My Trading Game Plan | August 25, 2026

My name is Gareth Soloway and I was a
losing trader until [music] I mastered
technical analysis. Logic and charts
beat hype and narratives every time. Now
I teach investors the same techniques
[music] that made me a multimillionaire.
This is my trading game plan.
Hey folks, welcome to my trading game
plan. My name is Gareth Soloway, chief
market strategist here at
verifiedinvesting.com.
As always, we're going to jump into the
charts and the data that's what's
driving the market. Let the narratives
be, let everyone get on social media
fight it out. What we're going to focus
on is probability. Now, as we get into
the markets, we are seeing a market that
is trending higher this morning. This is
coming on the back of a pullback in oil
and the 10-year and 30-year yields are
pulling back. Those two factors together
definitely give the market a bid and we
are seeing that in the S&P futures. So
here we have the S&P futures. Yesterday
we were chopping, it was a general down
day on the S&P 500. In the overnight you
could see as oil and yields pulled back,
the S&P futures moved higher. We topped
out earlier this morning, pulled back
just a little bit and are now trading
sideways into the opening bell. Now a
couple things that got my attention
here. Number one, Stanley Druckenmiller
who's one of the top hedge fund managers
out there, basically came out attacking
the administration and Scott Bessent in
terms of their yield curve control
attempt. And again, basically what he
was saying is that you can put lipstick
on a pig but you can't mask what is
going on. You have to attack the problem
which is the 40 trillion plus in debt
and the rapidly rising debt at that. Um
ultimately what's fascinating about this
story is that Druckenmiller and Scott
Bessent worked together at the George
Soros Fund years back. So kind of
buddy-buddy at one point. The question
is are they still in that capacity uh or
has Scott percent kind of gone over to
the dark side on the political side
versus the logic and discipline approach
of a hedge fund manager. All right, so
that was an interesting story this
morning that I picked up on. I did think
that that was fascinating. Looking at a
couple other things this morning, the
dollar today is flat. Notice what the
dollar is doing though. We had this
classic trend line ascending trend line.
We came down sharply off resistance,
tagged it, bear flagged, broke down, and
look at what we're doing again. So
again, you have your down move inside
bar. This is telling us based on
probability that we may see a little bit
more upside in the US dollar, but
eventually it is going to go down. And
remember folks, while everyone says,
"Oh, well, it's great to have a weak
dollar. It can bring manufacturing back
to the US." In the near term, a weak
dollar imports inflation. And we know
that we have a Fed meeting coming up
basically in 3 weeks, just under 3
weeks, and we will hear whether or not
the Fed is going to raise. In addition,
don't forget we have the Jackson Hole
press conference, not press conference,
but speech by Kevin Warsh, and that will
be Friday at 10:00 a.m. And again,
that's that big symposium in Jackson
Hole, Wyoming for the Federal Reserve
and all of the governors. All right.
Keeping in mind folks, tomorrow morning
we have the PCE inflation data, and then
after the bell we have Nvidia earnings.
Nvidia earnings will absolutely set the
tone for how the AI trade is doing,
which certainly has been lagging
recently, right? If we look at the
charts and you bring up even Nvidia,
Nvidia's been a very poor performer, and
arguably it did make a high back here,
but since that high in May, it has
really been struggling substantially.
There is a trend line I'm watching very
closely, which goes back to the April
2025
lows through the pivot low here in March
of March 30th, 2026 to this pivot low in
July 29th. And if we come down into
this, will this trend line hold or will
Nvidia break to the downside? Now,
looking at the options market, the
options market have an implied move on
earnings of about 6% one way or the
other. So, that gives us a little
general idea of what the option market
expects in terms of a move off earnings
from Nvidia for Nvidia. Okay. Couple
other things to go over here, guys. As
we continue through, I did mention the
10-year yield was dropping. It is down
over four basis points today. So, again,
a little bit of a drop on the daily
chart. We haven't broken down though
yet. So, keep in mind, short-term you
have a very decisive little trend line
right here. There's additionally some
levels underneath. Even right here,
there's not a whole lot of downside
potential on the 10-year yield. Now,
even a fall down to this lower trend
line around 4.6%
would give the markets a nice little
bid, maybe back towards the all-time
high on the S&P 500. But, unless we
break this bigger trend line here, it's
unlikely to trigger a bigger rally in
the stock market itself. All right. So,
we'll keep an eye on this trend line.
