It’s only Monday and already it seems to be one of the most exciting weeks of the year for the financial markets. Asian stocks are flying this morning (the reason for this below) despite some clear signs that investors are still cautious.

One of these signs is the price of gold, which has spiked during the sell-off two weeks ago (purple circle) but is now showing signs that it may be ready to stretch higher (yellow rising support line).

The fact that gold is trading near its highs is not necessarily any indication in and of itself. The upcoming Diwali Festival in India is traditionally a time when gold prices tend to rise. 

As we’ll see below, investors are still happy to pour money into this market but they are doing so very carefully right now.

Traditional Markets

As we mentioned above, Chinese stocks are flying. The China 50 index is up an astonishing 5.3% as of this writing. This is largely due to strong support from President Xi Xinping…

We’ve seen these type of stunts before from President Trump but this behavior does seem to be new for the Chinese leader. 

The timing is impeccable here too. As we’ve been watching, the Chinese stock markets have been on the ropes after retreating more than 30% since the year’s highs. However, the Xi’s gambit may have fallen short of the mark.

As we can see below, the red line being defended on the China50 is just above 10,500 points. Whereas, to break out of the current range to the upside we’d need to see levels above 12,000.

Cautious Like an Oak Tree

For legendary investor Howard Marks, the markets are not so binary. The co-founder of Oaktree Capital does see the current markets as expensive but adds that this doesn’t mean we’re about to see a crash. The economy is doing well and therefore it pays to be in the market, but defensively.

We all know that markets are cyclical. They go through bull times and bear. However, not every rise is a bubble and not every decline is a crash. In fact, most market moves are a lot more moderate.