Gary Tanashian's  Instablog

If you are a speculator, the extreme situations currently in play in the broad stock market (95% of the way to a potential 'triple top' scenario price-wise, and 80+% of the way time-wise) and the gold market (impulsive price drops amid growing concerns that the bull is dead despite rising money supply data) as of March 1, 2013 are the situations that you wait for.

In short, pivot points are the place to deploy capital (either to the short or long side) for big gains. The stock market has been on a cyclical trend for 4 years and a secular, mostly sideways trend for 12 years. Gold has been in cyclical downtrend for 1.5 years and a secular uptrend for 12 years. That is all well and good but trends can be a grind, filled with ups and downs, stops and starts.

A big macro pivot point on the other hand can be a career maker - if you can catch it at the right time after correctly gauging its potential. This is no easy task. If it were we would all be mega rich due to our amazing ability to call the markets. Unfortunately, the markets have a great way of throwing curve balls that not only have a wicked spin on them, but also burrow down hard and in. Maybe it is heavy sliders that the market continually throws, maybe it is sinkers. Whatever it is, our bats are often sawed off just when we think we are dialed in to a grand slam.

So moderation and risk management are what we should practice most of the time. It sounds boring, but when a big pivot comes, you will be glad to be in position to capitalize on these rare events. As an example, people who had cash in 2008 and 2009 were afforded the opportunity to buy all sorts of assets on the cheap, beginning with the precious metals, then key commodities and finally extending out to the stock market.

2008′s deflationary destruction was a contrarian macro pivot point as this Time Magazine cover with its depression-era bread line photo said all anyone needed to know about what the play would be.

And then came Tony Robbins sometime in 2009 warning the public about the dire consequences of the new depression and the rest is history. A cyclical bull market was born of too much doom, gloom and certainty by the public that the world as we knew it was over.

Dial ahead to today and we find the estimable Time Magazine asking…

Are We Watching a Great Rotation Into Stocks?

What does this tell you? Does Time know what it is talking about this time or is it just reflecting the public's view of the world back from mirror into which it dimly gazes?

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S&P 500 monthly chart

Time Magazine published photos of breadlines and headlines reading "Depression 2.0″ at the very beginning of the current cycle, at exactly the time people should have been buying. Today, just below a potentially profound macro pivot point Time seriously ponders a "great rotation" into stocks. Sure, they could get it right this time. But what do you think are the odds of that?

You see, you have got to think for yourself if you are going to effectively practice what is necessary to succeed over the long-term in the markets. No analyst, guru or newsletter writer should be followed in a passive manner. How do you know they are not just trend followers, doing what is comfortable; doing what seems to feel the best and make the most sense at any given time?

It seemed to make the most sense to be bearish in early 2009. It was time to be very bullish. It seems to make sense now to be bullish now because it feels good and the apparent dangers are dissipating as policy makers assure us that they remain benevolent and in control. They are not in control, but it has been a long, hard battle for the formerly embattled Ben Bernanke to be given the respect of his predecessors. He now has it.

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Dear (monetary) Leader, our Hero

Just look at his smug self-satisfaction. The benevolent hero in full control. We will continue to work on a macro pivot for sometime in 2013 until given reason not to. In 2008 I became bullish on the gold sector first, then in early 2009 there was crude oil, copper and soon a Pandora's box of asset markets giving contrarian bull signals. That was a macro pivot.

Today we should look out ahead to gauge the possibility of its opposite becoming engaged before too long. I believe the bloodbath in the precious metals may be a precursor to something profound. The PM's did after all, lead the great cyclical bull market dubbed here as "Hope 09″.

For profound events to work for you in any sort of a good way you must be prepared for it. Being prepared means opposing psychologically powerful forces like the will of the herd, which probably comprises 90-something percent of the people. It is harder than it sounds.

May, 2012: "Gary = Dumb Investor", which was a memorable comment response (among many) to the SeekingAlpha version of this bullish article: Dumb Money Sold in May and Went Away

Presently, I am an "idiot" and a "doomer" for being 'risk vs. reward' bearish on the US markets.

Excerpted from NFTRH 225:

The Great Rotation Promotion

Promotion (Dictionary.com): something devised to publicize or advertise a product, cause, institution, etc.

