Saturday, October 23, 2010

Crude and the Euro Standing at the Crossroads

Nothing frustrates an energy investor more than doing the homework on the fundamentals only to be outdone by technical price movements. All commodities eventually return to their supply and demand fundamentals, but the short term seemingly random price swings are driven by the technicals. With crude and the euro at critical technical levels, traders will need to watch for breakouts or containments to determine when to buy or sell.

The strengthening euro has been the main reason crude has been able to ignore over supply fundamentals and churn its way from $65 to $84. The euro is now facing strong resistance on the monthly charts, unable to plow its way past 1.4150 vs the US dollar. Euro bulls will have a few more goes at this barrier, but should it hold, the bears take control driving the US dollar higher and taking crude lower.

Crude also has been facing rather strong resistance unable to break and hold the $85 level. Having held its $81.45 200 day moving average on Friday, crude bulls will go into Monday with some momentum to try and take out this monthly resistance barrier.

Should the euro and crude resistance levels hold, be ready to position short positions for the ride lower. The fundamentals of oversupply will then kick into gear and the bears will be partying like its September 2008.

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