Market timers are on the sidelines, which means you might want to jump in

Bear-market calls are rampant these days. Paul Tudor Jones says “really scary moments” are on the way. Jim Cramer warns there’s nowhere to hide in this “very serious correction.” Steve Cohen predicts that the bull is about to die a painful death.

Get the idea? Yeah, pretty sure you do.

So perhaps it is time to consider Baron Rothschild’s famous market take: “The time to buy is when there’s blood in the streets.” That’s gospel for contrarian investors, and despite the occasional market blip to the upside, there’s very little doubt that there’s blood flowing in the streets these days.

Which brings us to our chart of the day.

Amid all the reasons for doom and gloom, there’s one indicator that is pointing to a rally, at least for the short term: Market timers are sitting this one out.

According to this chart from Erin Swenlin of the DecisionPoint blog, the National Association of Active Investment Managers (NAAIM) exposure reading hasn’t been this low since 2016, and that is typically taken as a contrarian indicator.

“They will sometimes be ‘right’ in their exposure in the very short term,” Swenlin wrote. “But in the intermediate term, price reversals nearly always occur.”

Swenlin did warn, however, that if a trend of lower and lower readings unfolds, a bear market could be coming, as was signaled before “the dam broke” in 2007.

“I would expect a small rally or bounce,” she wrote. “But we need to be cautious if these extremely low exposure readings continue lower.”

Not much of a rally or bounce taking shape yet.

The market

Futures for the Dow Jones Industrial Average














YMZ8, -0.35%












 and the S&P 500














ESZ8, -0.36%












 are looking rather sluggish this morning, as is the Nasdaq Composite














NQZ8, -0.36%












Gold














GCZ8, -0.18%












 is also in the red, as is silver














SIZ8, -0.26%












Crude oil














CLZ8, -0.11%












was providing a glimmer of green this morning before turning mostly flat to lower.

Overseas, Asia markets














ADOW, +0.30%












 and Europe markets














SXXP, +0.07%












 are doing just fine, with most major markets in the green.

The buzz

Last week was a chart-lover’s paradise, especially if said chart-lover was looking for warning signs in this unsteady stock market. Apple














AAPL, +1.11%












bitcoin














BTCUSD, -5.29%












 and oil














CLZ8, -0.11%












 were all ringing alarm bells in recent sessions, and they’ll surely be closely eyed by traders in the coming sessions.

Facebook














FB, -3.00%












 is back in the news and looks set to stay there this week. In the latest development, CEO Mark Zuckerberg reportedly has adopted a more aggressive management style in recent months, driving away many top execs amid sinking employee morale. He apparently also blamed COO Sheryl Sandberg for the fallout of the Cambridge Analytica scandal, making her wonder if her job was secure, according to The Wall Street Journal. About a dozen high-profile execs have left Facebook this year.

The bad news just keeps pouring in from Northern California, where the death toll from the “Camp Fire” rose to 76, as of Saturday’s tally. The number of people still unaccounted for jumped to 1,276, according to CBS News. In case you missed it, here’s Trump reporting from the forest floor:

Condoleezza Rice as the next head coach for the Cleveland Browns? This report caught fire across social media over the weekend. The Browns deny it, as does Rice, but that doesn’t matter—the internet eating it up.

The call

One of the most compelling story lines during the recent weak spell has been Apple’s














AAPL, +1.11%












 retreat toward bear-market territory, as you can see in this compilation of disastrous charts. But is the pain over for shareholders? Barron’s over the weekend explained “why apple’s stock slide could continue.”

Tae Kim explained that clues pointing to further trouble ahead for the stock emerged when two key suppliers, Lumentum Holdings














LITE, +1.07%












 and Qorvo














QRVO, +1.78%












basically singled out Apple for a sudden shortfall in component orders.

New Street Research analyst Pierre Ferragu, who downgraded Apple to Sell in August, was singled out in the Barron’s piece for his $165 price target on Apple shares. That’s the lowest on Wall Street.

Ferragu told Barron’s that the “disappointing” performance of the iPhone XR shows “High-end buyers are happy to spend more for a fancier phones. It is much less true for budget buyers.”

Ferragu predicts iPhone unit shipments will fall 9% in fiscal 2019, while Wall Street analysts are expecting only a 2% decline.

The quote

“I would give myself, I would…look, I hate to do it, but I will do it, I would give myself an A+, is that enough? Can I go higher than that?”—That’s how Donald Trump says he would grade himself in an interview on Fox News on Sunday morning.

Here’s the clip:

The stat

50%—that is the share of people (out of almost 100,000) who said they would choose to be gifted $10,000 in bitcoin, when given the choices listed in this Twitter














TWTR, +1.57%












 poll from former U.S. congressman Ron Paul:

The economy

For a holiday-shortened week, there’s still plenty for to occupy traders in terms of data. At 10 a.m. Eastern on Monday, we’ll get the November NAHB home builder survey. The more notable numbers trickle in starting Tuesday, when October housing starts are reported, followed by existing home sales Wednesday. Wells Fargo in a recent note waxed pessimistic about the housing market. “We suspect the housing market will continue to cool in coming months, as virtually every leading indicator of housing has continued to weaken,” the analyst said. “While we expect to see less typical seasonal weakness over the winter months, we expect the overall sales to remain anemic.”

Read: The economy will knuckle under if firms become tight-fisted. So keep an eye on this number.

Random reads

This is the “Idiocracy” that lives in online America.

Speaking of “Idiocracy,” behold the Flat Earth conference.

Check out FLOTUS’s hotel bill.

Take your money advice and shove it, say critics, who argue that most personal-finance pearls as elitist garbage to truly poor people.

Decorated Navy SEAL could face life behind bars after these acts.

Amazon’s














AMZN, -1.61%












 Jeff Bezos, as portrayed by Steve Carell, sticks it to Trump in this Saturday Night Live skit:

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