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Gold and silver are breaking down, and the miners are where you can see it clearly. GDXU, the leveraged miner fund, has broken under its key moving averages. That's the tell. When the leveraged vehicle goes first, it isn't the metal being repriced. It's the leverage coming out. Gold has seen a large speculative buildup over the past few weeks. Negative momentum flushes that out, and it's flushing now. The paper is unwinding, and it can move a lot further and faster than anyone expects, because leveraged positions don't get sold gradually. None of that breaks the thesis. Central banks are still buying. The debt is still $40 trillion. Every road out of this still runs through more money getting created. The case for owning gold over the next few years hasn't changed at all this week. What changed is that gold is trading as a momentum position right now instead of a monetary one, and momentum is going the wrong way. The levels worth writing down are $4,000 on gold and $60 on silver. That's where this stops being an unwind and starts being an opportunity. If it gets there, that's a buy, not a warning. If you're already long and want to protect it while this plays out, the inverse instruments are the cleanest way. GLL for gold, GDXD on the miners, and you can buy calls on them rather than shorting anything outright. Keep the size small. These move violently in both directions and they're a hedge, not a position. Don't sell your metal into this. Just recognize what's driving the tape right now and let it come to you.

noreply@slice-app.io (Republic Research) — Tue, 01 Sep 2026 15:35:21 GMT

Gold and silver are breaking down, and the miners are where you can see it clearly. GDXU, the leveraged miner fund, has broken under its key moving averages. That's the tell. When the leveraged vehicle goes first, it isn't the metal being repriced. It's the leverage coming out. Gold has seen a large speculative buildup over the past few weeks. Negative momentum flushes that out, and it's flushing now. The paper is unwinding, and it can move a lot further and faster than anyone expects, because leveraged positions don't get sold gradually. None of that breaks the thesis. Central banks are still buying. The debt is still $40 trillion. Every road out of this still runs through more money getting created. The case for owning gold over the next few years hasn't changed at all this week. What changed is that gold is trading as a momentum position right now instead of a monetary one, and momentum is going the wrong way. The levels worth writing down are $4,000 on gold and $60 on silver. That's where this stops being an unwind and starts being an opportunity. If it gets there, that's a buy, not a warning. If you're already long and want to protect it while this plays out, the inverse instruments are the cleanest way. GLL for gold, GDXD on the miners, and you can buy calls on them rather than shorting anything outright. Keep the size small. These move violently in both directions and they're a hedge, not a position. Don't sell your metal into this. Just recognize what's driving the tape right now and let it come to you.

Energy Transfer (ET) is back under the price its chairman paid last week. Kelcy Warren bought a million units on August 18 and 19, about $21.3 million of his own money at an average of $21.26, which was slightly above where it closed that day. He already owns roughly 9% of the company. He's the last person alive who needs more of it and he bought anyway. Energy Transfer doesn't drill anything. Midstream gets paid on the volume moving through the pipe, not on what a barrel sells for. So this selloff is sympathy and it's handed you a better price than the chairman got. The MACD is crossing down, so let that finish and watch for it to curl back positive before you step in. The refiners are the ones with real exposure here. Those record refining margins exist because supply got knocked out. Put barrels back in the market and the margins come in with them. PBF Energy (PBF) is sitting right on its 20-day. There's a short here already, and it gets cleaner if it cracks that line. Buy the in-the-money $69 put. The 8-day sits at $70.71, and that's your stop. If price climbs back over that line you're wrong, you cut it, and it costs you very little to find out. If a deal actually comes together on Hormuz, that's the trade that pays.

noreply@slice-app.io (Republic Research) — Tue, 25 Aug 2026 14:11:20 GMT

Energy Transfer (ET) is back under the price its chairman paid last week. Kelcy Warren bought a million units on August 18 and 19, about $21.3 million of his own money at an average of $21.26, which was slightly above where it closed that day. He already owns roughly 9% of the company. He's the last person alive who needs more of it and he bought anyway. Energy Transfer doesn't drill anything. Midstream gets paid on the volume moving through the pipe, not on what a barrel sells for. So this selloff is sympathy and it's handed you a better price than the chairman got. The MACD is crossing down, so let that finish and watch for it to curl back positive before you step in. The refiners are the ones with real exposure here. Those record refining margins exist because supply got knocked out. Put barrels back in the market and the margins come in with them. PBF Energy (PBF) is sitting right on its 20-day. There's a short here already, and it gets cleaner if it cracks that line. Buy the in-the-money $69 put. The 8-day sits at $70.71, and that's your stop. If price climbs back over that line you're wrong, you cut it, and it costs you very little to find out. If a deal actually comes together on Hormuz, that's the trade that pays.

