Well, that closes the books on another trading week. Although the market (mostly) closed in the red on Friday, stocks still closed higher for the week, putting a convincing exclamation point on the reversal effort we saw start to materialize two weeks ago. From a trend-following perspective, we're still in the bullish camp, though we know this rally is going to face a sizeable headwind real soon if it remains in motion through the early part of next week. We'll take a detailed look at what we're talking about in a moment. Let's go ahead and get some other business out of the way. The Headlines Were a Little Misleading (Again) We only got one piece of economic news today, and it wasn't exactly earth-shattering. But, since we brought it up yesterday we'll go ahead and follow-through on it today. We're talking about the pace of existing home sales, as of December. You might recall that the rest of the real estate and construction data we heard earlier in this week was good, even if not great. On the flipside, you may have also seen the headlines telling you 2014's existing home sales pace was the first annual decline since 2010. All I can say is, be wary of headlines based on misleading math. Truth be told, I'm sure existing home sales did fall in 2014 for the first time since 2010. It only took a quick glance at our chart of the data below, however, to recognize it only waned last year because it was so strong near the end of 2013 and then fall sharply at the beginning of 2014. The current trend isn't a downward-pointing one, however. Sales of existing homes perked up in May, and are still broadly trending higher. Take a look. We just wanted you to have all the data and all the perspective only a chart can provide. While the housing market may not be red hot, it's not as troubled as Friday's headlines would have you believe. Gold, Dollar, and Bonds - Oh My! We dissected the daylights out of gold's rally, the dollar's rally, and the rally in bond prices back on January 16th, so we're not going to rehash that information today. I just told you we'd update the chart of these trends from time to time. So, here's an update. Our opinion the last time we looked was, bonds (blue, at top) were at a top, and therefore yields were at a low (red, at bottom). Although yields have yet to start ascending in a big way and bond prices have yet to slide, we can see indecision on both of those charts which would suggest a turning point is taking shape. We also figured the U.S. dollar (green, second from bottom) was at or near a top, and so far, that call's been wrong. Then again, the injection of a huge bond-buyback stimulus in Europe was a curveball few would have expected, and that's the core of the reason the greenback has rekindled its rally this week. Thing is, gold (gold, second from top) has remained pretty firm anyway, and is now looking like it's regrouped and wants to move higher again. Broadly speaking, the dollar and gold move in the opposite direction. When they don't, it's almost always because the gold bugs don't have any real faith the dollar will continue to rise. Given the choice, I think I'd trust the intuition of gold's buyers here and assume it's still only a matter of time before the dollar starts to move lower in a big way. That should really light a fire under gold, which has stabilized nicely this week despite the profit-takers having an opportunity to knock gold off its new perch. Though not strongly correlated, should yields start to rise and bond prices start to sink, that's also going to be a bullish catalyst for gold. This is all my indirect way of saying I remain bullish on gold for the time being. That's only a short-term outlook though. As always, we'll send you an update when merited. Are We Still Spinning Wheels? Truth be told, there's not a lot to add today to our market. Yesterday's concerns and strengths are still in place, as Friday's movement was minimal.... just like the movement since mid-November. Yawn. Just to make sure we're on the same page though, let's at least take a quick look before signing off for the week. Yes, the NASDAQ Composite closed a little higher today, putting some distance between itself and the big hurdle at 4699 we've been talking about for a while. The longer I get to look at what's firming up as a ceiling at 4811 though, the more concerned I get that level could put a cap on the rally. I hope I'm wrong, but with all the valuation problems we discussed on Tuesday and Wednesday, it's unlikely the market is going to get any lucky breaks. It's also worth a look at the S&P 500's chart today, only to see a ceiling seems to have developed at 2064. That's pretty much where the index topped today and yesterday, but it's also where the S&P 500 peaked three weeks ago. There's something to that line, and it's not particularly encouraging. A look at the Russell 2000 chart doesn't help any, as it closed right at a key resistance level today after briefly trading just above it. While the bulls technically have the edge on the chart of the Russell 2000, it's a very weak grip. In fact, I'm still inclined to think the market as a whole has too many technical and fundamental hurdles to clear at this time. We still need a really good capitulatory reset here. For the time being though, stocks are wedged between a rock and a hard places, and aren't giving any real movement to the folks on either side of the table. The good news is, this means you won't have to worry about not being on the right side of the table over the weekend.