With today's early rally and VIX on its way back down the recent mountain, now feels like the right time to capture some options premium in a wide Iron Condor in the QQQs.

I'm not calling that the bottom is in, but I'm open to it. Either way, it's unlikely we V-Bottom out of this morass, which is why betting on a wide, sloppy, sideways range feels right to me.

In today’s Daily Digest, we’ll review the following:

1. New position in XLB.
2. No adjustments are needed today.
3. Exited XLB and EEM at profit targets.
4. Current status of open campaigns.
5. Volatility Snapshot.

Let’s dig in!

From the Desk of Steve Strazza @Sstrazza

Welcome to The Minor Leaguers.

We've had some great trades come out of this small-cap-focused column since we launched it back in 2020 and started rotating it with our flagship bottom-up scan, Under the Hood.

For the first year or so, we focused only on Russell 2000 stocks with a market cap between $1 and $2B.

That was fun, but we wanted to branch out a bit and allow some new stocks to find their way onto our list.

We expanded our universe to include some mid-caps.

Nowadays, to make the cut for our Minor Leaguers list, a company must have a market cap between $1 and $4B.

And it doesn't have to be a Russell component — it can be any US-listed equity. With participation expanding around the globe, we want all those ADRs in our universe.

The same price and liquidity filters are applied. Then, as always, we sort by proximity to new...

Some of the most important names in software and semiconductors are seeing fresh buys, perhaps indicating confidence at bargain levels.

📌 Adobe $ADBE

CFO Durn Daniel bought 1,300 shares, equivalent to $507,759. 

Following CFO insider buys is crucial because they know the numbers better than anyone. When a CFO puts their own money on the line, it’s often a strong signal of confidence in the company.

📌 Oracle $ORCL

Director Michael J. Boskin added $111,145—not massive, but still a nod to a software heavyweight that’s been holding key support.

Here’s The Hot Corner, with data from March 21, 2025:

Click the table to enlarge it.

📌 Advanced Micro Devices $AMD & ASML Holding NV $ASML

Sen. Ashley Moody purchased $100,000 to $250,000 worth of AMD and between $50,001 and $100,000 of ASML—two semiconductor powerhouses way off their highs from last year.

Sen. Moody also bought $100,000 to $250,000 of Lilly(Eli) &...

Nike reported earnings on Thursday evening, and the market crushed it on Friday.

It was the stock's 4th consecutive negative earnings reaction. This is one of the longest beat-down streaks in the S&P 500.

Our retail analyst, Jeff Macke, said, "Nike (was) expected to report its worst quarter in years." The expectations were super low, allowing the company to beat expectations across the board.

They reported revenues of $11.27B versus the $11.02 estimate and $0.54 per share versus the $0.30 estimate. It was a great quarter, so why didn't the market reward the stock?

Here's what Jeff thinks, "because of the massive size of the Nike, turning it around is like doing doughnuts in an aircraft carrier. It takes time and space."

In other words, the market wants to see more. 

Nike is guilty until proven innocent.

*click the image to enlarge it

As you can see...

Bottoming is best thought of as a process rather than a moment. The all look different but when you see a correction it usually hits these stages:

• A negative catalyst appears, usually when stocks are expensive. Expensive stocks get sold. Investors "rotate" with growing speed.
• The threat seems larger. Inevitable. The rush to the exit picks up pace in stocks. Everyone's running the same playbook and "sell" is the only defensible call as every group sells-off.
• The tide turns, slowly then all-at-once. The risk becomes quantifiable. Bad news becomes more company specific. Selling slowly dries up as (dirty truth of investing here): The Optimists Always Win.

That was the case to a much greater degree the greatest bottom in the history of consumer discretionary stocks in March of 2020. The group was down 35% in just over a month. Stores were shutting down day after day, leading to pretty much the entire economy being shutdown for the foreseeable future. 

It was a really hard time to start buying consumer discretionary stocks. Like a Trade...

The S&P 500 continues slipping in the power rankings as long-term trends shift in favor of international markets.

This transition is clear in the S&P 500’s shift from green to red—signaling weakening relative strength.

We’ve highlighted this rotation for some time.

Two key questions arise from this:

• Will international markets outperform the U.S. over the long term
• Which leads in the short term?