Finviz added a nice anchored VWAP tool. Click the button on the image, then click the candle you want to anchor to. Look at Moderna. The stock closed up 177% yesterday, a record day, after its cancer vaccine with Merck succeeded in a large trial. Pull up a five-minute chart and anchor to the candle where it took off yesterday morning. That line is the average price everyone has paid since the move began, weighted by volume. Moderna has come back and touched it several times since, and it bounced every time. Each of those was a clean short-term trade. One line defines right and wrong. If price holds, you get the move. If it breaks, your stop sits right there and it's cheap, because a name that loses that line usually rolls straight over. You're not guessing where to put your risk. The line carries weight because volume built it. Price only gets pushed under a volume-weighted average by size, and not the kind retail can generate. That's institutions leaving, and you find out the moment it happens. You can anchor to any significant moment, not just a stock's breakout. Treasury announced the bigger bond buybacks around 8:30 yesterday morning. That's an institutional line, because that's the minute the money made its decision. Anchor gold futures to 8:30 yesterday. Gold broke under that level this morning, came back to test it, and is rolling under it now. Do the same on the SPY on the three- or five-minute chart, using the same 8:30 anchor. The market pivoted off that line cleanly several times yesterday. We're back under it this morning, with the line at 769.81. Add a regular VWAP alongside the anchored one. A common play is trading from one to the other. On the chart below, the thin blue line to the thick orange one. SPY sits below the anchored line right now. If it crosses the regular VWAP to the upside and gets momentum behind it, you take it there and play for the reversion back up to 769.81. Buy the first in-the-money call instead of reaching out of the money.

noreply@slice-app.io (Republic Research) — Thu, 20 Aug 2026 13:39:52 GMT

Finviz added a nice anchored VWAP tool. Click the button on the image, then click the candle you want to anchor to. Look at Moderna. The stock closed up 177% yesterday, a record day, after its cancer vaccine with Merck succeeded in a large trial. Pull up a five-minute chart and anchor to the candle where it took off yesterday morning. That line is the average price everyone has paid since the move began, weighted by volume. Moderna has come back and touched it several times since, and it bounced every time. Each of those was a clean short-term trade. One line defines right and wrong. If price holds, you get the move. If it breaks, your stop sits right there and it's cheap, because a name that loses that line usually rolls straight over. You're not guessing where to put your risk. The line carries weight because volume built it. Price only gets pushed under a volume-weighted average by size, and not the kind retail can generate. That's institutions leaving, and you find out the moment it happens. You can anchor to any significant moment, not just a stock's breakout. Treasury announced the bigger bond buybacks around 8:30 yesterday morning. That's an institutional line, because that's the minute the money made its decision. Anchor gold futures to 8:30 yesterday. Gold broke under that level this morning, came back to test it, and is rolling under it now. Do the same on the SPY on the three- or five-minute chart, using the same 8:30 anchor. The market pivoted off that line cleanly several times yesterday. We're back under it this morning, with the line at 769.81. Add a regular VWAP alongside the anchored one. A common play is trading from one to the other. On the chart below, the thin blue line to the thick orange one. SPY sits below the anchored line right now. If it crosses the regular VWAP to the upside and gets momentum behind it, you take it there and play for the reversion back up to 769.81. Buy the first in-the-money call instead of reaching out of the money.

