Retail Is Running Scared Into Two Stocks
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Holy crap, I've never seen anything like this.
We're sitting at all-time highs - literally a day or two removed from them - and retail is acting like it's the end of the world. The liquidity concentration has never been more extreme, and it's getting worse by the day.
The Numbers Don't Lie
Yesterday, almost 61 million option contracts traded across all markets. That's a massive volume. But here's what's broken: it's all flowing into maybe three stocks.
Apple used to be the mainstay. You could always count on Apple. Now? The order flow is completely and totally dead. I'm talking about crickets. Broadcom AVGO - a major tech player - only had 22,000 contracts trading. Microsoft? 80,000 contracts, and that pales in comparison to what we used to see.
The flow is now basically Tesla TSLA, Nvidia NVDA, and maybe META somewhere in between. That's it. Everything else is an afterthought.
I've Been Calling This for Three Years
I've been saying this concentration thing for three years, and here we are. There's nothing left to concentrate on.
When you're a market making firm, you have algorithms that are like guns pointed at specific products.
All your server capacity gets focused on one or two stocks, and that's all you're doing. Market making firms are reactive to retail, and right now retail is the driving force behind this because they don't know what to do.
Something's Really Off Here
Their big boy products aren't necessarily going up anymore. Nvidia's been a sketchy trade. When retail gets confused, they run to what they know - the same names everyone's talking about.
But in just the last 10 days, it's concentrated even more. Retail is running scared, and I don't understand why. We're at all-time highs, people. What the hell is wrong with everyone?
Maybe it's the noise in the background - government shutdown, planes falling out of the sky, end of the world stuff.
But Google GOOGL is basically hitting new highs if it closes today. The advanced decline line isn't that bad. We haven't even hit the lower edge of the expected move this week.
When I Don't Have a Feel, I Stick to What Works
Look, I ain't got a great feel for this market, and I don't mind saying that. When that happens, I go with probabilities and stick to proven strategies.
While everyone's running scared into two stocks, proper trade structure still works.
When markets feel this funky and disconnected, you don't force trades. You wait for setups that make sense regardless of whether you can read the overall tape.
Why Your Stocks Feel Dead
If you're wondering why your favorite stocks feel dead, this is why. The action has fled to just a handful of names. This creates a completely different trading environment. When everything depends on two or three stocks, the whole market becomes a hostage to those names.
I don't like it when people start aligning with me on bearish sentiment. It feels very awkward.
But this situation is legitimately concerning. We've got retail psychological breakdown while markets are making new highs, and that's a dangerous combination.
It's one funky marketplace where order flow feels very broken and disconnected. We're trading in pockets, almost in autonomy most of the time.
I'm watching key levels - 6715 in the SPX is where all hell could break loose if we break below it. But mostly I'm being patient until I get more of a feel for what's actually driving this thing.
And the probability here is that this concentration can't last forever.
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