MarketChess

25Feb12:58 pmEST

With a Kiss

The Nasdaq is leading a broad market rally today on the back of a cheerleading performance by President Trump in last night's lengthy State of the Union Address. There is also hope that a deal will soon be struck with Iran to avert a major escalation. And even NVIDIA is rallying nicely in front of its big earnings report tonight.  That said,...

Read More

24Feb3:37 pmEST

I Saw the Sign for Base Metals

Another day where we are hearing tons of bloviating about the deflationary nature of AI and the disruptions to life as we know it.  But it is also another day where base metals and miners are rocking to the upside to virtually no fanfare. Specifically, copper and aluminum stocks are smoking hot. COPX is the copper miner ETF with a strong daily...

Read More

23Feb12:56 pmEST

I Want My $50,000 Dow Dollars!

In between thinking about Pam Bondi recently paying homage  to Tatum O'Neal in Paper Moon (1973), we also have Trump's State of the Union Address coming up tomorrow evening. The President already gave out an expectation that he will give a "long speech," which could easily mean the east coast telecast will not conclude until well after...

Read More

20Feb3:15 pmEST

Afternoon Update 02/20/26 {Video}

Read More

19Feb12:54 pmEST

Dow Credit Card Drama

Despite still being in the Dow Jones Industrial Average, American Express has almost half the market cap as non-Dow component Mastercard, obviously another credit card play. Visa, of course, is bigger than both AXP and MA and is also in the Dow.  Although we do not analyze the Dow as frequently as we do the other indices due to its narrow (only...

Read More

18Feb1:15 pmEST

Checking in on Major General Chess

As noted earlier today both on my main X feed (@chessNwine) and with Members, I am deferring to the price action in crude oil in lieu of bloviating about whether or not America will escalate against Iran. You can be sure there are geopolitical pundits everywhere now, many claiming they have the inside scoop or have picked off a magical tell...

Read More

17Feb1:02 pmEST

Deny All You Want, This is Reality

You may have noticed a strong rotation into defensive names of late, particularly those offering reasonable valuation and a reliable dividend. Indeed, the XLP (consumer staples) and XLU (utilities) ETFs have thrived so far in 2026, in addition to the industrials in the XLI ETF.  At the cross-section of several of those sectors we have the...

Read More

13Feb2:49 pmEST

Afternoon Update 02/13/26 {Video}

Read More

12Feb1:17 pmEST

Markets Do Indeed Have a Sense of Humor

The star of the dot-com bubble was Cisco, updated below on the quarterly chart. After earnings, CSCO is selling off today on the back of pressure from memory chip pricing.  But the larger point is that Cisco finally--finally!--made its way back to its prior dot-com bubble highs after twenty-five years of meandering price action. The stock came...

Read More

11Feb3:16 pmEST

Intrepid Rotations

Much like the oil industry we have not heard much from the farmers and agricultural complex with respect to equities for a good while now. All of a sudden, however, oil stocks have improved mightily in recent months and then we have large cap ag machinery plays like CAT and DE essentially going vertical.  Soft commodities in the ag space like...

Read More