This is not a normal statement from a normal cabinet member of a major nation.
This statement from Israeli National Security Minister Ben-Gvir is the statement of a war criminal.
The racist, extremist Israeli government does not deserve one nickel of U.S. support.
The market is experiencing a historic divergence:
The ratio of the equal-weighted S&P 500 to the S&P 500 index is down to 1.1, near the lowest since 2003.
This ratio is now below the 2008 Financial Crisis low of ~1.2 and is down -28% since February 2023, the biggest drawdown since the 2000 Dot-Com Bubble.
Over this period, the S&P 500 has rallied +81%, more than double the gain of the equal-weighted index, at +34%.
These massive gains have been fueled by technology stocks, with the Nasdaq 100 index surging +151% over the same period.
Tech stocks are all that matters.
Opening Print:
Our View
Yesterday, prediction markets saw a surge in activity, including over $53 million in wagers on conflict outcomes. According to Polymarket, traders recently assigned a roughly 65% chance that the U.S. and Iran will announce a cease-fire by June 30, a notable increase from 52% in late March.
Simultaneously, data from the Intercontinental Exchange revealed aggressive hedging in the energy sector; traders snapped up options betting that Brent crude could either plummet to $85 a barrel or lower next month or catapult to $120 and above.
While there has recently been a lot of front-running in the futures and options markets, the predictive markets have proven to be where a lot of the inside information bets show up. No matter what happens during tonight's speech, I will not be changing anything I have written.
Our Lean
There should be absolutely no surprise about what's going on. Trump has a history of making bullish headlines after the stock market falls. Since the start of his second term in January 2025, several high-profile instances stand out where market-moving rhetoric shifted following significant drops.
April 2, 2025: “Liberation Day” tariff announcement (start of 11% plunge)
April 9, 2025: Administration pauses tariffs (the “bullish pivot”)
June 2025: Major indices recover all losses to hit new all-time highs
Early October 2025: S&P 500 suffers its sharpest decline since April
October 13, 2025: Administration signals openness to a China trade deal (market rebound)
March 2026: S&P 500 enters technical downtrend (8.7% drop from records)
March 26, 2026: Bullish comments follow a 450-point Dow drop
April 1, 2026: Wall Street rallies on ceasefire speculation and the June 30 deadline
So far, I have never thought the war was over. Iran has not agreed to negotiate an end to the war in any straightforward or unconditional way. There is indirect messaging and some diplomatic activity, but Tehran has repeatedly rejected U.S. proposals.
At the end of the day, Trump has mixed this with threats of further strikes on Iranian energy infrastructure if no deal is reached quickly by his April 6 deadline.
The two-day rally is the largest since April 10, 2025, and the largest percentage gain since May 13, 2025, but there have also been some large drops or reversals. The VIX has fallen from 35.45 on March 9th down to 23.49 at 12:00 PM yesterday and settled at 24.54, down 0.71 points or -2.81%.
While still elevated, there seems to be a lower level of fear, yet the Fear and Greed Index is still showing extreme fear.
Our lean: Are the lows in? I don’t know. I asked GROK if the lows were in, and it said:
"Bottom line: April 1's up day was encouraging and tied to hopes the Iran conflict eases (echoing your previous questions on negotiations). But it's too early to call the absolute lows in — this remains a high-uncertainty environment with geopolitical headlines dominating. A sustained break above recent resistance or clear progress on Iran/U.S. talks would strengthen the case for a bottom. If fighting continues or escalates, new lows are very possible."
This pretty much says what I said last week: if there is a negotiated end to the war, the markets will go back up, but traders have made a lot of money betting with Trump after big sell-offs.
My gut says the markets can go higher, my street smarts says... this isn't over until it's over, and we have already rallied sharply. Trump’s speech could be a sell-the-news event.
BREAKING: President Trump is "enthusiastic" about continuing the war in Iran for at least another 3-4 weeks even as oil prices rebound, per Axios.
Details include:
1. Following a G7 call, France's President Macron said "no one can tell what Donald Trump wants from this war"
2. US and Israel have not secured the 450 kilograms of highly enriched uranium that Iran holds
3. US and Israel reportedly "do not entirely agree on what winning looks like"
4. "We don't want to leave early, do we? We gotta finish the job, right," Trump said
US stocks are now down over -1% on the day.
