Weekly column: Uranus in Gemini and the tariff shock

Review

President Trump’s latest tariff threats could put a stop to stocks’ winning streak. Late Thursday, Trump said the U.S. would put a 35% levy on Canadian imports, up from the current 25% rate.

— Live updates, “Stock Market Today: Dow Slips After Trump Threatens 35% Canada Tariffs,” www.wsj.com, July 11, 2025.

President Trump likes tariffs for their own sake, and the latest evidence is his bewildering decision to slap a 50% tax on copper imports. How this will help the U.S. economy is a mystery.… Mr. Trump says the tariffs will ensure that the U.S. can “once again, build a DOMINANT Copper Industry.”… A major reason the U.S. doesn’t mine or refine more copper (and other critical minerals and metals) is the government permitting morass. Developing a new mine in the U.S. takes on average 29 years, the second longest in the world after Zambia…. Mr. Trump is going to make U.S. firms pay 50% more for a vital metal while they wait five or more years for U.S. sourcing. How does making it more expensive to build aircraft, ships and ammunition promote national security? This is national insecurity.

— The Editorial Board, “Trump’s Tariffs Blow Up the Copper Market,” Wall Street Journal, July 10, 2025.

Uranus moved into Gemini last week, July 7, and several financial markets busted out to new multi-year or all-time highs. This is right in line with Uranus’ “boom/bust” nature. And it’s just beginning. I think we will see several “boom/bust” market activities through to 2032, while the sudden and disruptive nature of Uranus combines with the changeable qualities of Gemini.

Global stock indices were mostly bullish last week but ended on a note of anxiety as President Trump rolled out a round of new and stiff tariff charges (essentially a new tax) on US companies for importing goods from other nations.

In Asia and the Pacific Rim, Australia, China, and Hong Kong performed quite well. China’s SSE index soared to its highest mark since October 2024. India’s Nifty and Japan’s Nikkei indices did not fare so well, as both pulled back from their recent cycle highs made in June.

In Europe, both the German DAX and London FTSE rallied to new all-time highs. Rallies in the Netherlands AEX and Zurich SMI indices were muted and may actually be setting up bearish patterns.

In the Americas, Brazil’s Bovespa index was hammered following Trump’s announcement of 50% tariffs on imports of their goods into the US. The Bovespa reversed sharply from its all-time high of July 4. But in the US itself, both the S&P and NASDAQ Composite made new all-time highs on July 9-10 before falling after the new tariff fees were announced. The DJIA did not make a new high last week but did have an interesting secondary (lower) high on July 10, which may be a tell, unless a rally can exceed those highs and end the current case of intermarket bearish divergence.

Excitement roared in other financial markets last week. Bitcoin, for instance, exploded to a new all-time high on Friday as it approached 120,000. This is what we anticipated with the current phasing of the primary and 4-year cycle as reported in our recent special BTC update issued in early May. Ethereum was also strong, rising to a new 5-month high, but was still well off its all-time high. Silver surged above $39.00/ounce for the first time since September 2011. Gold, on the other hand, had a rally, but is still well off its all-time high of April 22, an MMA 3-star CRD (critical reversal date time band).

With all these new highs, and Saturn about to turn retrograde this weekend, traders will need to be on the alert for sudden reversals. Even if it is only temporary, it could be sharp.

Short-term geocosmics

 At some point U.S. tariffs will settle at a multiple of where they were before the Trump presidency. Tariffs are taxes on U.S. consumers and businesses, and they are stagflationary, like sales taxes.

— Alan S. Blinder, former vice chairman of the Federal Reserve, “Big Beautiful Bill? It’s Certainly Big,” Wall Street Journal, July 11, 2025.

There are several reasons to anticipate long-term dollar weakness: (1) One not unimportant one is that President Donald Trump himself wants a weaker dollar. (2) Another is that the highly personalized nature of Trump’s style of governing, with the resulting unpredictability reflected in the recent twists and turns on tariffs, should create a natural discount…. by far the most important reason to assume a long-term weakening of the US dollar is that America’s extreme fiscal deterioration post-Covid, courtesy of Fed largesse, means that the most likely end game remains a growing resort to financial repression resulting in some form of yield curve control and even possibly exchange controls…. The most likely currency bloc to enjoy long-term appreciation against the US dollar remains Asian currencies.

—Christopher Wood, “Global Equities Are Breaking Out, Should You Chase?” [email protected], July 9, 2025.

Not only have stock markets, precious metals, and cryptos been doing well since April, but so have foreign currencies against the US Dollar. These trends are likely to continue, but based on the geocosmic signatures during the next two months, sharp counter-trend reversals are also likely, which can result in excellent option opportunities for the contrarian.

Let’s look at some of the short-term planetary patterns unfolding and how they might affect financial markets. We already mentioned Uranus ingressing into Gemini as of July 4. But for now, we are interested in the possibility of large price swings during the next 2-4 months, even 2-5 weeks, especially given that new all-time and multi-year highs are forming in stock indices, Silver, Copper, Bitcoin, and currencies.

In the case of Gold, Silver, and even Copper (the “metals”), we note that Neptune turned retrograde on July 4. Historically, Gold (and Silver) will make a trading cycle low just before the retrograde. From there, both will rally 1-2 weeks after the planetary station. We see this movement already underway now, as Gold and Silver both bottomed on June 30, four days before Neptune turned retrograde.

Next, we note that one of our favorite signatures for a Gold rally correlates with heliocentric Mercury in Sagittarius, which is now in effect from July 8-19. Both Neptune retrograde and Helio Mercury in Sag are overlapping now.

Also overlapping those two signatures will be both Saturn and Mercury turning retrograde, on July 12 and 18, respectively. We have observed that when two or more planets change directions in a short span of time, major or primary cycles often culminate.

This is why we chose to host the options webinar this weekend. And the markets are complying with historic new highs. When planets change directions, so too do financial markets. How long the reversals will last (if they even happen) involves the art of trading used with the market timing tools we have studied and researched over the past several decades. They are not 100%. But they are in the 80% frequency range, which puts the edge in favor of traders who use these timing methods.

There is another big reversal zone approaching in late August and going into early September, one that fits TUMDI, our new market timing indicator introduced last week. It stands for the “Trump Uranus Market Disruption Indicator.” It was present on July 4 as Venus conjoined Uranus. And sure enough, Trump began his new round of tariff threats then, which continued to make investors nervous all last week, and will probably will continue to do so well into August when the next TUMDI signal arrives August 24-September 6. What will it be then?

Stay tuned. Never a dull moment with Uranus entering Gemini and TUMDI always lurking around the next bend.