Will Gartman make it 4 out of 4 this week? As a reminder, Tuesday Gartman came out swing bearish and stocks soared. On Wednesday, he was bullish and stocks staged a late tumble. On Thursday, Gartman exhausted from all the flip-flopping refused to virtually trade virtual money, and said he was "flat and nervous". Stocks, not knowing how to fade that, closed virtually unchanged. To wit: Tuesday - bearish: Trend Line Support, We Fear, Is A Very Long Way Down: This is a sobering thought, but this chart… which we included in our commentary yesterday… should give everyone a case of very real concern for support for the S&P is several hundred points below where the market closed on Friday. Strength is to be sold into.... We remain here at TGL modestly net short of the market generally and we’ve no intention of changing that focus other than to become a bit shorter still as time and market conditions demand. Wednesday - bullish: In our retirement fund here at TGL… the only money which we manage directly… we came into yesterday’s session decently net short; not aggressively so, but not marginally so either. However, it made no difference; we were short in a rampaging bullish move and we had no choice but to rush to cover much of the net short position immediately upon the opening of trade on the NYSE.... Within moments of the opening we had reduced that net short position almost entirely. Would that we had had the temerity and the foresight to have reversed our derivatives position entirely, but we are neither that insightful nor that heroic. Today, almost certainly we’ll be covering in a bit more of our derivatives position and at the same time we’ll be buying more of our single “tanker” stock to take our “net” position to one that is modestly, marginally net long. We’ve no choice. The market has spoken and it has spoken loudly. Thursday - "flat and nervous": We enter today effectively net market neutral, holding the same position we have held wherein we are long of the same “tanker” stock and long of a small position in coal shares while “short” of derivatives and at this point we see no reason to believe that we shall be changing that position today; however, the randomness of the market’s movements makes even that statement seem disingenuous. We are indeed “Flat and nervous,” and that seem quite reasonable and rational under the circumstances. Which brings us to today, and the most recent now daily flip-flop by the world renowned contrarian indicator, when somewhat to our surprise, Gartman did not revert back to being bullish, which would be great news for bears, but instead Gartman decided to almost assure that stocks close the week green. To wit: From a purely technical circumstance we are still quite worried about the markets in general terms, but we are very worried about the markets here in the US in specific, catholic terms because the current consolidation has traced out what in the text-book of technical analysis, Edward’s & McGee’s Technical Analysis of Stock Market Trends is a nearly classic “pennant” formation that almost always resolves itself in the direction that prevailed before the consolidation took place. In this instance, since the moved preceding the “pennant” was down, the next move of consequence shall also likely be lower. If the consolidation is indeed reconciled to the downside, the target becomes 1725-1750, or just a bit more than 200 S&P points to the downside. * * * NEW RECOMMENDATION: we wish to sell the S&P futures short this morning, fearing that a major top hss developed and that the recent consolidation in the stock market is precisely that: a consolidation before the next leg downward. We’ll sell the S&P future short and will buy the December T-note at the same time, with the S&P trading 1933.00 as we write and with the Dec T-note future trading 127 ¼. We’ll risk no more than 1.5% on either position and we look for the consolidation in the S&P to resolve itself sharply lower as discussed at length above. Not sure what being worried in "catholic terms" means aside from the daily comedic trolling of clients for what may be the most accurate (if completely in inverse terms) newsletter in history. Bears (and Treasury bulls): this has been your public service announcement warning.