Before "Takeaways" I wanted to wish all my Jewish friends a Happy Passover.

And, if President Trump live tweeted at Ivanka and Jared's Seder tonite, this is what he might tweet...

"Doug Kass wrote an article today about how he fears the lack of fear in this market. I agree with Doug that lack of fear is an issue, but it goes further than that. What this market has missed for quite some time is strong emotion. There may not be much fear, but there isn't much euphoria either. I can't recall the last time market players were celebrating the action like they did at times prior to the Great Recession of 2008-09. There is no high-fiving and celebration. In fact, bulls are more likely to grumble about being underinvested and being in the wrong stocks than they are to talk about how the indices are at new highs.."

- Rev Shark, Yes, Market Lacks Fear, but There's No Emotion Either

Several columns from me on the same theme today:

* I Fear the Absence of Fear of Loss

* More Wall Street Nonsense on Display

* Meshuganah Is Trump

* Thinking and Trading Opportunistically on the Short Side

Trade of the Week - Long a current fave - Allergan AGN! Goldman issued some sweet talk on the name this morning.

I leaned short into the small rally today.  And I added to my Treasury short. And to ProShares UltraShort S&P500 (ETF) and to SDSProShares Trust UltraPro Short QQQ ETF (SQQQ) longs.

A positions update after my prime broker changeover. 

A Reminder Why Telsa Doesn't Turn My Crank!

On the market, I remain unimpressed. While the BOTDers are clearly still around, they have been unable to mount a sustainable rally over the last week or two.

I should be shorter than I am, but I want to remain more disciplined in waiting for the market to give me a green light on the short side -- so I am less anticipatory!

* The US Dollar weakened today.

* The price of crude oil rose by +$0.76 to $53/barrel.

* Gold lost -$2.

* Ag commodities: wheat +4, corn +7, soybeans flat and oats -1.

* Lumber -$4.40.

* Bonds rallied in price, declining by about one basis point. The 10-year US note closed at 2.366%. I shorted more TLT at $121.40.

* The 2s/10s curve was flat on the day.

* Municipals caught a small bid.

* High yield also was stronger. Blackstone / GSO Strategic Credit Fund (BGB) up three cents, back near $16/share.

* Banks, however were lower again. Thursday is a key day for the money center profit reports -- my guess is they are a penny or two better than consensus and that the stocks have discounted the reports and could

be vulnerable to profit taking. I am a short seller on any eps induced strength later in the week.

* Insurance stocks rose modestly, Hartford Financial Services (HIG) is starting to turn back up (+$0.40). I am a short seller in Metlife (MET) and Lincoln National (LNC) on a 3% or more rally.

* Brokerages were mixed with Morgan Stanley (MS) down and Goldman Sachs (GS) up better than a beaner. I would be a short seller +3% to +5% rallies.

* Autos caught a small bid after recent underperformance and EPS downgrades. Value traps, still!

* Retail continues to rally - J.C. Penney (JCP) Home Depot (HD) Nordstrom (JWN) Target (TGT) and Kohl's (KSS) upside leaders as BAT disappears into the background.

* Biotech was dead flat. There was some pressure on spec biotech on Monday. (AERI, SAGE, etc.)

* Big Pharma was mixed with Bristol-Myers Squibb (BMY) and Eli Lilly (LLY)  , up and Merck (MRK) andJohnson & Johnson JNJ down.

* Consumer staples were broadly higher. Campbell Soup (CPB) rallied- - there is a buyback put under the stock.

* Old tech was weaker.

* Ag equipment was much stronger. Caterpillar (CAT) is back into my shorting zone.

* Media weakening late in the day. Disney (DIS) down. I should be adding to my short!

* (T)FANG, everybody's favorite (I mean EVERYBODY'S!) -- broadly higher with Tesla (TSLA) (on a stupid analyst upgrade), and Amazon (AMZN) leading the pack.

Here are some value added contributions on our site today:

1. Jim "El Capitan" Cramer on up, up and away.

2. Ben "Goldfinger" Cross explains why gold wont swoon. 

3. RevShark on an emotionless market  -- addressing my "Lack of Fear" post this morning. His is a good one -- and discusses emotion, in a broader sense. Rev doesnt think a market lacking fear is a negative or contrary to contend with. By contrast, I believe it's a measure of complacency -- we need not be euphoric to be complacent. Weigh both arguments and pick a side!

4.Oil Vey from Dan Dicker.

