Don't Count the Bulls Out... Yet

I awoke this morning at the crack of dawn all fired up for Turnaround Tuesday.

While yesterday was the slowest session of the year -- and that's saying something -- it was meaningful from a price action standpoint. S&P 1040 (and S&P 1010) are levels of lore for traders galore. You don't need to believe in technical analysis, you just need to be aware that alotta traders do.

Here's what I'm vibing at a top-line level during a day when I have more meetings than J-Date:
 

• The merchants of doom and gloom, discussed last week and featured in tomorrow's syndicated missive, edged my internal compass in a more constructive direction, if only for a trade.
  
  
• That might be silly given the frightening headwinds such as slowing global growth, untenable debt, out-of-control derivative markets, muted volatility levels, and -- despite all this -- a scarce percentage of bears as measured by sentiment surveys, but it's how I feel and I would be remiss if I didn't share.
  
  
• If we break below the aforementioned S&P levels, picture a pit boss yelling "No bet!" before risking your hard earned coin on the Matador Crowd. Until then, view obstacles as opportunities -- and defined risk as your friend.
  
  
• And no, that doesn’t mean we’re no longer in The Eye of the Storm, I’m just hoping to get some color in my cheeks before I gotta put on a poncho and man up.
  
  
• I bought Apple (AAPL) last week and sold it flat (before it popped $5 -- premature evacuation!). It's since edged back to that technical toggle and I nibbled on that name this morning near $240 as a pure rental as discussed in real-time on the Buzz & Banter. I have dual stops -- the S&P and/or below $240 in Apple -- and it'll be gone (but not forgotten) by today’s close win, lose, or draw.
  
  
• Minyan Brett, in The Exchange following my column yesterday, asked "At what point does an effort to run a site "sans acrimony" result in the site becoming dull, bland, and not thought provoking?" I would offer that the quality of the content, the vibe of the tribe, and the Minyanville message outweighs the... political correctness? He wasn’t being adversarial (he's a good dude); just think how far we've come when someone mentions "Minyanville" and "bland" in the same sentence. Either we've come a long way... or we're going the wrong way.
  
  
• Professor Fil “My Pockets” Zucchi on yesterday’s Buzz:
  
  "Across the pond the spreads of Italy, Portugal, and Spain 10yr. bonds vs the German 10yr. widened approximately 10% since Aug. 24, and Irish bonds widened more than 15%. All these spreads are within a whisker of the highs seen when Greece was on the ropes, with the exception of Ireland's spreads which are a full .50bps higher. I am aware of the argument that, with the ECB standby printing line of 800 billion euros (I can't believe something like that actually exists, but I digress), there is little if any chance that countries will fail auctions. Nonetheless, the burden of the printing press ultimately falls on the currency and by extension on Germany and France. So far the German bonds are not showing any signs of stress, but don't take them off your radar because, as we have seen before, when sovereign avalanches get rolling they pick up speed faster than most can react.”
  
  
• The Raider Haters are positing that my Silver and Black could conceivably make the play-offs? Hey, I'll take it; this is my favorite time of year... they're tied for first!
  
  
• Wow Zhou, say it ain't so?
  
  
• You've heard of The Parent Trap but what about The Value Trap? We mused years ago that multiples would drop to single digit midgets from triple-digit giants (as we saw so often in tech) by the time the financial process singled through? Sorta like this?
  
  
• Did I ever tell the story about when I bought 400,000 Platinum Technologies because it was trading at 2X sales and BOOM, they pre-announced and all of a sudden it was trading at 4X sales?
  
  
• Bank America (BAC) and Citigroup (C) have under-performed since the word “go” this morning. Watch the financials, cookie; as go the piggies, so goes the poke.
  
  
• Why do I still feel guilty about taking trips -- even though much of it is business -- such as the excursion on Friday that'll take me through nine cities before depositing me back in the big city on the red-eye Wednesday, September 15th? If you’re a West Coast Minyan and wanna belly up in San Fran (9/10-11) or San Diego (9/12-14), tickle Gibby for more details!

R.P.

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