Buckle up fasten your seat belts, it's time for us to get started here today and uh discuss sort of the happenings across the stock market. Let's start off with the short thesis so starting off, first and foremost with uh the russia, russia situation. There was a couple things that i noticed and i retweeted one of them. This came directly from unusual wales and this is a situation in which i think we should probably uh just monitor, and it's that the the russian cyber attacks against u.s banks is increasing.

As per the hill, now, i've talked about this in a couple live streams now and as i've discussed before uncertainty, uncertainty, equals bears right. Uncertainty is where bears thrive, uh in the marketplace and within the russia situation there was two uh forms of uh warfare that i thought could create some uncertainty, one of them, obviously worse than the other uh. First one was cyber. Second one is nukes.

Cyber seems more likely than nukes, as it has already happened right. So this is an uncertainty that could continue to develop, and you already see uh that it has begun uh to take root, at least in some way, shape or form within uh the the us economy. As you see here, russian cyber attacks against u.s banks is increasing. Now it does appear to be uh managed decently well, but if this gets out of hand, this could really affect the stock market.

If this gets out of hand, this will create uncertainty. Now it doesn't appear that the market's actually reacting to this uh too strongly. I expected some form of a gap down to be honest with you on the spy, having read that news, but it appears that big institutions and big money don't really give a if uh. If banks get hacked, i don't know, maybe maybe they maybe they don't think cyber warfare is as big of a deal as i do.

It beats me who knows at the end of the day the market's not reacting to it as strongly as i thought that they would uh. However, if it does get bad right, i think this is a situation in which existentialism is gon na take root. Apparently uh is, if there's actual consequence right so watch for some form of a consequence watch for some form of a casualty or loss in terms of financials uh from some entity or bank from a cyber attack, and that could be some form of uncertainty. But for now apparently seems like this is uh off the map.

Right people aren't really taking that too seriously. Now nukes nukes are actually quite interesting. I thought to myself a lot. I thought to myself.

If i was russia, if i was russia right now, how would i feel about this war and what's happening currently the way i feel like i'm winning it would, i feel like i'm losing it so you come on and you check on with the russia, ukraine, uh Conflict and you sort of look at the news amid war in ukraine, u.s marine detained by russia faces urgent health needs second round of talks, uh second round of talks, but right here between russia and ukraine end with no cease fire uh. What i would be personally thinking is, i want to wrap this up as quickly as possible, not even from a casualty perspective as they have faced many casualties, but from an economic perspective. Remember there are sanctions uh that are affecting their economy, they're they're being financially hit. Pretty hard by this as the world is retaliated, i don't think to the full scope that they could, but in a way already that is going to be hurting russia's economy and russia's stock market rush.

The stock market is down uh or was down at the very least, about 40-ish percent. Since the beginning of this conflict uh. This is this is something that i think they're going to want to wrap up at least uh decently. Quick now is it possible that they do drop a nuke.

It is right, but is it likely? I find the nukes to be far far far less likely than cyber cyber seems like something that that could very easily happen. Uh decently quickly, but nukes starts world war. Three: this is a world war. Three scenario, if you hear any talks about an actual launch of uh, of a nuclear weapon right, that is, that is world war, three territory and i don't think they're going to escalate things that quickly uh right now.

What i do think is you're going to reach some form of uh discussion and toxic of a cease fire. Now it obviously hasn't happened. We just got news that stated uh. You know as long as this is accurate.

That is completely dependent on this news being accurate. You you, they had a second round of talks between russia and ukraine and there was no ceasefire, so this is still kind of on the table, but i i find it to be less likely. You know i'm gon na leave this box unchecked, at least for the time being, because the risk is still there. But russia to me has one objective: uh and it is this.

Russia objective end conflict. I think they want to come to some form of an agreement in terms of of what uh what this should look like. I know that cyber already started yeah. I showed that i showed that unusual whales tweet and it's something i fully expected.