Last week, money rotated back into the U.S., with the S&P 500 bouncing, albeit modestly. Further, the ratio between the two bumping into this resistance zone could signal further short-term strength for U.S. equities.

A pause in the capital exodus out of the States wouldn’t be surprising—many trends, including Gold, Bitcoin, and growth stocks, appear exhausted for now.

This week, we want to be on the lookout to see if money continues its short-term rotation out of global and back into the States. If so, it could set the stage for the next few months as international digest their gains.

In that tape, we could see some catch-up trades emerge in the...

Today's number is... 10

S&P 500’s price is currently trading under its 10-month moving average.

Here’s the chart:

Let's break down what the chart shows:

• The black line is the S&P 500 index price.
• The red line is the 10-month moving average of the S&P 500 index price.
• The gray lines highlight when the price is above the 10-month moving average.

The Takeaway: With just six trading days left in the month, there's one model I'm paying close attention to. The bulls need to work hard to push the S&P 500 price back above its 10-month moving average. At the moment, the S&P 500 is 1.7% below this moving average. If the price stays below it, this could create challenges for stocks.

I have done the math… Take a look at the table on the chart.

If you've been following me for some time, you know that I like to know what type of market environment we’re in. One of the simplest strategies I use for assessing the longer-term environment is: If...

I hope you're having a nice weekend.

Before I head out for the day I wanted to share a few thoughts about the market and what I'm seeing out there.

This week I laid out all my thoughts and favorite trades during our LIVE Conference Call. So today's note is about a few other things I didn't talk about on the call. 

The first one is this big 2100 level in Ethereum. Remember that despite all the underperformance from this one, ETH still carries a $240 Billion market-cap and is still the 2nd largest token on the planet.

If we're back above last year's lows, I would really start to get interested in this one. Look for the Bitcoin dominance to come off if Ethereum starts to outperform again. ETH can really help the Alts...

Sign up for my free note here.

The current state of the market is indecision.

The major indexes popped to start the week, then they gave it back.

We had a little Powell pump mid-week, and then they gave that back.

Trump’s promise to play nice on tariffs Friday sparked another little rally, and markets closed strong, albeit well off the highs from Wednesday.

This indecision is illustrated by dojis on the weekly charts of the Nasdaq 100 and S&P 500.

And frankly, I’m undecided about just how much I want to dip my toes into US stocks right now.

As you know, I think the bulls have a lot of work to do. And with each passing day, I’m just not seeing it.

But you know where I continue to see...

This is the weekly post that aggregates all the charts we put together throughout the week and organizes them all into one, easy to flip through deck.

We don't have bull markets without Financials. It's just how the market works, both in the United States and Internationally. 

European Banks keep ripping. Japanese Banks keep ripping.

And you're seeing it in the United States as well. Berkshire Hathaway is the largest component of the S&P Financials Index, and BRKA just went out at new all-time highs again this week.

Here are the exchanges, still dominating as well. Both the CME Group and Intercontinental Exchange are hitting new all-time highs:

If this is your first bull market, I would encourage you to go back and study former bull markets throughout history. 

You'll notice similar behavior from Financials.

It's when things are making a turn for the bad that Financials really struggle.

We're currently seeing the opposite.

By my work, it's really the more "Value" oriented areas of the market that keep dominating returns, while the "Growth" areas have corrected.

Here is a list of the very best of the biggest companies in America. Notice all the Financials, Industrials, Healthcare and Energy.

This list is sorted by relative strength and the "...

It's happening.

Are you paying attention?

The best is when you're already moving on a position, and then new extremes in sentiment confirm the opportunity that you had already identified.

This is the setup currently in place for shares of Tesla stock.

Last week I told you how I had 2 separate experiences with normies who were telling me how much they hated Elon Musk. This was on an unsolicited basis. I didn't even ask.

See: The Libs Hate Elon & Tesla

It happened twice. In the same weekend. Civilians on both occasions.

So we immediately laid out the trade for Premium Members of ASC Research. You can access the...

Investors in the United States are panicking because their tech stocks are sucking.

Their irresponsibly large positions in Microsoft and Nvidia have come around to bite them in the rear.

Which investors have been sheltered from this pain? The ones who own Energy stocks! 

