Boston RS Institute: Register to join us in person for a 3-hour educational symposium on relative strength investing. This event is for financial advisors and will offer 3 hours of CFP/CIMA credit.

When: July 24th, 2025, 9 AM EST - 12 PM EST

Where: Courtyard Boston Downtown, 275 Tremont St, Boston, MA 02116

Who: Speakers include...

John Lewis, CMT, Senior Portfolio Manager; Andy Hyer, CFP, CIMA, CMT, Client Portfolio Manager; Ian Saunders, Senior Research Analyst; Michael Silver, Founder and Managing Director of AlphaScale

Cost: Free! Lunch will also be provided.

Registration is limited to the first 75 advisors, so be sure to act fast!

Click Here to Register!

Wednesday morning, CPI data came in lower than expectations with a month over month change of 0.10%. After a hot print in January, month over month CPI change has not exceeded 0.20% which is a good sign that inflation is continuing to cool down. A likely concern for the Fed at this point is that inflation less food and energy has flatlined on a year-over-year basis since March, staying sticky at 2.8%. Energy prices have been a big driver of headline inflation numbers heading lower but crude oil prices have rebounded over the last few weeks, as we’ll discuss in today’s featured article. Vehicles, both new and used, have seen their prices increase far less than the overall basket of goods tracked. On the other hand, shelter inflation has remained elevated at 3.9% over the last year.

After CPI data release, odds of at least one rate cut by September moved slightly higher to just below 70% whereas it was just above 60% one day prior. This isn’t a large change in expectations, but it does show that if inflation behaves, rate cuts are on the horizon. The big roadblock right now is the unknown impact from tariffs and if energy prices will continue to descend. Intermediate term interest rate benchmarks like the US Treasury 10YR Yield Index (TNX) are near the middle of the range they have been in since the end of 2023. Therefore, while we may see rate cuts later this year, the market is not pricing in a drastic reduction in interest rates despite the cooler inflation data over the last few months.

Recent research has had its fair share of international commentary, and for good reason. Less frequent in its analysis has been commodities, which fell below internationals within the broad DALI rankings to open June. The most likely reason for the lack of distinct research on the group is somewhat simple: long-term themes have stayed largely the same. Precious metals, namely gold, remain relative strength stalwarts while energy focused areas have continued to lag behind. Today’s feature takes a moment to judge the strength of said long-term themes, touching on a handful of interesting performance metrics & technical pictures for the leaders and laggards of the space. Since the start of June, crude oil CL/ has advanced nearly 4% while gold GC/ has fallen just under 1.5%. While it goes without saying that a mere one-week performance spread isn’t enough to change our technical opinion on the space, it is enough to revisit some PnF charts to check under the hood of commodities RS picture.  

Starting with the RS leader, gold has consolidated over the course of the last few months. The default chart is a bit choppy, so we will zoom out to a less sensitive 40-point scale (below). Interestingly enough, the precious metal posted its first sell signal since 2022 on this chart… and while one signal towards the downside certainly doesn’t make a trend a  continual failure to break past $3,400 would certainly be telling as a longer-term resistance point. Despite the slowdown for gold, its cousin silver SI/ hasn’t consolidated quite as much, returning to a positive trend and breaking to levels not seen since 2012 in June. Regardless, both options remain quite strong and the overall message remains pretty clear: Precious metals leadership remains pretty consistent, even if gold is struggling a tad in the near-term.

Given this near-term uptick for silver, we can compare the two precious metals against each other using a 3.25% chart. While the long-term picture continues to favor gold, the chart below shows silver SI/ returning to a column of X’s against gold GC/ for the first time since late October. While neither a signal or column switching strategy is particularly additive when compared to a simple buy and hold strategy of either asset, the chart itself is largely consistent in movement, a point to remember if we see further silver outperformance.

Crude oil CL/ has put together quite a different technical picture than other areas within commodities. We have mentioned it as a laggard for quite some time now, seeing upside action continuously thwarted by stiff resistance or negative trend lines over the better part of the last year and a half. June’s action has seen black gold break a triple top buy signal on its default chart, a positive at first glace. Upon further review, CL/ isn’t out of the woods quite yet, seeing it now test a significant level of old support and its bearish resistance line all within earshot of current levels.

All this to say, exposure to commodities within your client accounts should still be tilted towards precious metals, despite the last few weeks of underperformance. If trends shift and improvement for energy focused areas continues to emerge, momentum strategies may shift. Until that improvement is seen however, continue to focus on those areas that have shown relative strength so far this year.

Each week the analysts at NDW review and comment on all major asset classes in the global markets. Shown below is the summary or snapshot of the primary technical indicators we follow for multiple areas. Should there be changes mid-week we will certainly bring these to your attention via the report.

Remember, these are technical comments only. Just as you must be aware of fundamental data for the stocks we recommend based on technical criteria in the report, so too must you be aware of important data regarding delivery, market moving government releases, and other factors that may influence commodity pricing. We try to limit our technical comments to the most actively traded contracts in advance of delivery, but some contracts trade actively right up to delivery while others taper off well in advance. Be sure you check your dates before trading these contracts. For questions regarding this section or additional coverage of commodities email james.west@nasdaq.com.

Data represented in the table below is through 06/10/2025:

Broad Market Commodities Report

Portfolio View - Commodity Indices

Cryptocurrency Update

Cryptocurrency Video (2:31)

Daily Option Ideas for June 11, 2025