Trump put tariffs on imported drones. Signed yesterday, effective September 3. Anything over 25 kilograms or carrying thermal imaging gets hit at 100%. Smaller drones get 25%. Allies get 15%. The reason given is national security. We buy too many drones and drone parts from overseas, mostly China, for something the military now depends on. The tariff is meant to force that production back home. Whether it works long term is a different conversation. What matters this morning is that every foreign drone in this market just got more expensive, and the domestic makers didn't have to do anything to gain the advantage. Kratos (KTOS) is the one we know best. The stock has been in a slump all year, working off a huge run from last year. Support has held around $50. It's up about 3% this morning, sitting right at its 200-day moving average. Clear that and turn it into support, and the year's damage starts to repair. Above there, $70 is the next base. Red Cat (RCAT) has the same story on the chart. The 8-day crossed above the 20-day on August 7, and the stock has taken back its 200-day. Buy the stock and set a 20% stop.

noreply@slice-app.io (Republic Research) — Fri, 14 Aug 2026 13:28:58 GMT

Trump put tariffs on imported drones. Signed yesterday, effective September 3. Anything over 25 kilograms or carrying thermal imaging gets hit at 100%. Smaller drones get 25%. Allies get 15%. The reason given is national security. We buy too many drones and drone parts from overseas, mostly China, for something the military now depends on. The tariff is meant to force that production back home. Whether it works long term is a different conversation. What matters this morning is that every foreign drone in this market just got more expensive, and the domestic makers didn't have to do anything to gain the advantage. Kratos (KTOS) is the one we know best. The stock has been in a slump all year, working off a huge run from last year. Support has held around $50. It's up about 3% this morning, sitting right at its 200-day moving average. Clear that and turn it into support, and the year's damage starts to repair. Above there, $70 is the next base. Red Cat (RCAT) has the same story on the chart. The 8-day crossed above the 20-day on August 7, and the stock has taken back its 200-day. Buy the stock and set a 20% stop.

We're coming in more cautious than we've been in a while. CPI lands tomorrow, and this market has run hot for a week and a half now. Nothing has actually broken yet. Our momentum numbers are still green. Capital is still coming in. Small caps firmed up overnight, and the FNGD is still bleeding lower. The rally is intact. The problem is oil. The OILU is breaking out again. Brent touched 90 last night as the Hormuz deal stalls and the hostilities pick back up. When oil runs, it leans on everything, and you can already see it in the 10-year, which pushed back over 4.70 this morning. Rising oil means rising costs, and rising costs bring the rate fear right back. That's a bad setup heading into an inflation print. The market's priced for perfection up here, oil is turning into a real problem, and this is usually the point where the first person heads for the exit and everyone else follows. We're not fighting the trend. We stay long what's working. We just keep it light and watch the door until CPI clears.

noreply@slice-app.io (Republic Research) — Tue, 11 Aug 2026 13:45:43 GMT

We're coming in more cautious than we've been in a while. CPI lands tomorrow, and this market has run hot for a week and a half now. Nothing has actually broken yet. Our momentum numbers are still green. Capital is still coming in. Small caps firmed up overnight, and the FNGD is still bleeding lower. The rally is intact. The problem is oil. The OILU is breaking out again. Brent touched 90 last night as the Hormuz deal stalls and the hostilities pick back up. When oil runs, it leans on everything, and you can already see it in the 10-year, which pushed back over 4.70 this morning. Rising oil means rising costs, and rising costs bring the rate fear right back. That's a bad setup heading into an inflation print. The market's priced for perfection up here, oil is turning into a real problem, and this is usually the point where the first person heads for the exit and everyone else follows. We're not fighting the trend. We stay long what's working. We just keep it light and watch the door until CPI clears.

The jobs number just landed, and it was ugly. The economy lost 23,000 jobs in July. The Street was looking for a gain of 83,000. It's the first outright decline in months, and they revised the prior two months down by a combined 103,000. Unemployment ticked down to 4.1%, but the hiring picture is clearly softening. Stocks rallied on it anyway. All week this run had one real threat hanging over it. A hot jobs print would have handed the Fed's hawks their argument, put the September hike back on the table, and pushed yields higher. Higher yields are what's been leaning on this whole mechanical rally. A number this weak flips all of that. It takes the hike off the table and turns the conversation toward the Fed holding, maybe even cutting. Futures climbed and yields started dropping the second it hit. This is the bad-news-is-good-news market we've been in for weeks. A weakening economy that forces the Fed to ease is exactly what a market running on cheap money wants. The read for today is simple. With yields rolling over, the highest-beta names get the green light again, the semis and the software. That's where money runs when the rate pressure lifts. Worth keeping one thing in the back of your head, though. A market at record highs cheering the economy losing jobs is its own kind of strange. It works right up until the weakness stops being a rate story and becomes a growth story. We're not there yet. Just remember what we're actually celebrating.