The title implies a bear writer about to write bearish things. I get it. I guess I am a bear writer now because I can no longer be a bull writer. That is because my b/s detector is calibrated to its most sensitive setting and usually begins sounding early. The b/s detector went off early last May and the bullish analysis had to endure through a very volatile summer. Now it is the same, in reverse.

But SPX 1550+ is our plan, not that of most come-lately bulls. We staked it out months ago and it appears to be coming about. Further, it is coming about with signs - like the 'boots on the ground' evidence of the semiconductor equipment upturn, creeping 'jobs' stabilization and generally good corporate results during earnings season. That is the reality.

What is also a reality is a Federal Reserve doing its best to backstop and promote all of this, as normal inflation indicators have not yet registered. They literally have free license to print money and try to promote bubbles. The "Great Rotation" story is being manufactured in the media and it is the perfect accompaniment to the current sentiment-fueled rally toward very important targets. It also raises an interesting question.

If low interest rates have been a key to what lame economic recovery is in play now, what would the rising interest rates implied by the "Great Rotation" out of bonds and into stocks bring about?

We'll follow up that question with more questions; with a defection by the public would the Fed then begin to buy bonds of all types and durations? Shorter-term Treasuries, investment grade corporates, junk and municiples to go along with its stated operation in MBS and long-term Treasuries?

Basically that is a Fed out of control and on steroids, bloating itself up until one day it just bursts. Perhaps the tin foil hat brigade will find the answer in the $Trillions in buying power of US retirement accounts. There is chatter about the government overseeing these accounts for the benefit of its citizens.

More likely, bond revulsion to the benefit of stocks would serve to expedite the end of the now 4-year-old bull market. The story seems to fit nicely with the big picture technicals and the idea that a bull market will use the weirdest stories to suck in the final holdouts prior to termination.

This is a cyclical bull market, so it does not need to flame out with the grand idiocy of the dot.com-style promotions ('who needs revenue?') of the secular bull ended 2000. It is a cyclical bull that has already run for 20% of the time of its secular predecessor, and a silly story about a great rotation from bonds to stocks goes well with the dynamics currently in play. It is more in line with the garden variety insanity that the inflation-fueled cyclical bull (2003-2007) promoted: 'house prices will always go up'.

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A cycle nears its end. Will it be different this time?

The kinds of people who chase late-stage bull markets need paint-by-numbers direction. After all, to these people there are only "stocks and bonds" per the most basic, fundamental and ongoing financial industry promotion.

The chart above shows an epic setup in the making. The first part of the big play will be to either preserve capital or for those willing to risk the short side, capitalize on the next down cycle. The best opportunity however, would probably be to buy assets for pennies on the dollar at the next cycle bottom.

Meanwhile, it appears bull heroes are being made as the trend-following media celebrate the brave contrarians that called the bull when everyone was bearish in 2009. Where was the media last summer? The end of the world is what it was promoting then.

Bring on SPX 1550+ and the potential for a profound transition sometime in mid-late 2013 or early 2014.

[Note the word 'potential'. Nobody has a crystal ball, but technical targets, bull cycle duration and the current sentiment backdrop argue strongly for a defensive stance on balance when viewing the entirety of 2013. Meanwhile, this post measures SPX targets of 1562 and 1589 for euphoric bulls to chew on.]

Biiwii.com, Twitter, Free eLetter, NFTRH

The following is excerpted from this week's edition of Notes From the Rabbit Hole, NFTRH 224:

"Just the Facts"

To once again quote the man I respected more than any other market professional I have come in contact with, [a late friend], we will list "just the facts" in order to define a complicated, yet very interesting period in time.

• Stock sentiment was at an extreme over-bearish level by what Sentimtrader.com's data label "dumb money" last summer and as expected, a continuation rally of the bull market out of 2009 sprung from that sentiment backdrop.

• The rally's character is currently of one-way momentum compared to its jagged, up and down nerve-racking beginnings.

• The sentiment profile is now opposite to its over-bearish state (by dumb money) at the rally's beginning.

• The bull remains in full force with a string of 4 sets of major higher highs and higher lows intact out of 2009.

