosen) are associated with market tops, and the red dots over the price bars indicate such.

Figure 4. Rydex Total Bull v. Total Bear/ weekly
Rydex Total Bull versus Total Bear

Shorter term Rydex measures showed excessive bullishness (i.e, not seen since 2004) earlier in the week. This data, which has proved to be very actionable, is available as Premium Content. This service should help you improve your market timing.

 

Back to homepage

Leave a comment

Leave a comment