noreply@slice-app.io (Republic Research) — Fri, 07 Aug 2026 13:14:51 GMT

The jobs number just landed, and it was ugly. The economy lost 23,000 jobs in July. The Street was looking for a gain of 83,000. It's the first outright decline in months, and they revised the prior two months down by a combined 103,000. Unemployment ticked down to 4.1%, but the hiring picture is clearly softening. Stocks rallied on it anyway. All week this run had one real threat hanging over it. A hot jobs print would have handed the Fed's hawks their argument, put the September hike back on the table, and pushed yields higher. Higher yields are what's been leaning on this whole mechanical rally. A number this weak flips all of that. It takes the hike off the table and turns the conversation toward the Fed holding, maybe even cutting. Futures climbed and yields started dropping the second it hit. This is the bad-news-is-good-news market we've been in for weeks. A weakening economy that forces the Fed to ease is exactly what a market running on cheap money wants. The read for today is simple. With yields rolling over, the highest-beta names get the green light again, the semis and the software. That's where money runs when the rate pressure lifts. Worth keeping one thing in the back of your head, though. A market at record highs cheering the economy losing jobs is its own kind of strange. It works right up until the weakness stops being a rate story and becomes a growth story. We're not there yet. Just remember what we're actually celebrating.

Copper is ripping. Traders are front-running Trump's pending decision on tariffs for refined copper imports. Everybody wants their metal inside the country before a tariff hits. So copper is pouring into the US at the fastest pace in at least 12 years. More than 200,000 tons landed at US ports in July. That's the biggest monthly haul on record going back to 2014. Prices are up near $14,000 a ton, a two-month high. The way we'd play this isn't a miner. It's Mueller Industries (MLI). Mueller makes copper tube, fittings, and line sets for HVAC, refrigeration, and construction. That puts it levered directly to copper demand. What separates it from a miner is the balance sheet. Mueller is debt-free and cash-rich. Its sales grew about 19% last quarter. And it just agreed to buy another copper-tube maker. So you get the copper exposure without the baggage the mining names carry. It also tracks the metal about as tightly as anything out there. Look at Mueller against copper futures and Southern Copper on the chart. It moves right alongside both, with much better fundamentals. One thing to keep in mind. Part of this move is traders getting ahead of a tariff that may not land the way they expect. If it doesn't, copper gives some of it back, and Mueller comes in with it. That's the spot to start selling spreads at lower levels. This is a name you'd love to own under 53.

noreply@slice-app.io (Republic Research) — Tue, 04 Aug 2026 13:37:31 GMT

Copper is ripping. Traders are front-running Trump's pending decision on tariffs for refined copper imports. Everybody wants their metal inside the country before a tariff hits. So copper is pouring into the US at the fastest pace in at least 12 years. More than 200,000 tons landed at US ports in July. That's the biggest monthly haul on record going back to 2014. Prices are up near $14,000 a ton, a two-month high. The way we'd play this isn't a miner. It's Mueller Industries (MLI). Mueller makes copper tube, fittings, and line sets for HVAC, refrigeration, and construction. That puts it levered directly to copper demand. What separates it from a miner is the balance sheet. Mueller is debt-free and cash-rich. Its sales grew about 19% last quarter. And it just agreed to buy another copper-tube maker. So you get the copper exposure without the baggage the mining names carry. It also tracks the metal about as tightly as anything out there. Look at Mueller against copper futures and Southern Copper on the chart. It moves right alongside both, with much better fundamentals. One thing to keep in mind. Part of this move is traders getting ahead of a tariff that may not land the way they expect. If it doesn't, copper gives some of it back, and Mueller comes in with it. That's the spot to start selling spreads at lower levels. This is a name you'd love to own under 53.

