FuturesTechs Blog

Someone should buy Ben Bernanke and Hank Paulson a pair of super-hero suits, because they’ve come to the rescue again!

Back in March (the last time were down at these levels) they stepped in to rescue the markets when they were on key Fibonacci support levels… Today I’m going to post the mail I sent out to all of our professional clients and contacts at that time. You may get a feeling of Deja vu reading this:

“Anyone who looks at Dollar/Yen will know that the BoJ intervene at key technical levels. THEY LOOK AT CHARTS.

I mooted something in the Bund report this morning that may have had a few people questioning my sanity; the idea that the Fed are stepping in to hold Equities above key supports.

Let’s look at the evidence: The last big move from the Fed was the 75 bps cut in January, just when the S&P was threatening to shank through 1281.70, the 38.2% Fibonacci retracement of the March 2003 - October 2007 rally. A BIG LEVEL!

They did the same thing yesterday when we were once again back at these levels.

In terms of the medium term technicals there is a strong argument that many people will be looking for weakness to 1187.50 then 1093 if this level breaks.

The key here isn’t whether this move can or will unfold; it’s the number of people who believe the story, and if intervention means the sell trigger doesn’t come, and a solid base of support is found, then the intervention would be deemed a success.

In the Dow Futures the corresponding KEY support is 11651.

In the NASDAQ it’s 1699″

The NASDAQ has done fine since then and isn’t threatening these key levels but the Dow and S&P dipped below them last week…. and Treasury and Fed stepped in…

More tomorrow. Watch this space.

PS. Follow this link for my latest CNBC appearance. I was making a point about not needing to “pick bottoms”. It could have been any number of charts from the Banking or Building Sectors, really, so no offence to Bradford and Bingley…

Another busy week in the markets:

Bond markets have pretty much gone one way all week, and it’s been quite tidy, barring the first hour blip in the Eurex Bund Futures on Monday. I have spoken to several traders this week as it was the IDX Exhibition in London. To a man they said that Monday was one of the craziest moves they’d ever seen in these markets. Technical Analysis allowed us to step back from this and suggest it may be a selling opportunity. Sweet!

Equities have been pretty predictable, I think. Across most markets is looking increasingly Bearish and I said at the SII Risk Forum last night that I think we’ll see a fresh test of the Year’s lows soon in things like the FTSE, DAX, Dow Jones and S&P. The NASDAQ has been the most resiliant of late, but even that has now given a sell signal.

Oil is a market for the brave right now. It’s just insane!!! In the Brent Crude Oil contract on ICE we’ve seen so much volatility that it does smack of a top, but as yet we haven’t broken any really important supports, so we’re not calling a top. In fact we still consider that weakness should be bought.

And a football tournament that I have absolutely no interest in is, I have to admit, somewhat strange. I really want Holland to keep up the good work, partly because I really like the Dutch people anyway, and partly because Monday’s game was (what I saw of it) a real joy to watch.