The US Dollar Index (DX/Y) has been in a steady decline since early 2025 but had established a strong level of support going back to July. This support broke on Tuesday when DX/Y dropped below 96 to break a triple bottom and mark its fifth consecutive sell signal. On its longer-term one-point chart, DX/Y’s next area of support is 89-90, so there is a good amount of room to fall. While there are plenty of headlines about the US Dollar, it is now back to levels last seen in 2021 with the next big level of support dating back to 2021 as well. So, be wary of any words proclaiming a collapse. Nonetheless, the USD is in a clear downtrend and the path of least resistance is lower.

This is a green light for certain asset classes, particularly precious metals and ex-US assets which have done very well over the last year. While precious metals are very overbought just about any way one looks at them, a lower USD is still a tailwind on longer time frames. While precious metals may be inactionable in the short-term, international assets are in a better place although still overbought. Secondly, momentum and relative strength strategies have done well in the international space over the last few years, as we’ve talked about extensively (read more here). This has been most evident in developed markets, but emerging markets have been improving for momentum strategies. The image below shows the relative strength spread for both developed and emerging market equities with both lines exploding higher as high-momentum names are doing better than low-momentum names.

If you have been around the Nasdaq Dorsey Wright platform for long enough, many of you will be familiar with our “anatomy of a collapse” series detailing a failing company on the technical front before the demise came to fruition on the fundamental side of things. We typically update this series in the aftermath of a large, well-known company goes belly-up, and new editions are the favorites of many of you who read our research from time to time. While today’s feature isn’t that, it is a new take on the same idea… what we will call an “anatomy of a failed breakout.” As many of you know, finding proper breakouts are more of a fine art than an exact science… one that even the analyst team can misread from time to time. Regardless, looking back at pitfalls the technicals can sometimes throw at us can help us sharpen our pencils for the next chart that comes across our desk.

A “breakout” will be different in everyone’s book. For many of us in the NDW office, one of the criteria of a possible breakout is when a stock (weak or strong) moves back into a positive trend. This typically marks a new page for a stock, one which we would hope ushers in sustained upside action as demand takes control. A trend break also brings with it the addition of a technical attribute… but it is worth noting that a stock in a positive trend can still earn a “weak” rating by NDW standards by failing its other relative tests. Not every positive trend break is created equal- some will quickly fall out of bed on their way to fresh lows- these are the ones we want to avoid if we want to protect our portfolio.

Before going further, its important to clarify the PnF charts today are admittedly cherrypicked. There are certainly charts out there that have the markings of what today’s feature will designate a “failed” breakout that will ultimately be quite successful, and vice versa. Regardless, during our search for historically significant failed breakouts…. One main feature was present: the break failed to reach/overcome a most recent high. Nike is a great initial example in the chart below. You’ll note that every trend break (of which there have been four since 2023) has failed to reach a previous, obvious price battleground despite the seemingly positive break. This makes complete sense- despite the break bulls were unable to overcome the overwhelming supply of sellers pushing price back down. Those astute to notice this lack of ability for the name to overcome this slew of then previous highs would have been rewarded handsomely for calling the bull’s bluff.

 Halliburton Company (HAL) is another interesting picture that played out largely as you would have expected it to throughout the last decade. Note below the first “failed break” in early 2018, where price action failed to eclipse the most recent high at $58. Bears quickly took the wheel until the name ultimately bottomed around the Covid low. At that point, you’ll notice the markings of a productive breakout during which price was able to sustain itself around previous highs. That trend was ultimately in place (as price advanced) until we saw three more “failed” breakouts from 2023-2024 before ultimately falling out of bed and reaching new lows to open 2025. Those following the markings of today’s observations would again be rewarded for their keen eye for the ongoing battle between supply and demand.

To avoid laboring on, Chipotle Mexican Grill (CMG) (2025), Exxon Mobil (XOM) (2016-2019), Caterpillar (CAT) (2018-2020), UnitedHealth Group (UNH) (2025), and Meta Platforms META (2021-2022) all had markings consistent with our definition of a “failed breakout” at the time. Certainly check them out to provide more examples. Shifting gears to actionable ideas today, there are 27 low attribute stocks (<3) within the S&P 500 that have the markings of a current failed breakout in progress. The full list is included below, but a few highlighted names include the likes of SHW, CCI & BLDR.

We will wrap today’s piece with one final “mystery chart” (answer at the bottom of the article, so scroll down if you can’t figure it out…) highlighting the constant failed breakouts during a rather historic time for major markets. You’ll note at least five failed breakouts on the default chart, highlighting the heightened confusion and lack of upward price conviction over this 3.5-year stretch. Here’s a hint… it isn’t just single stocks that can fail to break out.

You’ll note that today’s piece didn’t reference the TA scoring system in our analysis, and for good reason. The goal of this piece is not to discredit the importance of following the attributes over time or ultimately seed doubt into the validity of positive trend breaks. That said, the goal is to provide another way to look at breakouts and ultimately find “confirmation” of strong stock movement, rather than chase headfakes unnecessary over time. (Mystery chart was SPX default chart from 12/31/1999-7/1/2003, highlighting the dotcom bubble.)

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 1/27/26:

Portfolio View - Commodity Indices

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