When documenting Gartman's latest flip-flop yesterday just after 12 pm, in which the "world renowned" CNBC contributor and newsletter writer finally threw in the bearish towel, a position he had stuck with since March 16. This is what he said:
We may not agree with what Dr. Yellen is proposing… and what she will pursue… or why she is proposing and pursuing it… but it is not our duty to argue and then to take positions openly at odds with her, for as the great, departed and greatly missed Mr. Marty Zweig always said, “Don’t fight the Fed.” We have no actual net long or short position in equities, however."
We then warned that "the rally may be on its last legs", and at that exact moment, the S&P topticked its intraday high of the day.
Fast forward to today, when - with condolences to the bears - it appears the downside following today's "good news is bad news" report may be limited because Gartman has, once again flipped. To wit:
The fact that all ten markets comprising our International Index have fallen is of interest for it is exceedingly rare when such unanimity of direction takes place. However, when it does and especially when it does after sustained moves previously it is usually all the more consequential. The few times that we’ve seen all ten markets move lower have almost always been followed by further and material weakness. Coupling that history with the fact that the CNN Fear & Greed Index had reached 78 at one point late last week and has turned lower, and further given that a goodly portion of the buying this week has been of the short-covering kind following Dr. Yellen’s speech to the Economics Club of New York, and coupling those notions with the fact that the margin levels on the NYSE have turned lower, we arrive at the possibility that a major turning point to the downside is hard upon us.
So... fight the Fed after all? Under other conditions we would speculate that this is just another April fools joke report, but then again, this is Gartman.
Joking aside, we may be in for a range-bound market once again, at least until Dennis goes bullish again, and we would not be at all surprised to see the market levitate (on no volume of course) back to green by the end of the day.