Joel Elconin – Market Gaps Down, Is There Anywhere To Hide?
Joel Elconin, co-host of PreMarket Prep, joins us to break down another brutal day for markets across the board.
Following last week’s warning signs, Joel returns to assess what now feels like a full-blown market unwind. Stocks are down sharply, volatility is surging, and investors are scrambling for safety – yet even traditional defensive sectors are cracking under pressure.
Key Theme: With equity markets collapsing, safe havens weakening, and algorithmic selling accelerating, we could be witnessing a structural shift in how investors interact with markets.
🔻 Market Breakdown:
- S&P down nearly 6%, Nasdaq and small caps also getting crushed — a continuation of the post-Liberation Day selloff.
- Circuit breakers in focus: Markets approached the 7% intraday decline threshold, reminiscent of March 2020.
- Joel’s technical take: Watching the S&P Cash Index closely – with a potential downside target of 4,150 – 4,200 based on long-term retracement levels.
- No signs of capitulation (yet): Joel stresses the selloff remains “orderly,” not panic-driven – but warns that real capitulation could trigger deeper damage.
- Gaps aren’t the focus: Unlike previous pullbacks, Joel isn’t seeing actionable gaps in the futures market and cautions against assuming they’ll be filled quickly.
- A generational investor shift: The meme-stock era and rise of zero-day options have created a “casino-like” market dynamic, distorting fundamentals..
- Cash is king right now – and Joel, like Warren Buffett, is comfortable sitting in yield-bearing instruments..
- Safety trades showing cracks: Bonds and the dollar are catching bids, but even those trades aren’t bulletproof in this environment.
💬 Big Picture Insights:
- “The past 100 years of U.S. free trade policy was just overturned in a week — the markets are reacting accordingly.”
- “We’re not seeing capitulation – yet. But volatility is feeding on itself.”
- “There’s nowhere to hide. Even defensive names and dividend plays are getting hit.”
Click here to visit Joel’s PreMarket Prep website.
SPX:Gold has almost filled its August 2020 gap:
https://stockcharts.com/h-sc/ui?s=%24SPX%3A%24GOLD&p=W&yr=9&mn=11&dy=0&id=p20464803126&a=942651397
Margin Calls coming in:
Wall Street banks have asked their hedge fund clients to stump up more money as security for their loans because the value of their holdings had tumbled, according to three people familiar with the matter. Several big banks have issued the largest margin calls to their clients since the beginning of the pandemic in early 2020. DT
2001, A Fleckenstein Odyssey: “It’s a Casino out there!”
As far as tariffs and the intent is to balance trade and actually bring manufacturing jobs back to America, yes will take a few years to play out and market is not going to wait too bad, if we don’t start now USA will suffer a hell of a lot more than now, stock market is mostly opportunity for upper middle class and rich to get richer or maintain weather against inflation but middle class and lower are the ones that will be hurt most but will hurt more along with our grandchildren in the future
People made ton money leading up to COVID then stocks recovery in a V up tent due to all spending and for last 4 years have made ton money and their portfolio getting destroyed no just gave back some of their gains, stop, we need to get back our core manufacturing and good paying jobs and stop importing all these china products. We need that get these good paying jobs for lower and middle class workers and they will buy and pay taxes and stop government from this spending spree that got us into $35 billion in debt and we need to get this under control for our future.
Americans pay taxes and those taxes pay for many other countries through trade deficit, for our military to protect all our allies, Japan, Canada, Europe, Mainly Germany who doesn’t even have military, South Korea and South Korea is a very wealthy country, as Biden said PAY your FAIR share.
Why did USA give billions of dollars under Biden to other countries to push his climate change agenda, and Woke policies it got to end NOW.
In 2023, the United States had a trade deficit of $41 billion with Canada in goods and services, although excluding energy, the US had a surplus of $63 billion So where’s the problem Paul??? Unless you’re using the liars made up numbers???
USA first, it all started with NAFTA, the hell with globalization, we make American, buy American and use all our natural resources to energy independent.
We build our military strong and if other countries like Canada, South Korea, Japan, NATO etc etc need our protection pay for it why should I pay taxes my whole life to have to support military bases in other countries they can build their military up and we can support and back them up.
USA has to support everyone with our tax dollars, we can’t do it anymore we are $36 trillion in debt, maybe all our money should be loans like Europe gets for their support of Ukraine but USA has to give 2-3 time as much money and get nothing back enough is enough.
The soothsayers in Washington will be convening a meeting over the weekend to decide what should be done. How sound are The Banks? Should we close the markets for a day or a week to let the fear fervor die down. Of course, the physicians will be trying to soothe the patient (the public) with reassuring words like our markets are strong never underestimate the strength of America. Words are all that is left except for quantitative easing which will bring on hyperinflation. DT