For me, this is the key trend line for
the yields. If we break this trend line,
I think that would initially be taken as
a big positive for the markets. But,
again, we have to see if we come down
and test it first and foremost. Now,
flipping over to the S&P 500, we
continue to look at a megaphone pattern.
And all a megaphone pattern means is
that two trend lines are con- uh
diverging, right? So, they're going
apart from each other versus two trend
lines that are converging like this,
right? This is a wedge pattern. So, you
have a wedge pattern, all right? And
then you you a megaphone pattern, which
essentially is two trend lines that are
diverging with price getting in wider
and wider range, but still respecting
resistance and still respecting support.
You can see that right here. Up, down,
down again, down again, then up and up,
and now it's pulling back. And you can
see again, these two trend lines are
diverging, but still you got to respect
resistance here and technical support
there. Now, I did put on that other
trend line, which is my pivot line. And
a pivot line, basically, all this does,
guys, is give me a basis for what to
look for. So, as long as we stay above
this 75 60 70 level, then I'm bullish on
the markets near term. If we break below
this line and stay in this zone, you
can't be bearish yet because you haven't
broken this trend line, but you would be
more neutral. And then, if we break
below here, that's where the bearish
sentiment, the probabilities really take
over and start to see a bigger potential
downside move. All right. Couple other
charts here. We did talk about Nvidia.
Nvidia is trading up just a little bit
in the premarket here from yesterday's
big decline. There was some news that I
caught on Nvidia that I thought was
interesting. There's a firm in India
that's buying 9,000
Vera Rubin chips. So, that's the newest
chip that Nvidia is going to be
debuting, I believe, later this year.
And again, there's already a 9,000 chip
order, and those chips are expensive.
So, there is demand out there. The
question is, when we look at what Nvidia
says, how much are margins when they
report? And obviously, earnings will be
important, but the guidance. The
guidance is going to be the driving
factor. What investors want to see is no
slowdown at all, and they want to see
margins still at their or near their
peak. If you see anything about a
slowdown or margins contracting, it's
going to be a huge negative for Nvidia,
which by the way is trading at a
reasonable PE at this point. I think
it's only at like uh uh 15 PE forward PE
or so. So, it's very very reasonable.
But again, it's the law of large numbers
with Nvidia as well. You know, they can
add 5 billion in revenue and it's a drop
in the bucket at this point. Okay.
Couple of other things here. Uh Dick's
Sporting Goods this morning reporting
earnings. Take a look at this intraday
chart that I'm popping up now. Look at
this fall on DKS. It is now down almost
20%.
That is a nasty fall on earnings. And
basically just to summarize the earnings
for you guys, they missed on revenue,
they missed on earnings, and their
guidance was atrocious.
Now, what's interesting here is we're
seeing all sporting goods or or athletic
wear stocks coming down because of this.
So, Nike's down, Lululemon's down a
little bit pre-market because it's
affecting the entire athletic wear
sector. So, keep that in mind. Now, in
terms of a trading level, there is an
intriguing level on uh DKS coming up
really right around 139 or so. So
[clears throat] again, this little
That's hard to see. I know you guys
probably have a tough time seeing it,
but these lows right in here would
dictate right around one Actually, it's
a little lower. Looks like 138. That
would be a significant potential bounce
level for a day trade. Would I swing
trade it? Heck no. Um in general, when a
stock reports and is bad or really
really good, there's a 3-day window
where you'll see either funds buying or
dumping. So, there's additional pressure
in that direction. And in a case like
DKS where it drops 20% or more, there
can be margin calls that have to be
remedied. And so, forced selling of the
stock uh over the next 3 days. And so,
in general, um especially for swing
trades on big moves, I like to give
myself about 3 days. I call it the 3-day
rule to let things settle down. Then I
start reevaluating the chart on a swing
trade basis. Day trading, I'm in and
out. We're in and out in the live
trading room. doesn't really matter that
much in terms of waiting on that. Bloom
Energy. So, Bloom Energy this morning is
trading higher. Interesting news here,
and then we'll get into the charts. The
news here is that Nancy Pelosi revealed
that she had bought, or I think it was
her husband bought 15,000 shares of
Bloom Energy. Also, 200 call options.
