BULZ after the July low: where past %R upcrosses have led
BULZ is consolidating below its September 22 high. The weekly data through October 5 show a close of $45.01, 83% above the $24.61 July low and 5% below the $47.59 peak since the September 8 cross. Among past cycles that got at least as far as this one (1.93 times their low), the median peak was $73–81, typically about 20 weeks after the cross, which points to late January 2027.
About 75–83% of those cycles went on past the $56.09 June high. The main caution is the one failed BULZ cycle: in 2022 the rally reached the same 1.92 times its low two weeks after its cross and then topped. This cycle matched that path two weeks ago, but it has since held a $42–47 range instead of rolling over, and it has not yet made a new high.
What changed in this update. Two more weeks of price data (the weeks of September 28 and October 5). BULZ pulled back from its September 22 high to $45.01 but stayed well above the $39.42 cross close, and no threshold or cycle signal changed. The base case stays at $73–81 because the peak multiple, 1.93 times the low, is unchanged.
New this time: a sentiment section built on the Composite MAD, which blends Nasdaq-100 breadth, Fear & Greed and the smart-minus-dumb money spread. It reads +0.83, the Nibble Buy zone, which has historically been a fear reading rather than a topping signal. The new data also raise a question about the July low itself, covered under the risks below.
Table 1. Where each threshold stands. %R is −11.2 on the October 5 bar, in the top fifth of its 14-week range.
| Threshold | Crossed | Close at the cross | Change to $45.01 now |
|---|
Table 2. Key parameters of the current setup
| Parameter | Value | Condition or source |
|---|---|---|
| Bottom low | $24.61 | Week of Jul 27, 2026. %R armed at −93.8 the week of Jul 20. |
| Prior swing high | $56.09 | Week of Jun 1, 2026. 2.28 times the low and +24.6% from the October 5 close. |
| Price now | $45.01 | +82.9% from the low and 5.4% below the $47.59 peak since the cross (week of Sep 21), which is 1.93 times the low. The week of Oct 5 is still open. |
| Decline depth | −56.1% | From the $56.09 high to the $24.61 low. |
| Updated base-case cycle peak | $73–81 | +197% to +231% from the low. Median of past cycles that reached at least 1.93 times their low. |
| Chance of clearing $56.09 | ≈75–85% | 5 of 6 BULZ and 15 of 20 scaled TQQQ cycles that got this far went on past 2.28 times their low. |
| Typical peak timing | Late Jan 2027 | Median about 20 weeks after the Sep 8 cross. Middle half of BULZ peaks: mid-Nov 2026 to mid-Feb 2027. |
| Dip since the cross | −8.2% | To $36.17 in the week of Sep 14. The historical median before the peak was −12% to −14%. |
| Level that ends the cycle | $29.21 | A close that puts %R back below −80. Rises to about $32.81 the week of Nov 2 and $36.53 the week of Nov 9 as the July and August lows leave the window, if the $47.59 high holds. |
How a cycle is defined
The study treats each oversold episode as one cycle and asks how far price ran after %R recovered through a chosen threshold. The rules are fixed before looking at outcomes, and every trigger uses only data available at that week's close.
- Arm
- %R(14) closes below −80.
- Trigger
- The first weekly close after arming where %R crosses up through the threshold. One trigger per arm.
- Bottom
- The lowest low between the arm and the trigger.
- Cycle peak
- The highest high from the trigger until %R next closes below −80.
- New high
- The cycle peak clears the 14-week high at the bottom, the level the decline started from.
TQQQ scaling. BULZ moves about 1.4 times as much as TQQQ: its weekly return volatility is 1.38 times higher and its 14-week range 1.41 times wider over the overlapping period. TQQQ multiples are raised to the power 1.4 before being applied to BULZ prices. %R was recomputed from the raw OHLC and matches the source data's %R values to within 5×10⁻¹¹.
Every cycle in the record
BULZ has 7 completed cycles at −50 since its 2021 launch. TQQQ adds 23 more going back to 2010. Switch the ticker and threshold to see where each bottom, trigger and cycle peak fell.