Genuine question: Why was $SNDK such a great fader today?
I’d love to learn what some of the causes are based on community feedback.
I have a few ideas but nothing great yet, I did trade it but didn’t get close to the potential.
I would appreciate anyone who has deeper insight
Current situation:
1. Stocks = Record high
2. Gold = Record high
3. Silver = Record high
4. Home Prices = Record high
5. Copper = Record high
6. Platinum = Record high
7. Money Market Funds = Record high
8. US Debt = Record high
9. Deficit Spending = Record high
10. Household Debt = Record high
When everything hits a record high at the same exact time, it's not a coincidence.
Fiat currencies are depreciating.
Qullamaggie on Do This One Thing, End Up With 10 Million In Your Trading Account
“What are your tips for anyone who wants to - okay, easiest one. You need to research the markets. What you need to do, get TC2000, look at the monthly chart, then you put up the watchlist. US stocks, you go through every US stock, and then you can have instead of a volume, you put a dollar volume here.
You look at stocks that you know, at least say a billion or whatever in monthly dollar volume, or five billion or whatever. So you avoid all the super thin ones and what you’re gonna look for are the stocks that say doubled in six months, or went up 300% in a year or 400% in 3-4 years.
You know you look, you’re gonna go create a separate watchlist for every single stock that made big moves. Maybe you’re gonna get 500 or whatever 300, 200 stocks that are liquid. You just gonna go back to like, you know to the 90s or 80s, and then you gonna look just at chart patterns.
Like how do stocks move? Because stocks move in a very specific way, you get this, the same chart patterns occur over and over again. There’s nothing new; you get the same chart patterns. There’s some variations of them, but you got the same short patterns in the 90s as you get today.
That’s the first thing you look at. Just price action like you can put some indicators on, like I use the moving averages. You can use whatever indicator you want! Don’t use too many, okay? Use a few; I would recommend moving averages, and then you look at this.
You know the biggest moves and look at how they acted, like when they pulled back, like how do they act in a pullback. Which moving averages do the best stocks? Like obey right. You look at all that stuff; you build a database in your head.
You spend 1,000 hours doing that, just you know. Print the charts out. I have a big ever note database with thousands and thousands of them, like I have thousands, tens of thousands of charts right.
And then you start looking at fundamentals and news, etc., etc. Like what is driving what? What makes a stock go up 500% in a year?
You spend another thousand hours doing that, and boom before you know it, you’re gonna have $10 million in your accounts, I promise you.”
--if a stock has large volume on Open and trades abv all resistance then look to buy when it pulls back to R1/R2 area.
--in $PRAX buyers stepped up to R1(pre-market resistance) which became support
--if stock then closes above R3/top 20% range it is a good swing long
MY TRICK TO OBSESS OVER DAILY IMPROVEMENT RATHER THAN DAILY PNL
One of the first concepts I teach any new trainee is the importance of focusing on daily improvement rather than daily PNL.
My “bobblehead concept” helps you stay focused on what matters.
https://t.co/Ek2CE23wsH
The selloff on Friday is a result of ALOT of concentrated bets being unwound at same time . Does this continue ? Fundamentally it makes no sense to be bearish . Why? Well because the tariff levels to be implemented effectively extinguish trade between US and China . Moreover it doesn’t resolve the rare earth controls for the US. Both sides will be hurt significantly- that’s why we have a 1st Nov implementation date . So fundamentally there is no reason to be short .
So why would you be short ? Well if you think VOL needs to reprice and shift to higher level . That could create further forced flows . Given Monday is US holiday- this could be problematic as there is a low liquidity environment .
At a technical level markets had run out of momentum the past 2 weeks . So this correction was long overdue . But this little wobble is hardly a correction . That being said - we have not seen more then 5% pullback since start of April rally . Will we get one now? I don’t see any reason why …..
Don’t forget - US growth is >3% and no risks have been able to stop the markets from rallying. I’m not sure why empty threats changes anything.
probably worth watching $ORCL for next few days.
--it was sold 6 days in a row after the large gap
--a close above 305 could be start of it moving back to 330+