Now, the tricky thing is, and I this is
why I caution people jumping on board on
this news, but the stock is up about 5%
on this news, is that from when someone
buys, they have 45 days to disclose it.
So, for all we know, this was bought 45
days ago, or 20 days ago, or 30, you
know, you don't really know where their
entry was, so you also don't know where
they're going to exit. And so, you have
to be a little bit careful in general if
you see a government official or someone
that you follow buying a stock, I always
look to see is it down from where they
bought it? If it's down, then I'm more
interested, cuz at least I'm getting it
at a better price. I don't like to pay
up for anything, right? I don't go to
the store and say, "Oh, yeah, milk's $10
a gallon this week. Let me buy five
gallons." I say, "Oh, it's $10, I'll
just wait till it comes down." Like with
eggs. Remember eggs just months, was it
year, a couple years ago, there was a
huge shortage, egg prices were going
nuts. Well, I mean, if you can live
without a few eggs, just wait, and they
came in. Now, eggs are rock bottom
prices again. So, the idea is you want
to apply the methodology you would use
at the grocery store, or at, you know,
the mall, let's say, or the store where
you're buying a pair of jeans, you want
to apply that to investing, and if you
do that, you tend to do much, much
better. All right, so, Bloom Energy up a
little bit. It's really there's not much
to do here. If it gets to 232, there's a
gap fill right here. I would be
interested in a short there on a day
trade, but that's really about it.
All right, MasterCard. MasterCard big
surge up yesterday. We've seen Visa
really go back up to the upside, but
this is where things get interesting for
me. So, what we have here and if if I'm
doing this correctly, we can see that
you have a trend line right through
here. Okay? So, notice pivot low from
April 2025 to this pivot low here.
And you also have a double top. And so,
what I look for is multiple factors.
Now, this is now switching into swing
trade mode. Now, swing trade, this
actually looks like a reasonable
opportunity for a pullback on
MasterCard. Um it's vertical, it's gone
from about $470 all the way up to 600 in
almost a straight line. It's running
into two different trend lines, a
horizontal line and a ascending line.
And ultimately, you should see some sort
of pullback in the near term on
MasterCard. So, I like that one as a
swing trade. Another one I like as a
swing trade potentially, I'm keeping an
eye on this. It's not at the level yet,
but this is the KWEB, which is the
Chinese Internet ETF. High pivots here.
Look at this descending trend line. We
broke out. Now, look at the retrace to
the scene of the crime. If it gets down
to let's say 25, that starts to look
very interesting as a long opportunity.
As we've seen the Chinese Internet plays
like Alibaba and Baidu really take a hit
recently. All right.
Let's flip to commodities. So, gold
yesterday and overnight were pushing up.
I had given you guys a trend line I was
watching. Let's take a look. And you can
see gold is now coming in today and look
at where it kind of topped out here. So,
really remarkable because if we look at
this, you have this pivot low, which is
the one I showed yesterday to here and
to here. And then, if we flip it around,
look at how price goes right up to that
line and then gets rejected. And so,
these these are what we call hidden
trend lines. Most people don't see them.
Um hidden meaning that price has crossed
through at some point. So, most people
are all you know, generally, I would say
the average investor is looking at a
pivot high, a horizontal like double top
or a double bottom. Like everyone sees
those.
But what you want to do is you want to
be unique. In this game, you have to
look for the things that are harder to
see. And when you find these trend
lines, you start to find something
that's more insightful and usually more
profitable for you as a trader.