5. Carolyn Boroden wants to protect her Apple (AAPL) profits.  I want it to go down!

There is precious little to report on this dull day.

I wont have "Takeaways" because of Passover but will deliver "The Good The Bad and The Ugly" in the next sixty minutes

I added to my iShares Barclays 20+ Yr Treas.Bond (ETF) (TLT) short at $121.40 just now.

Like 1999, "you cannot afford to miss it (a +30% price surge)."

- Morgan Stanley strategy this morning

It's Passover tonite so it might be appropriate to quote Grandma Koufax, who used to warn me when the "animal spirits" get out of hand and speculation is robust, that -- Meshuganah is Trump. In Yiddish that phrase means craziness is three fold. (Please note that the quote was well before the President was elected, so no double entendre meant here!).

The action today is a bit concerning as rallies are beginning to exhibit an inability to sustain themselves.

As many do, I watch the optimism of a self confident, all knowing and bullish business media who generally seem, from my perch, to rationalize the irrational. The talking heads on these platforms participate in little or no discussion of downside -- just upside, blow off possibilities and euphoria (even though valuation metrics are more often than not among the highest in history).

The Bull Market in Complacency is acutely apparent as fear (of any meaningful downside drawdown) has left the Street and the radio, newspaper and television airways that engage in such discussion every day.

This morning, Morgan Stanley is suggesting that stocks can gain +30% as the germs of insanity may multiply in the air above the New York Stock Exchange. 

But, remember, the structure of our markets in 2017 -- skewed towards ETFs, CTAs and Quants -- produces buyers that buy higher and sellers than sell lower.

So, be forewarned and don't forget, if you are Jewish, to ask The Four Questions tonite  at your Seder and seven other questions tomorrow before the market opens.

I have shifted to a small net short position based on the failure to hold the morning highs.

ProShares Ultrashort S&P 500 ETF (SDS) and ProShares UltraPro Short QQQ 500 ETF (SQQQ) are my favored vehicle.

Reflecting the increased and disproportionate role of strategies (quants, ETFs and others) that worship at the altar of price momentum, over the last few months I have adopted of strategy of rather dramatically reducing the holding period of my shorts. It has served me well, especially in shorting the financials and in trading the indices.

Trading with more of a reactionary bias geared to fundamental, political or geopolitical catalysts -- and less of a more anticipatory and cosmic "view" -- my trading profits in stocks and options have begun to accumulate.

While I will continue to maintain small core investment shorts on my books consistent with my overriding negative market outlook that sees at least a 3:1 negative risk over reward, I also will continue to emphasize trading on very short time frames, particularly on the short side, until I can see a more decisive break and the beginning of some technical damage in the averages.

It is at that point in time that I will "shove it in" in an attempt to capitalize on the aforementioned imbalance between downside risk relative to upside reward.

This is, I believe, a practical approach of an economic skeptic and corporate profit cynic who sees more risk than reward but also recognizes that ahistorical market influences have and can perpetuate an unrelenting eight-year market advance to levels that exceed my evaluation of intrinsic value with little in the way of meaningful selloffs.

I am market neutral with a relatively small gross exposure.

Longs: Allergan  (AGN) large, Hartford Financial Services Group (HIG) large, Twitter (TWTR) large, Campbell Soup (CPB) large, Radian Group (RDN) , and DuPont (DD) small.

Shorts:SPDR S&P 500 ETF (SPY) , PowerShares QQQ Trust (QQQ) , iShares Russell 2000 ETF (IWM) small, Starbucks (SBUX) small, Apple (AAPL) small, Caterpillar (CAT) small, Disney (DIS) small, Fastenal (FAST) small, iShares Dow Jones U.S. Real Estate ETF (IYR) small, and Coca-Cola (KO) small.

As I mentioned last week, I moved to new prime brokers and I decided to basically liquidate my portfolios to make the transition faster. 

I have completed the changeover this morning and I am reconstructing my portfolios, so disclosures going forward will be representative.

As a reminder, here is why I feel Tesla (TSLA) is both unlongable (a word I made up) and unshortable (a word I didn't make up):

Dear Mr. Fantasy, Play Us a Tesla Tune

APR 3, 2017  10:52 AM EDT

Stock quotes in this article:

TSLA

"Dear Mr. Fantasy play us a tune
Something to make us all happy
Do anything, take us out of this gloom
Sing a song, play guitar, make it snappy."

--Traffic, "Mr. Fantasy"

This morning Tesla's (TSLA) share price is up nearly $15 after advancing smartly in recent weeks.

