Some mornings start with coffee. Mine started with the police telling me a fugitive might be rummaging around my yard which, frankly, felt about right, because the market was doing the exact same thing: sneaking around, acting suspicious, and pretending nothing weird was happening while copper blew past all-time highs. Let’s cut through the theatrics.
Key Takeaways
Momentum Is Still Driving the Bus
- The V-shaped snapback isn't just intact — it’s swaggering.
- Even on a flat morning, we had virtually no breakdowns across the S&P, which tells you buyers are still lurking.
- Japan’s late-November liquidity dump plus heavy insider buying continues to underpin this run, and momentum hasn’t even blinked heading into the Fed.
Commodities Aren’t Hot They’re Incendiary
- Copper ripping through LME highs, silver spiking, and nat gas surging… that’s not a rotation, that's a siren.
- Early-stage commodity supercycle talk isn't theoretical anymore — price action is confirming it.
- Meanwhile XLU is still walking into doors, but materials, miners, and energy are stepping into the spotlight with real flows behind them.
Japan’s Policy Shift Is the Quiet Story That Matters Most
- BOJ hinting at rate hikes while still injecting liquidity signals stress under the surface.
- If the yen carry trade unwinds, it hits tech, global banks, and high-valuation names long before CNBC figures out why.
- Think of it as the global pressure valve: when it hisses, you pay attention — because cross-border flows can flip on a dime.
What I’m Watching
I’m glued to yields and Japan like they’re the two loudest characters in a crowded room. Every tick in long-duration bonds tells you how long this momentum burst can run before something cracks. Commodities look ready for another leg, small-cap squeezes (KTOS, UUUU, SMR) are building, and Dell’s quiet price hike into the AI hardware cycle is the first breadcrumb of margin compression nobody wants to admit is coming.
This market isn’t trading on vibes or fundamentals it’s trading on plumbing. And plumbing doesn’t lie. Liquidity is restless, opportunistic, and moving faster than the narratives trying to chase it. If you stay patient and watch where the money actually flows not where the headlines scream, you’ll stay a step ahead of the crowd, the panic, and yes, even the occasional fugitive wandering your neighborhood.
Until next time,
Garrett Baldwin
TheoTRADE