So, again, gold, we should see a
multi-day pullback. I would say
generally I'd be looking for this
consolidation right around 4435
as your pullback level. And again, if we
get into that, that would be your first
major support. Silver today, nice little
sell on silver today. Now, silver's
interesting. It didn't quite get to my
level I was looking for this trend line
to hit here. It came up just shy. So,
the question is does is there still one
more move up or is it just not going to
hit the line? Or better yet, am I
missing something? And that's always a
possibility. And remember that, folks.
It's not that my line necessarily was
wrong or right. It's more that if it
doesn't behave that way, price is always
right, right? The price is arbitrar
arbiter of truth. And so, more than
anything, what it means is I probably
didn't see something. There was probably
something else in that mix and I just
didn't have it on my chart or I didn't
find it. And And again, you know, it's
almost like a Where's Waldo in the
charts. Like, if you're a real chartist
and you have fun with this stuff, like
I'm always looking for these things and
I'm looking for these multiple factors
that align. And it really is searching
for something that most people won't
see. Um fun to fun to do anyways. I have
a good time doing it. And it's And it
makes you money. That's the best of all.
All right. Oil today, pulling back. I
mentioned this earlier on. Notice again,
I mean, this you can't you can't beat
this pair this wedge pattern. I mean,
this is a classic wedge. High pivot
through high pivot. You pierced here,
you pierced here, then you kissed it,
then you touched it, now you touched it
again. Look at how oil comes right back
in off of that level. Short-term, there
is a technical support you want to
watch. This trend line here around 79.
There'll be some support. If that
breaks, then you go to the low end of
the wedge pattern. Now, what I did say
I'm going to hold with so I told you a
few days ago. I was like, you know, I
don't see oil breaking out here. Number
one, the charts are telling me it's
stuck in a wedge. Number two, there's
unlikely to be military action against
Iran that would heighten the risks on
oil until after the midterms. And so
until the midterms, I still am sticking
to that I think oil is probably range
bound here. Uh probably between $85 and
$75 or $72 a barrel. Now, once we get to
the midterms, that's where we'll have to
reevaluate. And obviously if the chart
breaks out, the chart breaks out. Like I
said, the chart is truth. But right now
it's staying within the wedge, so I
respect that as a trader and we just
continue to follow in here into those
midterms later. Natural gas pulling back
today. Yesterday one again once again it
tried to break out and just could not.
Incredible how much effort it's taking
to try to break out, but has been
unsuccessful thus far. All right. And
lastly, Bitcoin. How can we not talk
about Bitcoin, guys? I gave you guys a
resistance. I came out and even said
that I said I said Bitcoin is likely
going to have a pullback here.
The technical was this technical act
analysis was just so simple here, just
connecting these highs right here or
these lows I should say. Look at that
trend line. Pivot low right through
here. And then price broke. And this is
again one of those hidden trend lines we
were just looking at on the previous
chart. Um and sure enough, it pierced in
the overnight. And what's even crazier
is you may be getting a daily topping
tail on Bitcoin. So again, and by the
way, we had a morning meeting with the
traders and my chief market market
strategy or chief chief crypto
strategist uh pointed out that inflows
into the Bitcoin ETF were the biggest
since the top on Bitcoin.
And again, that was the top on Bitcoin.
So So question is is it now the top in
the near term? Now, I'm not going to
pass judgment if I think Bitcoin's going
to go back and make new lows here for
this bear market cycle, but at least for
a pullback, if you get a topping tail
with extreme bullish volume and inflows,
it's a pretty good situation for at
least a case for a retrace. And in terms
of a retrace, what would I be looking
for? I would be looking for a pullback
probably I would say my base case would
be back to about 73 to 71,000, which
would be about a 50% retrace. And then
if you're looking for where I would
actually start buying it, right here.
This level here, notice former pivot
high, former pivot high, little inverse
head and shoulders breakout, retrace to
the scene of the crime. I don't know if
it'll get back there, but I certainly
know what I would likely be doing if it
gets back there. All right, I got to get
to my trading room, guys. Markets open
in about 11 minutes.
We're going to be day trading them.
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right, have a great rest of your day.
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Investing, and I'll see you soon. Take
care.