Choosing the threshold
The threshold decides when you act. It does not move the bottom or the top. At −50, −40 and −30 BULZ's bottoms and cycle peaks are identical, so the median gain from the bottom is +187% at all three. What changes is how far off the bottom you enter and how often you get faked out.
−60 fires earliest but catches false starts: BULZ in August 2024 and TQQQ in September 2011 and November 2022 crossed it, then fell back to −80 before the real move. −30 fires latest; in 5 of 22 TQQQ cycles less than 10% of the run was left at entry. −50 and −40 balance the two, which is why this study leads with −50.
Made a new high
Median entry above the bottom
Median further gain from entry
Table 3. Threshold comparison in detail
| Ticker | Threshold | Cycles | New high | Entry above bottom | Further gain from entry | Under 10% left at entry | Weeks to peak | Dip after entry | Worst dip |
|---|
All values are medians except cycles, counts and worst dip.
How far past cycles ran
Measured from the bottom, every completed BULZ cycle at least nearly doubled. BULZ is already at 1.93 times its low, past the weakest BULZ outcome (1.92 times, in 2022) and past 3 of the 23 scaled TQQQ outcomes. Those cycles topped below where this one already is, so the updated projection sets them aside.
The purple line marks the $47.59 high so far and the dashed line the 2.28 times needed to clear $56.09. Bars that end left of the purple line topped lower than this cycle already has.
BULZ, bottom to cycle peak
TQQQ scaled ×1.4, bottom to cycle peak
Table 4. Projected BULZ cycle peak, applying past outcomes to this cycle's $24.61 low or its cross close
| Method | Cycles | Weakest | 25th pct | Median | 75th pct | Strongest | Median vs. low |
|---|
The shaded rows keep only cycles that reached at least 1.93 times their low, as this one has. The other rows use every completed cycle, as in the September 10 version. The −60 cross was Aug 10 at $39.55; the others were Sep 8 at $39.42. Strongest values come from the 2020 and 2025 V-shaped recoveries and should not be read as targets.
Odds of clearing the $56.09 high
$56.09 is 2.28 times the $24.61 low, so the question is how often past cycles reached that multiple. Figure 5 plots each cycle's peak multiple against the depth of the decline before it, both in BULZ terms. Cycles in the shaded area topped out lower than this one already has, so they no longer describe what can happen here.
Of the 26 cycles that got at least this far, 20 went on past 2.28 times: 5 of 6 for BULZ and 15 of 20 for scaled TQQQ. Among declines at least as deep as this one, 55% or more, 9 of 10 did. Deep declines tend to produce bigger rebounds, which offsets the longer way back. The close calls sit right at this cycle's level: the 2022 BULZ rally topped at 1.92 times and TQQQ's 2016 cycle at 1.96 times.
Timing and the dip after the cross
Among cycles that got at least as far as this one, the median peak came about 20 weeks after the cross, which from September 8 is late January 2027. The middle half of BULZ peaks arrived 10 to 23 weeks out, mid-November to mid-February. TQQQ's peaks came later, 15 to 34 weeks out.
BULZ has so far dipped 8.2% below its cross close, to $36.17 in the week of September 14. Across all completed cycles the median dip before the peak was 12–14%, and the bottom itself was undercut in only 1 of 30 cycles (TQQQ, 2024).
Weeks from cross to cycle peak
Deepest dip below the cross close before the peak
Sentiment backdrop: Composite MAD
The %R study looks only at price. A second lens, the Composite MAD, blends three market-wide gauges into one contrarian reading: the share of Nasdaq-100 stocks above their 50-day average (breadth), CNN's Fear & Greed index, and the Smart Money minus Dumb Money confidence spread. Each is scaled against its own long-run median and spread and signed so that positive means fear and negative means greed, and the three are averaged. A reading of +1.10 or more is Heavy Buy, +0.26 or more is Nibble Buy, −0.34 or less is Trim and −0.77 or less is Heavy Sell. The range in between is Neutral.