That's why i i brought it up entirely so, unless cyber gets out of hand doesn't seem like the market's pricing, this doesn't seem like they care right, they're, not really caring about the uncertainty, as long as it doesn't create any sort of financial hardship, so uh for The time being, i i think uncertainty if i was to scale it in the market right. This is just my opinion, uh. If this is 10 - and this is also speculation, this is opinion right speculation, slash opinion if 10 is being absolute fear, absolute uncertainty and one is no fear, uh complete certainty. I would put things probably at about uh a four or so.

I don't think that the market's as uncertain as it once was, and the only reason that i have uh, perhaps a four - is coming into the second thing that i'd like to talk about, which is uh j-pow jerome powell, now what's going on here. Well, he did give uh a decent look inside to sort of what he would like to do with uh with the economy. Now that the probably the most important thing is the the way in which he plans on raising rates he's actually directly addressed, this powell of firms fed on track for march hike will move with care uh. They they have a plan, they have a game plan in terms of how they want to attack this uh, this rate hike situation, and that creates certainty, whether it's bearish or bullish news.

The certainty allows the market to create bulls and that's why you've seen the spy get some form of uh of a decent sized bounce today, even if it is slightly red right about point one, seven percent uh, you can see here that it's attempting to break out And has actually bounced off of this sort of long-term downtrend uh line and, if you're gon na bounce off this in a continuation. I think that just shows you that the market is getting a little more confidence in jerome powell in the fed, even if, even if it uh it doesn't, i don't think we've quite escaped the paint now. There is one thing, though, that i find to be interesting and uh it's this right here. The jerome powell has talked about how the the russian war will worsen inflation and if it does worsen inflation, i do think that's a lagging indicator, meaning that it's going to take a couple of months to truly get uh back on track to where they they want To be in terms of uh being able to analyze uh inflation, how they combat that, so that could be an uncertainty that we have to address uh in the future.

Maybe three million three months, four months, six months down the road uh, as as things continue to uh to worsen with this russian conflict right, we are gon na, have to wait and see how long this wage is on and how involved the united states is going To get because, from an economic perspective, the more involved we get, as was alluded to by biden, uh, the the worse it'll, be for our economy, so those are sort of the things that you're watching for right. Now, like i mentioned, i think that uncertainty factor is at about a four right now uh, it's we're not quite out of the clear there's, still uncertainty in the market, which means that there is still some form of a short thesis. I think it is drastically better than it was a couple weeks ago. There are good things that have happened right.

We do see uh that there is sanctions being placed on uh on russia. We do see that there are more certainties coming within the market. At this point in time, we do see the plan to some extent on how j-pal plans on combating inflation uh, which which is going to bring certainty back in the market, which is why i think we're in a better spot than we were uh previously. And that brings me back to uh iwm and ortex uh data for amc as as well right, so check this out.

We're going to come and check out iwm short positions and i'd be willing to bet you that they really have not covered a mass majority of their positions. Previously, it was at about 38-ish percent short interest. Now it's actually higher. You can see this right or text estimated to interest for free float in case you do not know.

Uh iwm is the russell. 2000 is a small mid cap etf and it is very heavily shorted. The c, a etf at 41 short interest screams that people do not have faith in the current small mid cap market continuing on an upward trajectory, otherwise they wouldn't really be short on the market right. These shorts to me are playing with fire.

When i look at iwm, what do i see right, iwm is by the way amc is inside iwm. It is a part of this etf uh. What i see is more upside the downside in the current market, unless there was to be a true market crash. If there was a true market crash, i could see more downside potentially, but i i don't think we're quite there yet right.

Maybe you can see this drop down uh if it breaks down beneath 188. You can see this pop down to about 178, which is uh uh about a 25 point drop or so a little less than that, but about the same now, if it's to come up not even two quite all-time highs, you know you can see a 26 27 Point move to the upside without even touching those all-time highs up here about 245, so i personally believe this is. This is the point in which i you'd be sweaty as a short - and i stand by that right about two weeks ago. I mentioned this for the first time uh, and i stand by that that thesis that reasoning.

I do think there is more upside than downside in the small mid-cap market uh and the shorts apparently have not realized that here yet as they are 41 short on iwm.