Weekly column: Trading the whipsaws of Venus, Saturn, and Neptune

Review

A 6–3 Supreme Court majority on Friday, February 20, struck down President Trump’s sweeping emergency tariffs in a monumental vindication of the Constitution’s separation of powers. You might call it the real tariff Liberation Day … but his rant in response to his tariff defeat at the Court was arguably the worst moment of his presidency.

—Review & Outlook, “The Real Tariff Liberation Day: Trump Demeans Himself on the High Court,” The Wall Street Journal, February 21–22, 2026.

 The Producer Price Index rose 0.5% last month, a pickup from December’s 0.4% rate. The new data indicates that more tariff-related price increases could still be to come. Stock futures moved lower after the data release, with investors fearing the hotter-than-expected inflation report could lead the Federal Reserve to keep its rate-cutting cycle on pause.

—Alicia Wallace, “Wholesale Inflation Was Hotter Than Expected in January,” CNN, February 27, 2026.

The Supreme Court’s ruling that the Trump tariffs launched on “Liberation Day” in April 2025 were illegal was a “good news/bad news” event for global stock markets. It was good news for most countries outside of the U.S., but bad news for the U.S. stock market. And, oh boy, did it ever coincide with our TUMDI signal – the “Trump Uranus Market Disruption Indicator” – in effect February 3-27, 2026.

The DJIA, for instance, made its all-time high on February 10, at 50,512, right in the middle of Uranus direct (Feb 3), Venus square Uranus (February 8), and the solar eclipse square Uranus on February 16-17. But the Uranus tsunami didn’t end there. Mars squared Uranus on Friday, February 27, just after Mercury turned retrograde on February 25 and just one week after the 36-year Saturn/Neptune synodic cycle. By Friday, the DJIA was breaking to a new 4-week low and nearing its lowest level since January 2. The S&P and NASDAQ also struggled last week but have not yet fallen to new monthly lows.

Yet, other world stock indices rejoiced at the Supreme Court decision, with many soaring to new all-time highs (ATH). In Europe, both the Netherlands’ AEX and the London FTSE set new ATHs late last week. Both the German DAX and Zurich SMI rallied smartly, trading at multi-week highs on Friday, too.

In Asia and the Pacific Rim, the Australian ASX and Japanese Nikkei indices roared to new ATHs. China traded up to 4168 in the SSE on February 25, not far from its 10-year peak of 4191 on January 14. India’s NIFTY and the Hang Seng of Hong Kong, however, declined last week, along with the U.S.

Gold and Silver performed well, rallying to their highest levels since the collapse, following their January 29 ATHs. This is probably related to the threat of a military strike on Iran as Mars squares Uranus. The same war threats probably led to Crude Oil’s rally to 67.83 on Friday, a level not seen since August 1. Bitcoin and Ethereum failed to maintain a mid-week rally and faltered into Friday.

Short-term geocosmics

“Is there something so wrong with society that makes us so pressurized that we cannot live in it without guarding ourselves against it?”

—John Lennon, “The Year That Music Changed Everything,” Apple TV+.

We now enter another Mercury retrograde cycle, February 26-March 20. It didn’t take long for the Trickster to start its iconic “Contradictory Shuffle” dance routine. On Friday, the U.S. Producer Price Index came in very hot, rising by 0.5% when the consensus expectation was 0.3%. Normally, this would cause interest rates to rise and stocks to fall, as the Fed would be concerned about rising inflation. Stocks did indeed fall after the report, but Ten-Year Treasuries rose as rates fell below 4% during the day for the first time since November. Is this to be the first example of a Mercury retrograde fake-out for this cycle?

With the Trickster (Mercury retrograde) back amongst us, and Mars square Uranus with Mars (aggression) about to move into Pisces (passivity) on Monday, March 2, the next three weeks may be very confusing for both the masses of people as well as world leaders. Where are we headed? It is a subject I addressed in last week’s Annual Forecast Webinar, and it may lead to an increase in mental health issues on one hand in 2026. However, on the other hand, the realization that societal and governmental change can come about through nonviolent protests. Violence will only lead people to support government restrictions on their freedom in return for promises of safety.