• Telsa' valuation per auto is $600,000.
• Ford's valuation per auto is $7,000.
• Tesla is now worth more than Ford.

This is 1999-2000.

From my perch, Elon Musk is our present-day P.T. Barnum.

Tesla's annual earnings estimates keep going down, but its stock keeps going up, manhandled by momentum-based strategies that worship at the altar of price.

If Tesla can't make money selling $100,000 cars to subsidized rich people while it has no competition and advertising costs, how will Tesla make money selling $40,000 cars to middle-income people with massive competition coming and as subsidies disappear?

As suggested in an earlier piece this morning, our markets have lost their innocence and bear little relation to reality.

Tesla possesses a nearly $48 billion equity value with less than 4% upside to the biggest Wall Street bull's fantasized price target.

Tesla, owing to the large short interest, is un-shortable.

It is also un-longable, though I am not sure that is a word, either.

Mid-morning musings from Sir Arthur Cashin:

A possible seasonal pattern?

On Friday night, Jason Goepfert wrote:

Good Friday is next week. When it has occurred in April, the week has been positive 71% of the time, averaging +0.7%. Since 1950, the week lost more than -2% only two times but rallied more than +2% eight times. During this bull market, it gained 4 out of 5 times, so a modest tailwind for bulls next week.

Liquidity also dries up when you get past Wednesday's opening as some markets close and traders pre-extend holiday.

BTW, I am going radio silent around 1:00 p.m. ET.

From Goldman Sachs on Allergan (AGN) :

Pipeline a free option but risky and a 2018/19 event. Based on our NPV analysis, we see an incremental $84 in NPV/share if all of Buy-rated AGN's pipeline assets work, and roughly $34 assuming a 50% hit rate. At current levels, we believe there is zero value in the price for the pipeline implying significant optionality.

I agree and I am making long AGN my "Trade of the Week."

AGN close at $238.85 on Friday.

Check out this headline from StreetInsider.com, with an addition from me in parenthesis:

Piper Jaffray Upgrades Tesla Motors (TSLA) to Overweight, Slashes EPS Estimates, Asks Clients To Employ Creative Valuation Methods (Price target raised to $368 from $223)

--StreetInsider.com

This may go down in the history books as a bell-ringing event on Wall Street. 

In my opinion, the head of research at Piper (I used to be a director of research elsewhere) demonstrates a staggering dereliction of duty to allow this to go out under the firm's name. Personally, I think that individual should be fired, along with the analyst.

If you need creative valuation methods, you clearly don't need an analyst's view, and his estimate changes clearly demonstrate his lack of analytical ability. Lacking in humility and not getting Tesla's (TSLA) numbers correct, he asks others to imagine a dramatically higher valuation in spite of this. Why should anyone believe his price target?

As to the SEC and other regulators, they are utterly derelict in allowing this nonsense.

Here is what my good buddy Peter Boockvar, chief market analyst with The Lindsey Group, wants to hear:

At least right now, what I'm most interested in this week is hearing from the bank CEO's who report earnings on Thursday, JPM, WFC, and C. What is going on with this decline in bank lending across the board? For C&I loans to businesses, is there less demand because of the uncertainty over the timing of tax reform? Are companies tapping the capital markets instead of utilizing bank loans? Are companies just lessening their demand for credit because of already high leverage ratios? Are oil companies mostly responsible for the decline in C&I loans because they are paying back credit lines tapped last year? Are banks cutting back on mortgage warehouse lines because of the sharp contraction in refinancings? With respect to the decline in consumer credit lines, the questions are easier. Is it a demand side issue or are standards being tightened? What is the credit outlook for commercial real estate where activity and pricing seems to be topping out?

Janet Yellen speaks today at 4pm and will actually take questions via twitter. That should be interesting. If Bill Dudley's recent comments are any indication of the thinking of Yellen too, we'll get a rate hike in June, another in September and some form of reinvestment taper in December and then Yellen can sail off into the sunset or darkness depending on how things go. With the full exit process then underway, the Bernanke/Yellen monetary policy experiment will be put to another test. The true efficacy of everything that was done since 2007 can only be fully measured when all or most of the easing has been reversed. Like the question I posed last week, if the final result ends up being a recession and a bear market at some point in the years to come, was it all worth it?

