• A reliable source for recession forecasting is the unemployment rate (UER), which can provide signals for the beginnings and ends of recessions.
• Recently Gundlach warned if the UER moves up a couple of tenths in the next couple of months, “we will be on recession watch.”
• The latest UER (March 2016) is at 5.0%, signifying that no recession is imminent. However, should the UER increase to 5.3% then a recession will be signaled.
• Investors should carefully monitor the unemployment rate, because if it moves up a few tenths of a percent from where it is now, then high recession probabilities prevail.

This model is similar to our iM-BestogaX-5 System which is partially hedged by shortening SSO. But the underlying component models of the iM-BestogaX-5(SDS) System use a long SDS hedge instead of short SSO.

• The iM-BestogaX Index of the Russell1000 holds the so called “Vice” stocks (excluding Gaming stocks), plus the stocks from the GICS-sub-industries: Restaurants, Soft Drinks, and Internet Retail.
• This capitalization weighted index outperformed SPY by about 4.5-times from Jan-2000 to Mar-2016.
• Over down-market periods the iM-BestogaX Index lost on average 87% less than SPY, and over up-market periods gained on average 24% more than SPY.
• Trading systems which periodically select a small number of highest ranked stocks from the Index produced simulated annualized return as high as 34.4% with maximum drawdowns of about -20%.

The iM Standard Market Timer endeavors to signal periods when it may be advantageous to exit the market or hedge one’s portfolio of stocks.

• This combination model aims to provide reasonable returns with low drawdowns during all market conditions.
• There are six equal weight component models in Combo6, five of which are from Combo5 and the BESTOGA3 is the sixth component model.

• This combination model aims to provide reasonable returns with low drawdowns during all market conditions.
• There are six equal weight component models from Combo6, (five of which are from Combo5 and the BESTOGA3), which are then hedged 25% with the Best10(Short Russell3000), the seventh component model.

The iM Gold-Timer timer endeavors to signal long-term investment periods for Gold. It uses the SPDR® Gold Shares ETF: GLD. When not invested in GLD the model goes to 100% cash.

• This model selects periodically up to 10 stocks of the Russell 3000 index to sell short.
• Stocks having a market-cap less than $800-million and those having a 10-week average daily total amount traded of less than $6,000,000 are not sold short.
• Simulated performance over a 16 year backtest period shows an annualized return of 18.8% with a maximum drawdown of -48%.

• This combination model aims to provide good returns with low drawdowns during all market conditions.
• For the period 2000 to 2016 the backtested annualized return is 24.0% with maximum drawdown of -10.5%.
• There are five equal weight component models in Combo5.

• The energy sector is in a recession — the energy industry has filed negative earnings for four consecutive quarters.
• Negative earnings and Debt-to-EBITDA (earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization) ratio at historic highs, and no respite in sight.
• The US government should not let this strategic industry fail and arrange a bailout program.
• According to our analysis the energy ETFs (XLE, VDE, XOP, etc) and energy stocks remain strong sells.