The tape looks great this morning. Amazon's blowout has the tech trade roaring back, Korea's market ripped overnight, and all three of our momentum readings are green again. But the thing actually holding this up is shakier than the screen makes it look. Japan is the reason, and it's worth understanding. Their finance ministry stepped into the currency market yesterday. The yen had been grinding down toward levels it hasn't touched in 40 years, and they moved to prop it up, buying yen and selling dollars to do it. The dollar had its worst day in about four years off the back of that, down roughly 3%. That's the part that reaches us. A weaker dollar loosens financial conditions, and that's a real piece of why stocks took off yesterday and why they're still bid this morning. So the rally we're enjoying is, in part, a product of Japan defending its currency two days ago. The reason we don't lean on it is that the move doesn't fix anything underneath. The yen keeps falling because Japan's interest rates sit far below the rest of the world's, and that gap isn't closing. The Fed held this week and the BOJ is expected to hold too. So traders keep borrowing cheap yen and parking it in higher-paying dollars, earning something like 260 basis points a year to do nothing, and that steady pull drags the yen back down no matter how much Tokyo buys. They've already shown it doesn't last. Back in April and May, Japan spent a record 73 billion dollars propping up the yen, nearly double anything it had ever done, and within six weeks the currency had slid right back past the level they fought to hold. Intervention buys time. It doesn't change the trend. So take the green for what it is. The AI trade is back in the pool, momentum has flipped positive, and there's money to make today. Just be clear on what it's standing on. Our signal went red midweek, the 30-year yield is at a 19-year high, and a good part of this morning's mood traces back to a currency defense that history says fades. Until that changes, this reads like a bounce, not a turn.

noreply@slice-app.io (Republic Research) — Fri, 31 Jul 2026 12:29:14 GMT

The tape looks great this morning. Amazon's blowout has the tech trade roaring back, Korea's market ripped overnight, and all three of our momentum readings are green again. But the thing actually holding this up is shakier than the screen makes it look. Japan is the reason, and it's worth understanding. Their finance ministry stepped into the currency market yesterday. The yen had been grinding down toward levels it hasn't touched in 40 years, and they moved to prop it up, buying yen and selling dollars to do it. The dollar had its worst day in about four years off the back of that, down roughly 3%. That's the part that reaches us. A weaker dollar loosens financial conditions, and that's a real piece of why stocks took off yesterday and why they're still bid this morning. So the rally we're enjoying is, in part, a product of Japan defending its currency two days ago. The reason we don't lean on it is that the move doesn't fix anything underneath. The yen keeps falling because Japan's interest rates sit far below the rest of the world's, and that gap isn't closing. The Fed held this week and the BOJ is expected to hold too. So traders keep borrowing cheap yen and parking it in higher-paying dollars, earning something like 260 basis points a year to do nothing, and that steady pull drags the yen back down no matter how much Tokyo buys. They've already shown it doesn't last. Back in April and May, Japan spent a record 73 billion dollars propping up the yen, nearly double anything it had ever done, and within six weeks the currency had slid right back past the level they fought to hold. Intervention buys time. It doesn't change the trend. So take the green for what it is. The AI trade is back in the pool, momentum has flipped positive, and there's money to make today. Just be clear on what it's standing on. Our signal went red midweek, the 30-year yield is at a 19-year high, and a good part of this morning's mood traces back to a currency defense that history says fades. Until that changes, this reads like a bounce, not a turn.

The semiconductors are officially in a bear market. The SOXX is down more than 20% from its June high, and it's still bleeding this morning. Micron is off 6.5%, Intel is down 5%, and the whole group is red again. It's worse overseas. Korea's KOSPI got halted again and is now down about 30% from its June peak. Samsung and SK Hynix both dropped double digits overnight. This is the memory and hardware trade, the exact corner everyone crowded into all year, unwinding hard. None of this should be a shock if you've been watching with us. This was one of the most stretched moves above the 200-day we've ever seen, beaten only by the March 2000 top. When something runs that far that fast, the trip back down is violent. That's what we're getting. Here's the part that matters. The broad market isn't breaking with it. Money keeps leaving the chips and landing in healthcare, financials, and the defensives. So this is still a concentrated unwind in the most crowded trade, not a market-wide collapse. That can change, but it hasn't yet. Watch the Mag 7 chart for a floor. Microsoft and Meta report tomorrow, Apple and Amazon Thursday. Until the biggest names stop leaking, treat any bounce in tech as a trade, not a bottom.