Shifting overseas and reflecting the improved economic data, calmed political worries and positive performance in their stock markets, the Sentix Euro area economic survey of private and institutional investors rose to the best level since August 2007. There was an implicit warning however to the ECB that the German economy was getting too hot. Sentix said "The strength of Euroland, not least also fired by an extremely expansive central bank policy, is not without a trace of the strongest national economy of Euroland. On the contrary: the current situation assessment is approaching the 60-point mark, absolute boom level. Expectations remain stable, which again underlines the fact that the German economy is doing well - but overheating is now threatening." The ECB is flying very close to the sun.

With respect to European investor sentiment of the US economy, there was a 7 pt m/o/m drop. Sentix said "While Trump is trying to make "America great again" with his verbal acrobatics, Euroland and Asia seem to be clearly better at present than the US economy. The president is talking a lot here, but the messages are getting less and less attractive among investors."

Data wise in Europe, there wasn't much except industrial production in Italy which slightly missed expectations. Quietly, the Italian 10 yr yield spread to German bunds is just 2 bps shy of the widest since February 2014. The next election there is not until next year but 5 Star Movement political worries are a growing issue.

The French 10 yr yield is at its widest level vs the German bund since February as the Far left candidate Jean-Luc Melenchon gained ground in a new poll vs Macron, Le Pen and Fillon. This same poll also has Macron, Melenchon and Fillon all beating Le Pen individually. The CAC is lower by .6% and the euro is down slightly after breaking below $1.06 last week. I continue to expect a Macron presidency which would be bullish for France in that a business minded politician would take power but we have to be reminded that in a land of many socialists, any crack pot economic idea can still be believed.

In Asia, of note was the almost 1% decline in the South Korean Kospi in response to the US decision to send an aircraft carrier and other war ships to the Korean peninsula. This of course follows the Trump/Xi get together but China is the one that must deal with this. I've been bullish on South Korean stocks as one of my favorite markets due to the political changes that hopefully will bring corporate governance changes to the chaebol's in a market that is cheap. I remain so but hopefully China calms things down and that the US is not unilaterally inclined to take action. That would be a scary potential scenario.

"It's not "Morning in America." Rather, Trump makes uncertainty and volatility great again. Stocks exhibit a volatility and randomness in price action rarely ever seen -- 1% daily moves become common place. The S&P 500 hits a high of 2,375 for the year and a low of 1,815 (down some 22.5% from today). Ultimately, it closes the year down 15%."

--Kass Diary15 Surprises for 2017

Over the years, like just about everyone else who has ever invested or traded in equity markets, I have spent some time studying market tops.

What do they look like? Is there a general pattern -- the equivalent of a general theory of relativity?

But as I am a fair Texas Hold 'em Poker player, I have looked not only for a generalized "top" shape, but within those shapes clues for how to read the intentions of market participants.

It is not my intention to bore you with my generalized observations about market tops or any insights I might have gained about reading the other player's intentions during topping periods. Rather. I want to offer you an observation related to a missive I wrote last week in which I featured George Soros' reflexivity insights.

Simply, there is a rather stunning lack of fear of loss showing up in equity markets. Moreover, there are almost no signs of fear of loss even beginning to build in the market's largest players, whoever the hell they are these days. And finally -- and I think this goes to my stated concerns over the last few months -- this lack of fear of loss is completely inappropriate!

At this moment, the biggest players in the equity market (again, whoever they are these days, and I don't pretend to know) are showing no signs of fear of loss in the market's price and volume patterns -- none!!

I find this incredible given the list of problems I have attempted to lay out.

How can this market's big boys have no fear of loss at this point? How is it they are not sliding toward the doors of the party room, calling their chauffeurs on their cells to "bring the car around the back and keep the motor running"?

The disconnect between reality or risk and protective behavior in the markets -- or rather the absence of protective behavior -- is frightening to me.

Are they right about the risks not being sufficient to lead to protective action, or do they think they possess some other form of protection other than reducing positions or -- and this is what worries me most because I think this may be the answer -- the people making the decisions on the largest pools of equity buying do not have any personal financial risk in the outcome. I suspect the biggest players are playing with other people's money (OPM) in some manner different even from the old-timers' hedge fund OPM days -- no personal financial involvement, no career risk and perhaps believing they have a way to shift any losses to some unsuspecting parties.

This probably all sounds nuts. However, one thing I am sure I see at a time when policy uncertainty and varying outcomes are heightened and rarely have been higher, valuations are elevated relative to historical norms and fear is absent -- the biggest players in this equity market are still operating without any visible signs that they fear any impending losses.

And that is definitely nuts!