A market that keeps going up in small volumes tends to make cautious investors nervous, not confident. That's a setup Chris Rowe, founder of True Market Insider, says he's looking at in the back half of 2026.
Rowe is not bearish. He calls himself a long-term bull who is eager to pull back, because it gives him the opportunity to buy quality names at a discount.
His case hinges on three signals, and he already has two ETFs and one high-risk stock to play.
Setting Up a Fix That's Already Moving
Rowe's first flag is the calendar. Mid-year election years, he says, tend to sell from summer to mid-October to November before the market picks up again. History is not a guarantee, but it treats the pattern as a starting point, not a prediction.
The second signal is the behavior of the volume price. Rowe points to a three-year weekly chart for the S&P 500 that shows a recent rally built on unusually light volume, a setup he says tends to ease quickly when sellers emerge. He has already seen a surge in volume at the beginning of the down weeks, which he read as traders checking the market position.
The third is wide. Rowe tracks a New York Stock Exchange index that shows about 51% of listed stocks in buy signals, a reading that has been slipping as more names change to sell signals. Fewer stocks participate in the upswing, more down, a pattern he associates with near-volatility markets.
Small Gold Miners Set Up as Flight-to-Quality Trades
VanEck Junior Gold Miners ETF today
VanEck Junior Gold Miners ETF share price
Starting at 10:22 AM Eastern
- 52 week interval
- $63.90
▼
$157.49
- Dividend Yield
- 2.76%
- Assets Under Administration
- $7.17 billion
Rowe's original idea leans toward possibility rather than avoiding it. You are viewing the VanEck Junior Gold Miners ETF NYSEARCA: GDXJfollowing small precious metals miners, the group he says has already hit the ground running after leading the market in many areas last year.
That's the way to look back: precious metals have been the best-performing sector for about a third of the time since last year's selloff, according to Rowe, yet the group is deeply oversold right now. Investors looking beyond the ETF wrapper can browse MarketBeat's list of the top gold stocks for individual names in the space.
If stocks are strong and investors are turning to flight to quality, you see the discounted sector poised to capture that flow. Diversification through an ETF, he adds, also alleviates the volatility that comes with picking up smaller individual miners.
Industrial Metals Rides the Same Technology Story
The second view is related but different. SPDR S&P Metals and Mining ETF share price NYSEARCA: XME it holds US mining companies tied to industrial metals rather than gold and silver.
SPDR S&P Metals & Mining ETF today
SPDR S&P Metals & Mining ETF
Starting at 10:22 AM Eastern
- 52 week interval
- $68.06
▼
$135.68
- Dividend Yield
- 0.36%
- Assets Under Administration
- $4.08 billion
Rowe frames this less as a commodity trade and more as a technology, as these things feed batteries, semiconductors, and the vast infrastructure that governments scramble to protect.
Government money is a thread that he keeps pulling. Just as defense budgets can send subcontractors soaring exponentially, Rowe sees the same logic in mining names that are of national importance.
The tradeoff is the same as the one that hit precious metals: power attracts profit-taking, and the sector's recent pullback shows just how far it had gone.
A High Risk Way to Hedge the Headlines
The riskiest prospect on Rowe's list is Battalion Oil Corporation (NYSE American: BATL ), a small Delaware Basin producer that trades below $2 a share after touching nearly $30 earlier this year.
Battalion Fuel Today
- 52 week interval
- $1.00
▼
$29.70
Rowe does not include it as a core element. Calling it the main trade related to the tension related to Iran, where any disturbance in the oil market can send the crude, and BATL along with it, is very high.
He is not transparent about the engineering: this is a name to be small, take profits quickly, and treat as a hedge rather than an investment thesis.
Rowe points to recent operational progress, including resolved gas processing bottlenecks and increased output from tight Permian acreage, as reasons the company itself is more than a pure options-style bet.
Still, he expects real volatility either way, and says the appeal is what the spike could support: the buying power of some stocks hit the bottom once the broader correction is over.
Know Your Risk Before Bouncing
Rowe's broader message is less about predicting the exact future and more about learning what is already happening. He says he does not predict; you adjust, and right now the adjustment means holding on to opportunities in areas that are already oversold rather than waiting on the sidelines entirely.
The upsidecase is straightforward: maintenance hits, precious metals and industrial metals hold the rotation, and the thin oil hedge compensates for some of the damage. The danger is real. Commodities can stay oversold for longer than expected, and a stock like Battalion Oil could just get a round trip to a quick profit if the headlines back off.
For investors weighing this type of playbook, the position size is probably more important than the ticker.
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