noreply@slice-app.io (Republic Research) — Tue, 28 Jul 2026 13:23:50 GMT

The semiconductors are officially in a bear market. The SOXX is down more than 20% from its June high, and it's still bleeding this morning. Micron is off 6.5%, Intel is down 5%, and the whole group is red again. It's worse overseas. Korea's KOSPI got halted again and is now down about 30% from its June peak. Samsung and SK Hynix both dropped double digits overnight. This is the memory and hardware trade, the exact corner everyone crowded into all year, unwinding hard. None of this should be a shock if you've been watching with us. This was one of the most stretched moves above the 200-day we've ever seen, beaten only by the March 2000 top. When something runs that far that fast, the trip back down is violent. That's what we're getting. Here's the part that matters. The broad market isn't breaking with it. Money keeps leaving the chips and landing in healthcare, financials, and the defensives. So this is still a concentrated unwind in the most crowded trade, not a market-wide collapse. That can change, but it hasn't yet. Watch the Mag 7 chart for a floor. Microsoft and Meta report tomorrow, Apple and Amazon Thursday. Until the biggest names stop leaking, treat any bounce in tech as a trade, not a bottom.

Momentum has turned negative. The S&P and Nasdaq downtrends are clear, lower highs and lower lows, and the Russell is fading right along with them. Time to start playing defense. Last night's earnings didn't help. Alphabet beat on revenue with cloud growing 82%, then told everyone capex could reach $205 billion this year, and the stock got sold 4% anyway. Tesla put up record revenue and still missed, with costs up 47% and margins collapsing to 1.4% from 4%. Both reactions say the same thing. The market has stopped rewarding the spending. It wants proof it pays off. Under the surface, the selling is concentrated in the biggest names while the average stock actually improved overnight. Energy is up almost 5% on the week, and utilities, materials, and real estate are pulling in money. Every group with more stocks breaking out than breaking down right now is defensive or rate-sensitive. That's where capital is hiding. Oil is driving this. Brent is pushing toward $100 after the Houthis hit two tankers in the Red Sea and Saudi Arabia suspended shipments through that route. That's a second chokepoint on top of Hormuz. The 10-year is around 4.65%, the 30-year has held above 5% for twelve straight sessions, the longest run since 2007, and gas is back over $4 a gallon. Rising energy feeds rising rates, and rising rates hit the companies borrowing billions to build harder than anyone else. The VIX is barely moving through all of this, so we keep leaning on the FNGD as our tell that something isn't right. It's above its 8 and 20-day, and it's been keeping us from getting too bullish for weeks now. The 50-day is the line where this becomes a bigger problem. Not there yet, but we're checking it daily. Intel reports tonight with options pricing a 15% move, so the week isn't done swinging.

noreply@slice-app.io (Republic Research) — Thu, 23 Jul 2026 13:27:44 GMT

Momentum has turned negative. The S&P and Nasdaq downtrends are clear, lower highs and lower lows, and the Russell is fading right along with them. Time to start playing defense. Last night's earnings didn't help. Alphabet beat on revenue with cloud growing 82%, then told everyone capex could reach $205 billion this year, and the stock got sold 4% anyway. Tesla put up record revenue and still missed, with costs up 47% and margins collapsing to 1.4% from 4%. Both reactions say the same thing. The market has stopped rewarding the spending. It wants proof it pays off. Under the surface, the selling is concentrated in the biggest names while the average stock actually improved overnight. Energy is up almost 5% on the week, and utilities, materials, and real estate are pulling in money. Every group with more stocks breaking out than breaking down right now is defensive or rate-sensitive. That's where capital is hiding. Oil is driving this. Brent is pushing toward $100 after the Houthis hit two tankers in the Red Sea and Saudi Arabia suspended shipments through that route. That's a second chokepoint on top of Hormuz. The 10-year is around 4.65%, the 30-year has held above 5% for twelve straight sessions, the longest run since 2007, and gas is back over $4 a gallon. Rising energy feeds rising rates, and rising rates hit the companies borrowing billions to build harder than anyone else. The VIX is barely moving through all of this, so we keep leaning on the FNGD as our tell that something isn't right. It's above its 8 and 20-day, and it's been keeping us from getting too bullish for weeks now. The 50-day is the line where this becomes a bigger problem. Not there yet, but we're checking it daily. Intel reports tonight with options pricing a 15% move, so the week isn't done swinging.