• Major events over the last year included a resolution by the ECB to bailout insolvent union members, the election in the US of a president committed to entitlements and credit expansion, the commitment by the US Fed to use increasingly inflationary policy to manage an economy it deems below capacity, a Kabuki Dance in service to the pretense that the Fiscal Cliff ™ debate was anything more than for show, a kicking of the US debt ceiling can a bit further down the road, Chinese stimulus operations and the election of a leader in Japan who called out the BOJ and has committed to stimulating inflation in his country. Have we missed anything? Yes, there was much more.

• Signs of economic expansion are cropping up in the economy, from the anecdotal evidence of semiconductor equipment orders we noted last week to a 53.1 reading on the ISM report to tepid jobs growth.

And all of it, but all of it is dependent upon credit expansion! The stock market rally, the economy's creeping expansion and the very continuation of the current system are all dependent upon policy makers' willingness and ability to continue to expand credit.

So let's not be fooled into getting too wrapped up in casino mentality. Yes, the writer who criticizes "casino patrons" and speculative mentality is using derivatives to hedge volatility, bull the Yen, etc. But I am also not able to short stocks directly because I requested that margin "privilege" be removed from my accounts to manage counterparty risk in the brokerage world. I keep healthy cash levels and have long-since been an investor in gold and a keeper of the idea that having debt in an expanding credit construct is fine until one day, it is not fine at all.

So with an understanding that everything bullish casino patrons are celebrating today is the product of inflationary policy that came in response to everything they were afraid of last spring and summer, let's move on.

Credit Must Expand

There simply is no other choice. Ever since Alan Greenspan met the end of the last great stock bull market and subsequent economic deceleration early last decade with bold new policy (now child's play compared to what today's Fed is doing), we have been locked into an ever-expanding credit continuum, which was severely interrupted in 2008.

This new bubble in credit launched house prices to new and unsustainable heights but worse than that, drilled down into the mortgage derivatives market by slicing and dicing new Ponzi-products that could be sold into this credit-expansion-lifts-all-boats atmosphere. Whatever it is, sell it! The Fed is compelling you to do so. They sold it all right, and a lot of people bought it.

As the mortgage bubble continues to deflate, credit risk has been offloaded from the institutions that abused and profited from the system to the Federal Reserve itself. But really, this burden falls on the American people in the form of their collective debt via the US Treasury.

So there is a great cyclical stock bull happening. The economy may turn up a bit. Investment managers and the public alike are turning more bullish after having been oh so bearish last year. I am once again writing like a 'bear writer' and this stuff may sound stupid for a while. Last summer I sounded (and sometimes felt) stupid for calling the market a bullish risk vs. reward situation.

How to Play It?

I am not going to try to tell readers whether or how to speculate. That is casino patron stuff. Bears are in agony now as the market feeds on pure momentum as all those investment managers come streaming back into the play. My extended family member who is a financial adviser is now constructive on the US economy and thinks the stock market has legs for 2013 and possibly beyond. You will recall he advised that his best and brightest fund managers were mostly cash in November and expecting a Fiscal Cliff related crash in December. Ha ha ha…

As of now, the market is bullish. They are printing money after all in the age of 'Inflation onDemand', inflate-or-die or whatever you want to call it. But this is now becoming a global phenomenon and as long as the system holds together various currencies are going play Whack-a-Mole and alternately appear strong or weak. As long as FOREX measures these basket cases against each other and as long as the vast majority maintains a casino mentality (i.e. as long as people are able to suspend disbelief that the system is unsustainable) the game goes on.

So it is not just the bears that are having a tough time right now. It is the believers in sound money, which to this point through history has been represented by gold. This is supposed to be THEIR time I tell you! Well no it is not, because it is not. We can read all kinds of reasoning into the situation, from the Fed and its henchmen in the 'Bankster' cabal operating ruthless manipulation schemes to a simple idea that too many people bought gold in too much of a panic during the acute phase of the Euro crisis.

Whatever it is, it is. If you are a strong believer in your principles and if you are able to manage without being overtaken by casino mentality, you are good. Go forth and speculate, but don't swallow anybody else's playbook (including or in some cases especially, the goldbugs') whole. You are a real believer in sound money and sound systems? Then you are not leveraged to the system because you have managed personal debt and outright own things of value, including possibly, the monetary metal.

Biiwii.com, Twitter, eLetter, NFTRH

Disclosure: I have no positions in any stocks mentioned, and no plans to initiate any positions within the next 72 hours.

Additional disclosure: No positions mentioned.