Historical Holiday weakness trend was right on cue last week. After a bid not far from Friday’s high when trading resumed prompt gas fell from $8.916 to $8.118 where support was generated from the rising 20 – day SMA (not commonly sighted here). July recovered from that test of support and traded all the way back to definable resistance just short of $9 (as discussed in the Daily last week), reversed lower and spent the remainder of the holiday shortened week churning between the two extremes, ending the week about in the middle.
The momentum divergences discussed here in previous weeks continued while market internals continued to deteriorate The momentum divergences discussed in previous weeks continues to exist and provide additional curiosity. For example, this week each day that price rallied to close higher, the volume declined –while it accelerated when price fell. With prices lower from Thursday to Thursday open interest (data lags by a day) increased nearly 19,000 contracts, suggesting larger positioning on the short side. When a market is in a healthy trend volume, open interest and price will move in the same direction (similar to the December and March lows), right now the opposite is prevalent. In summary for May–prompt gas ended May $.901 higher than on the last trading day of April while volume fell significantly. Open interest also declined during May (from 1,138,850 to 1,115,815). Rising prices – falling volume – falling open interest is a combination that is not likely to continue and underscore a problem within the market..
