Technically Speaking For September 11

Summary

• Hong Kong and Vietnam have entered bear markets.
• In fact, most of the ETFs that track broader global equity markets are either moving lower or are already near 52-week lows.
• Prices moved higher Tuesday.

It's hard to forget this day, isn't it? I was in law school on September 11, 2001. It was the first semester of my first year. I'm not sure when I first heard about what was happening, but I do remember being downstairs in the dining area and watching the news. Then there was an announcement that the school was closed (we were in the same building as a state appellate court and were therefore considered a hard target). I also remember being off the next day as well. There were several people who dropped out of law school, citing the 9/11 attacks as their primary reason. Anyway, those are my memories of this very depressing day in U.S. history.

I've already noted the divergence between U.S. markets and the rest of the world. Now Hong Kong is in a bear market:

Hong Kong’s stocks fell into a bear market Tuesday, another casualty of an international selloff driven by trade tensions, a stronger dollar, and worries about the resilience of developing economies.

And so is Vietnam:

Prices have dropped from 20.5 to an absolute low of 15.03 and are now just below the 200-day EMA in the mid-16s. Equity markets are leading indicators, which means we should definitely be paying attention to this development. Due to the increased international financial linkage, it's difficult seeing the divergence between the U.S. and other international markets lasting. One should logically give. And considering the U.S. market is a single market (albeit it a very large one) and the rest of the world comprises many markets, it seems natural that it's the U.S. that should move lower.

And since we're talking about global markets, and this is a chart-oriented column, let's look at the one-year charts of the ETFs that track global markets:

Australia (top row, second from right) was the other market performing well. It recently fell sharply and is now near a 52-week low. All the other charts are very bearish and are either near a 52-week low or are trending lower.

Turning to the markets, here is Tuesday's performance table
This is what the bulls want to see: equity markets moving higher and bond markets moving lower. That is a bullish alignment. And, we have the QQQs on top -- another healthy development. There's a bit more risk in this average. The SPYs and IWMs also rounded out the indexes moving higher.

When we last left the markets, they were trading right around key technical support levels:

Prices are trading right at the trend line that connects the lows of late June and mid-August. We are above the highs from late January but have sold off a bit from the record highs of last week. The main issue is the lack of momentum: the MACD is moving sideways, which is very non-committal.

As for Tuesday's action, we have the following chart:

There are two trends: an upswing that lasted all morning as prices moved from 170-171. They then consolidated gains sideways for the rest of the day.

The Russell 2000 was noticeably different. It traded between 170-171 during the morning. Then it rallied and moved lower for the rest of the day. It ended trading just above yesterday's close.

And here is the 30-day chart:

Right now, the 200-minute EMA is acting as a center of gravity for prices.

There remains an overall bullish undertone to the market, provided by price action along with the underlying economic sentiment. However, the lack of a really strong rally -- that is, big candles with really strong volume -- is an issue.

Disclosure: I/we have no positions in any stocks mentioned, and no plans to initiate any positions within the next 72 hours. I wrote this article myself, and it expresses my own opinions. I am not receiving compensation for it (other than from Seeking Alpha). I have no business relationship with any company whose stock is mentioned in this article.