Volatility breaks short term low

With the US equity indexes closing at new highs, it is no surprise that the VIX is back on the slide again, closing -4.7% @ 12.45. The next level is the mid April low of 11.99. That seems likely to be broken. Across the week, the VIX lost 1.1%.


VIX'daily3

VIX'weekly

Summary

So..another week of minor chop in VIX land, and we remain at bizarrely low levels.

With no sign that the Fed are going to end QE, it would seem VERY likely that we'll see the VIX remain under the key 20 threshold for many weeks..perhaps months.

It remains a mere academic question, but will this year be one where the VIX never breaks >20. The last two times that happened was 2005 and 1995 - both of which saw extremely strong bull market rallies.


Small spike..eventually

At some point in the mid-term, we're going to see the VIX spike, but just like April, it won't likely last long, days..if not hours..and I'd be surprised if the spike is much above 15/16. Baring some kind of 'baby black swan', VIX 20s just look out of range.
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more later..on the indexes