Market-wise, we have two other contradictory signatures ahead. Venus will conjoin Neptune on March 7 and Saturn on March 8. The first can be bullish, but the second activates one of our rules, which is to buy any market that declines into a hard Venus/Saturn aspect. Thus, we will apply another one of our rules: be very nimble and trade short-term during a Mercury retrograde cycle, for whipsaws and false buy and sell signals can occur every 1-4 trading days. In the event that no markets complete any major or greater cycle top or bottom within 4 trading days of February 25, we will look for a stronger reversal at the midpoint of the Trickster’s cycle, which will also occur on March 8-9 (a weekend/Monday, so watch next Friday and the following Monday closely for possible reversals that are tradeable for quick profits).

One may tempted to play a mental game of “he/she loves me, he/she loves me not.” However, it is better to ask for the truth and not rely upon one’s fears (Saturn) or fantasies (Neptune), especially with Mercury retrograde, where maybe the answer to this question is premature. Maturity should be held in high value these days.

Longer-term thoughts and opinions

The reality is that tariffs have been disruptive to the economy and are deeply unpopular. They haven’t reduced the trade deficit or boosted factory employment, as Mr. Trump claims they have. Higher levies on imports lead to higher costs and fewer choices. The president insists that tariffs ultimately are paid by foreigners and are necessary to “protect our companies,” but a recent study by the New York Federal Reserve concluded what many other studies have shown—that nearly all the economic burden from the Trump tariffs has fallen on U.S. firms and consumers. Jason L. Riley, “The GOP’s Last Chance to Shed the Tariff Albatross,” Wall Street Journal, February 25, 2026.

These data point to a reality that Mr. Trump refuses to acknowledge—namely, a country or region runs trade deficits whenever it attracts more global capital than it repels, and it runs trade surpluses whenever it repels more capital than it attracts. Donald Boudreaux, “America’s Trade Deficit Is a Sign of Strength,” Letters to the Editor, Wall Street Journal, February 21-22, 2026.

 As I think about how this Aries Vortex symbolizes the bottom of the social, cultural, and political divide and how we might come out of it economically stronger, a few thoughts come to mind related to Uranus entering Gemini in a trine aspect to Pluto in Aquarius configuration. President Trump wants to reinvigorate the manufacturing sector of the economy, which at first glance seems ill-advised, as very few Americans want to work in factories. Plus, it is apparent that this aspect coincides with a huge displacement of the current workforce in both public service (government) and manufacturing (automobiles, computer chips, military supplies, and weapons/drones), to be replaced by AI and robots. But herein lies a reason why the priority to resurrect manufacturing could work.

Imagine a factory where the majority of the labor is performed by robots (this is not hard to imagine). After the initial investment, even with the training and adoption of far fewer new workers to maintain and oversee the work of the robots, the payroll cost of these companies will be sharply reduced. They could very well fall below the cost of outsourcing the work to other countries where humans still assemble parts for much lower wages (and benefits) than are currently offered to American factory workers. The result could be very profitable to manufacturers. At the same time, this transition would not be particularly positive for unions, which would have to create a new class of memberships for robots.

In this scenario, the future would look very bright for both tech companies and those who produce robots, as well as manufacturers who put these new “machines” to work doing the labor. The demand for AI skills and robots is likely to increase substantially with Uranus in Gemini. And new jobs to maintain and repair robots and machines would also increase, yet require far fewer bodies than are currently employed in these vocations. The U.S. could again be competitive in manufacturing as the entire concept of labor and services undergoes this historic Pluto in Aquarius transformation.

This could be one of the positive outcomes of Uranus trine Pluto in air signs as we move past the Aries Vortex peak in 2026. Now, if the president could just get over his obsession with using tariffs as a weapon of control, causing our trading partners to lose trust in the U.S. and seek trade alliances with other nations, this could work out very profitably for U.S. manufacturers. Companies would likely reinvest in factories and manufacturing if they had a sense of greater certainty regarding them in the future of world trade. Tariffs, on the other hand, could cost the companies all the benefits this transformation could otherwise offer. Hence, they delay the investment required to make this work more quickly and to the benefit of the nation’s economy.

Someone (a friend) recently wrote that “The way to predict the future is to invent it.” I replied, “The best way to predict the future is to understand the present and the history that led to it.” Steep new tariffs have never served the U.S. well, and this time appears no different. A trade deficit is not a bad thing. It is more often a sign that your nation is doing well and can afford the products of other nations. Increasing the cost for other nations to buy your products or increasing the cost of your companies’ products to sell them abroad is not a policy that works in the long run, as today’s sharp increase in PPI, and the stock market’s negative reaction to the report suggest.