These shareholders have, for the most part, been treated poorly over the last 15 years. 

However, that wasn't the case in the post-COVID bull market. It also hasn't been the case so far this year.

As you can see, the Energy Sector SPDR $XLE is up over 8% this year. It's the best-performing sector.

Conversely, Technology $XLK and Consumer Discretionary $XLY have been significant laggards. They're the only sectors trailing the S&P 500.

We think this relative strength from energy can persist. Here's why 👇

The NYSE Natural Gas Index $XNG and the NYSE Oil & Gas Index $XOI are both in the process of resolving multi-decade basing patterns.

Structural trend reversals can be messy, but the path of...

From the desk of Steve Strazza @Sstrazza

Our Hall of Famers list is composed of the 150 largest US-based stocks.

These stocks range from the mega-cap growth behemoths like Apple and Microsoft – with market caps in excess of $2T – to some of the new-age large-cap disruptors such as Moderna, Square, and Snap.

It has all the big names and more.

It doesn’t include ADRs or any stock not domiciled in the US. But don’t worry; we developed a separate universe for that. Click here to check it out.

The Hall of Famers is simple.

We take our list of 150 names and then apply our technical filters so the strongest stocks with the most momentum rise to the top.

Let’s dive right in and check out what these big boys are up to.

Here’s this week’s list:

*Click table to enlarge view

We filter out any laggards that are down -5% or more relative to the S&P 500 over the trailing month.

Then, we...

Below is my weekly video for members of Macke's Retail Roundup. 

This week, I'm hunting for bottoms. There are 5 stocks that have my attention. I'm under no qualms about the fact that we could be in for more downside, but I'm officially in "tactical buy" mode. Any time you get a washout like we've gotten, you have to be willing to put money to work in strongly-held convictions. 

I've got a few on my list, and I discussed them in my weekly video.

Watch the video below.

Thanks to everyone who joined us for today's Hot Corner Insider Weekly Strategy Session.

In today’s Daily Digest, we’ll review the following:

1. New position in XLY.
2. No adjustments are needed today.
3. No exits since the last report.
4. Current status of open campaigns.
5. Volatility Snapshot.

Let’s dig in!

We recently wrote a deep dive into the boom in AI Consulting. These companies help businesses harness machine learning, automation, and data analytics.

As AI products and services become increasingly powerful, the demand for AI consultants to help implement them will only grow.

It's a brand-new mega trend.

The only problem is that the industry is entirely dominated by International Business Machines $IBM. Traditional consulting firms like Accenture $ACN are getting their butts kicked.

Accenture reported a double beat on Thursday and got crushed for it. The stock closed 7.26% lower and was down over 10% intra-day.

The reaction was nasty.

The company's operating margin is compressing due to increased competition. Moreover, the market is concerned the new administration in Washington will quit doing business with ACN. This would be a significant loss in revenue.

They also issued weak guidance for 2025, which only made things worse.

Accenture has enjoyed an industry with limited competition for...

Gold...

It's the hottest asset in town and it's smoking the U.S. markets in 2025. While the S&P is down 3%, Gold is up 14% and the Gold mining companies $GDX are up double that of 28%.

While this Gold trend has now certainly deserved a pause, the longer-term outlook is still decisively bullish.

Take a look at the Gold Miners ETF $GDX, which like all the precious metal mining funds is at the top of our list today. It's in the process of breaking out of a nearly five year base.

So long as GDX is above 44, the bias is to the upside for this group.

Today's number is... 12

The Philadelphia Gold and Silver Index just closed at fresh 12-year highs.

Here’s the chart:

The Takeaway: The Philadelphia Gold and Silver Index, an index of thirty precious metal mining companies traded on the Philadelphia Stock Exchange, closed yesterday at a fresh 12-year high.

This base-on-base breakout in the Philadelphia Gold and Silver Index suggests the path of least resistance is higher for precious metals.

100% of the stocks in the index are above their 50-day moving average.

80% are above their 200-day moving average.

If you didn't know already, we’re in the midst of a serious gold rush.

There is nothing bearish about this for precious metal stocks! 

Are you buying precious metal stocks here?

Let me know!

Grant Hawkridge | Chief Aussie Operator...