Where it stands. On October 5 the Nasdaq-100 composite read +0.83, in the Nibble Buy zone since August 31 and down from +1.04 on September 30. It would reach Heavy Buy at +1.10 and leaves the buy zones below +0.21. There has been no sell-side (Trim) reading since June 4.
How it fits the cycle study. Fear readings have coincided with buyable pullbacks, not with tops. In 2026 the first Trim reading came on April 27 with BULZ near $32.84, five weeks and about 70% before the June 1 high of $56.09, and the second (June 1 to June 4) came in the top week. That is a single example, so it is context rather than a rule.
MAD Timing Index. The same composite on a 0–2 scale, reversed so that low means fear: MTI = 1.129 − 0.481 × composite. Its zone lines are Heavy Buy 0.60, Nibble Buy 1.00, Trim 1.29 and Heavy Sell 1.50, and every zone call is identical to the composite's. At 0.73, today is more fearful than 78% of the 4,984 sessions since December 2006 (the 22nd percentile).
Table 5. Sentiment and breadth readings, October 5, 2026
| Market | Composite | Zone | MAD Timing Index | Breadth ratio | Stocks above 50-day | Breadth weaker than |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Nasdaq-100 | +0.83 | Nibble Buy | 0.73 | 0.85 | 46.0% | 72% of sessions |
| NYSE | +1.20 | Heavy Buy | 0.55 | 0.40 | 28.7% | 88% of sessions |
| S&P 500 | +1.25 | Heavy Buy | 0.53 | 0.34 | 25.4% | 90% of sessions |
The breadth ratio is stocks above their 50-day average divided by stocks below, read on a log scale from 0.125 to 8 with 1.0 meaning even. "Sessions" count the days since December 2006. The Nasdaq-100 row drives the composite; the other two are comparisons.
What could make this estimate wrong
2022 is the failure to watch. In the one bear-market cycle, BULZ reached 1.92 times its low two weeks after the −50 cross, then topped and went on to make new lows. This cycle was at 1.93 times at the same point and has since pulled back about 5% and held, rather than breaking down. The September 8 cross close of $39.42 and the end-of-cycle level below are the two lines that would show it turning into 2022.
The end-of-cycle level will tighten. A close that puts %R back below −80 ends the cycle by definition; this week that is $29.21. The July 27 low leaves the 14-week window after the week of October 26 and the early-August lows follow. If the $47.59 high holds, the level rises to about $32.81 the week of November 2 and $36.53 the week of November 9, so a pullback into the mid-$30s would then end the cycle under this rule.
The July low is uncertain by about 6%. The weekly price data and consolidated daily quotes put the low at $24.61 on July 29. A separate exchange-only daily file shows $23.25 that day. The study uses $24.61. If $23.25 is the true low, this cycle would already be 2.05 times its low, the base case would be about $81–87, and the chance of clearing $56.09 would be about 86%. The conclusions hold either way, but the targets shift up.
Breadth is narrow. Nasdaq-100 breadth is the strongest of the three markets at a ratio of 0.85 (46% of stocks above their 50-day average). NYSE breadth (0.40) and S&P 500 breadth (0.34) are weaker than 88% and 90% of sessions since 2006. A rally led by a few large stocks has less to fall back on if those leaders tire.
Small, overlapping samples. BULZ has 7 completed cycles, and only 6 reached this far. TQQQ adds history, but it has been 0.97 correlated with BULZ since 2021 and almost all of its record comes from a long tech bull market. Treat the percentiles as rough guides, not a fitted distribution.
TQQQ is leading, without a signal of its own. TQQQ's weekly %R is at −0.8, at the top of its range, but its July dip only reached −77, so it never armed under this rule. It is still inside the cycle that began in March, 6% below that cycle's $88.09 high. BULZ is lagging TQQQ in this rebound.
Appendix: cycle log
Every trigger in the record, with the numbers behind the figures. The shaded row is a cycle that is still open and is excluded from the statistics; its peak (*) is the high so far.
| Bottom week | Bottom | Prior high | Depth | Trigger week | %R | Trigger close | Entry vs. bottom | Peak week | Peak | Gain vs. bottom | Gain vs. entry | Weeks to peak | Dip after entry | New high |
|---|