The Week Ahead 7/5/26
Hello All,
I hope you’re all enjoying the long weekend and getting some time away from the screens & wishing you all a successful remainder of ‘26.
Jumping straight into it, this past week was a shortened one due to the holiday, but there was still plenty of volatility in between, most notably with specific factors such as the AI complex / Momentum trade, for example, which continued its unwind this past week, thus allowing capital to flow toward other under-owned pockets of the market. But of the indices, Spooz ended up being the best-performing of the group, having closed higher by just over 210bps, whereas Small Caps were the worst-performing of the indices, having closed lower by 75bps on the week.
- Economic Data for the Coming Week:
In regard to economic data heading into the upcoming week, it’s a fairly quiet one, with just a few manufacturing datapoints, but otherwise, we just have FOMC minutes (nothingburger), along with a few other sporadic data points in between but otherwise, it should be a quieter week.
- STD Channels on Indices for Perspective: Weekly TF
- SPY
- QQQ
- IWM
- DJIA
Since starting this Substack back in June of ‘23, between individual names / tactical trades / baskets, we have netted a 189.58% return whilst in the same period, the Q’s have returned 102.71% / Spooz has returned 79.18% / Dow has returned 64.52% & Small-caps have returned 70.56%, so nice outperformance against all the indices whilst having a 81.6% win rate, averaging a 30.56% return on realized gains / winners & a 15.40% loss on realized losses / losers.
Looking forward to the future & continued success through ‘26.
And for anyone who wants to follow an actively managed portfolio in real time:
I’ve joined Plutus as the cleanest, day-to-day way to track an actively managed portfolio in real time. It’s a live dashboard that’s broader, more diversified, actively managed by me, & updated continuously.
The Eliant Flagship is published on RunPlutus.
Once your Plutus account is approved, you’ll have the option to allocate right away. If you do, it’s straightforward: create an account, link your brokerage (Available only for IBKR at this time), & select the Eliant Flagship (or any of the baskets I’ve built). Your money stays in your account, and trades, position changes, and rebalances are replicated automatically so there’s nothing manual to manage. The idea is to make it easier to access an actively managed portfolio run by me without the overhead of traditional fund structures or high minimums, whilst you keep full custody of your assets & I stay focused on research, positioning, and portfolio construction.
Earlier in 2024, we launched a series titled Educational Pieces, covering a wide range of topics, many of which were suggested directly by you all (4-Part Series).
For those who may have missed the first installment, it covered topics including:
General background / knowledge on all option strategies
In-depth talk on risk / reversals & how to go about expressing / utilizing them
Options Structuring
When to used naked calls / puts vs. spreads
Choosing expiration dates
Identifying key pivots / supports / resistance zones
General briefing on stock gaps
What to look for in regards to fundamentals
Implementing fundamental / macro / technicals into a trade
Hedging
Creating risk/reward setups
Taking profits / managing losses
Overall Process
Book recommendations
A link to the original Educational Piece can be found here .
Given the positive feedback and how useful many of you found the first installment, we followed up with Educational Piece: Part Deux earlier in 2025 & for those who may have missed, a link to the piece can be found here & we then went on to release Educational Piece: Part Trois which can be found here.
And finally, the most recent installment, Educational Piece: Part Quatre, can be found here.
‘Risk management is the silent prerequisite for compounding & true wealth is built not by chasing the highest returns but by ensuring the survival necessary to realize them.’
Before we jump into the week ahead, looking back at this past week, similar to the week prior, it was mostly characterized by a continued unwind within Momentum, which was the worst-performing factor on the week, whereas, on the other hand, Private Equity was the best-performing factor on the week.
And in regard to the specific factors and or ‘baskets’ we’ve built on Plutus, here are the best performers year-to-date:
1.Industrial and Auto Analog Recovery
2. Rebuilding U.S. Industrial Sovereignty
4. Robotics
Whereas on the flip side, the worst performing baskets year-to-date have been:
Moving along, the action this past week, given the unwind within the Momentum / AI trade, ended up being quite bifurcated as upside participation has continued to improve, thus allowing for breadth expansion, which, as a result, has led to quite the rebound in the % of stocks above the 20D to 63%, which isn’t necessarily in overbought territory but is starting to encroach on it.
And similar can be said on a broader timeframe too, although to a slightly lesser extent, as currently 60% of stocks remain above the 50D, which still more so paints a neutral picture and isn’t necessarily signaling either overbought or oversold conditions in the medium term.
With that being said, the more incredible phenomenon is that despite the indices practically sitting at their respective highs, the Fear-Greed Index is still well into 'Fear' territory and has only recently worked its way out of 'Extreme Fear' territory, which once again emphasizes that this market remains far from 'true euphoria' or the type of positioning extremes typically associated with major, or even interim tops.
Historical context of the Fear-Greed Index overlaid with the S&P:
