Chapters
00:00 Intro: Cookie Is Back
04:10 Ben: Raising 50–70% Cash
04:41 Cookie: 100% Cash Since Christmas Eve (Except Bitcoin)
06:16 GP: On the Verge of a Roaring Market
10:27 Trading the Range vs. Picking Stocks
14:01 Cookie: The QQQs Wedge Repeats COVID
19:42 Inside the Wedge & What Sits Above 540
23:49 Cookie: Monthly Rounded Top & a 440s–480s Flush
27:27 Cookie: The SPY Measured Move to 610
32:03 What Would a Pullback Look Like?
34:37 Due for a Correction? Feb–March OPEX
36:43 GP: Netflix, Banks & Why Chips Go Higher
39:18 GP Bought Nvidia
43:25 Cookie: Nvidia's 15-Year Channels & the 9-Month MA
48:29 Cookie: Nvidia's 4-Hour Rounded Top & 118.7
50:31 Why Are Patterns So Organized?
56:37 Cookie: Tesla Above 373
1:01:11 Cookie: Bitcoin's Weekly Range & Hedges
1:05:15 Bitcoin's Monthly Parabolic Channel
1:08:50 Altcoins: Rentals, Not Homes
1:13:35 Wrap-Up: Three Years of Market Hours
Market Hours #142 went out live on Tuesday, February 4, with Ben, Nick and GP and their quarterly-ish guest Cookie_M. It was an early show, so GP was still making coffee at the start, and Ben had a hard stop. Cookie explained why he has been "100% cash since Christmas Eve" apart from Bitcoin, and why he's trading the QQQs' 500–530 range instead of holding through it. He walked through his repeating wedge and rounded-top charts on the QQQs and SPY, then Nvidia, Tesla and Bitcoin, with exact trigger levels. GP took the other side as a bull, saying the chip names and leaders like Netflix, Palantir, Tempus and Hims point higher. They closed on altcoins and on the podcast passing three years, since it started in January 2022.
Cookie_M's setups, levels and trades
Cookie has been out of stocks since Christmas Eve but is still holding his Bitcoin. He's doing short-term swings and some day trades because "the market's just been chopping up people every day for weeks." If it breaks out, "I'm not going to miss out," because a real breakout starts a move that lasts months. On the QQQs, he showed that the consolidation after the yen-carry drop is "the same effing wedge" as after the COVID plunge and in summer 2023. 500 has been support and he gets out at about 530, "trade the boundaries" until it breaks. Above the range sits resistance that wasn't there in 2020: a top that lines up with the 2022 bear-market top. The monthly chart shows a rounded top, so a flush to the 440s or 480s is possible even if it later goes higher. He said in December that the market might go nowhere until May, when the wedge ends. On the SPY, the measured move from the COVID bottom runs to about 610, a reasonable place to stall. A short-term top could come back to the 9-month moving average at about 510, roughly 20% down. For the QQQs, he'd start looking around 480, just under the 9-month MA, and would buy support there. He thinks a 15–20% correction is more likely than not this year, and "I hope we get it so that [I] can load the F up," starting this month or by May or June. He still calls it a bull market. "I'm still bullish."
On Nvidia, he said it "has just gone sideways for eight months," with the range midpoint around 120–130. His two-year-old chart shows three identical uptrend channels since a 15-year base that started in 2000, plus a seven-month sideways phase with the 9-month MA rolling over, like 2018. "Unless it takes out the nine monthly moving average, it's dog to me." Above about 124–125 would make it a failed breakdown with a path back to all-time highs. Short term, on the 4-hour chart, 118.7 is the trigger. Above it is a failed breakdown that also breaks the downtrend channel, targeting the 4-hour 9 MA at about 120.68, then 124.5 (the 9-month MA) and 127 (the channel centerline). Below it, his "shopping cart" is around 110. He sold Nvidia in the 140s after his 150 target hit. On Tesla's monthly chart, clearing the trendline going back to 2011 "opens the door" higher, and February's dip held the January low by $1. "Whilst it holds above 373, dip's done." Below that, it's the first lower low in five or six months, and he'd buy at 338 and the 9-month MA, with the 4-hour 200 MA around 300–310. A weekly pattern targets about 310–317 unless Tesla retakes the 9-week MA near 410. On Bitcoin, the weekly peaks sit on the same boundary as in 2017 and 2021. His 90,000 shopping cart got hit in the flash crash, and with the 9-week MA rolling over he's prepared for 75,000–80,000, or a breakout through 107,000. He holds his full Bitcoin position and hedges at the top of the range. The monthly chart shows the usual mid-parabola consolidation, so "why would I sell out of my Bitcoins?" He doesn't hold altcoins because "they're just widow makers," and only trades them when they trend. "It's always about execution."
Nick's setups, levels and trades
Nick said that when the indexes are chopping, "it doesn't necessarily pay to buy the breakouts. You should be looking to buy the pullbacks," which fits Cookie's approach. He asked Cookie whether the different patterns inside each wedge matter. On why price patterns feel so organized, his theory is that everyone is synced through social media and TV, so gauges like Fear & Greed can flip within a day. His closing advice was "find what works for you and then just focus on it."
Ben's setups, levels and trades
Ben has "been in the bear camp for a while." Every rip has been "a golden opportunity for me to raise cash," and his goal is 50–70% cash by the end of the first quarter. Like Cookie, he trades ranges in names he knows. He said he'd sell Solana starting in the 250s when it was near $200, then rebuy lower and repeat, and it has "worked perfectly." He pressed GP on buying Nvidia, "the poster child" and a crowded trade, while its moving averages roll over. He likes his "shitcoins" as rentals, not homes, and thinks Solana is replacing ETH. He would rather put a few hundred dollars into a meme coin for a shot at 100x than spread it out.
GP's setups, levels and trades
GP thinks "we're personally on the verge of a roaring market." The market has been sideways since July, but the monthly, quarterly and yearly charts point to an upside resolution, and short-term social sentiment just causes stress. Being long beat day trading. He said Tempus (TEM) was up about 90% one month into the year and Hims was up about 60%, from 24 to 39. He asked why a correction is "due" after the QQQs' roughly 19% drop in August. He also noted that February-to-March OPEX is a typical sticking point, as in COVID and the July yen-carry drop. Netflix was about to take out all-time highs, and banks and fintech have been strong since the yen-carry trade. His thesis is that Nvidia and Broadcom finally got back-to-back red months, and Nvidia bottoming lets other chips run, like Apple and Tesla bottoming two months after the market in early 2023. ASML has three straight green months at support on volume, and he did a thread on the monthlies for Synopsys, ASML, Lam and Ambarella.
He bought Nvidia around 118.47, saying it finally got the flush he'd been waiting for with the big drop the previous Monday. He's targeting at least 140 and thinks it takes out all-time highs, using Apple's late-2022 to early-2023 structure as the framework. He's also long AMD, which he expected to swing wildly on earnings that day, and said that apart from Nvidia bottoming, "AMD sucks." Closing out, he said to remove emotion. In the first year of Trump's last term, volatility was at historic lows, and this year has started differently, so check when a playbook's assumptions change. "The financials are always the last sector to participate in longer term bull markets." Trade what you see and don't panic.
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This is not financial advice. Market Hours is for education and entertainment only. Always do your own research.
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