Good morning.
Today is the feast of Saint Frumentius in the Latin Church. He arrived in Ethiopia as a captive, and the Church there is his work. Socrates calls the country India; the editor of his text takes the people to be the Abyssinians.
St. Frumentius, Apostle of Ethiopia
Socrates tells the story from Rufinus, who had it from the man who lived it. A philosopher named Meropius, a Tyrian, took two young kinsmen, Edesius and Frumentius, on a voyage to the country of the Indians. At a harbor where they stopped for supplies, the people seized the ship's company and killed them, "except his two youthful kinsmen; but sparing them from compassion for their tender age, they sent them as a gift to the king."
The king made Edesius his cup-bearer and gave Frumentius the royal records. When the king died, the queen "begged the young men to undertake the charge of him, until he should become of adult age." Frumentius ran the kingdom, and he used the office for one purpose. He "made it a task to enquire whether among the Roman merchants trafficking with that country, there were any Christians to be found," told those he found who he was, and "exhorted them to select and occupy some appropriate places for the celebration of Christian worship." Soon "he built a house of prayer" and taught some of the people the faith.
When the young king came of age, Frumentius gave back the government and went to Alexandria. He told Athanasius everything and asked him to send a bishop. Athanasius "requested Frumentius himself to accept the bishopric, declaring that he could appoint no one more suitable than he was." He returned as bishop, "built several churches," and, Socrates says, healed the sick.
The Catholic Encyclopedia gives the feast days: "The Latins celebrate the feast of Frumentius on 27 October, the Greeks on 30 November."
Tuesday of the Thirtieth Week in Ordinary Time
Gospel: "He said therefore: To what is the kingdom of God like, and whereunto shall I resemble it? It is like to a grain of mustard seed, which a man took and cast into his garden, and it grew and became a great tree, and the birds of the air lodged in the branches thereof. And again he said: Whereunto shall I esteem the kingdom of God to be like? It is like to leaven, which a woman took and hid in three measures of meal, till the whole was leavened." — Luke 13:18-21
The Latin of the seed is Simile est grano sinapis, quod acceptum homo misit in hortum suum, et crevit, et factum est in arborem magnam.
The first reading, Ephesians 5:25: "Husbands, love your wives, as Christ also loved the church, and delivered himself up for it."
In the Catena Aurea, Ambrose reads the seed as the martyrs: "The martyrs are grains of mustard seed. They have about them the sweet odor of faith, but it is hidden." Cyril reads it as the Gospel itself, "at first in the possession only of few" and then spread abroad. And Bede says what it does in a person: "It grows also in the mind of every believer, for no one is suddenly made perfect."
The full readings are on USCCB.org.
bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/102726.cfm →
The Catechism (768) says what the seed is in the Church's own words: "she is on earth the seed and the beginning of that kingdom." Paragraph 764 says where it began: "The seed and beginning of the Kingdom are the 'little flock' of those whom Jesus came to gather around him."
Monday's close: SPY $765.23, +0.7% · Nasdaq 100 +1.1% · Russell 2000 +0.4% · tape BULL, regime correction · new longs still paused by the two-loss warning
Monday opened higher and kept climbing. The S&P 500 fund opened at $762.26, 0.3% above Friday's close, touched a low of $761.69, and closed at $765.23, up 0.7%, after a high of $767.73. That is 1.8% below the six-month closing high of $779.10 set October 6. The Nasdaq 100 fund opened 0.4% higher, at $707.10, and closed at $712.11, up 1.1%. The Russell 2000 fund rose 0.4% and the equal-weight S&P 500 fund 0.4%. Eight of the eleven sector funds rose and two fell: technology led at +1.7%, industrials followed at +1.4%, and consumer discretionary rose 1.0%. Communication services was the weakest at −1.6%, consumer staples fell 0.3%, and utilities were unchanged.
The two-loss warning is still on: the system takes no new long until SPY closes above $779.37, and Monday's close was $14.14 short of it, 1.8% below. The tape turns, and the system sells every long, only on a SPY close below $629.29; Monday's close is 22% above that line. By our own count, 7 of the last 25 sessions are distribution days for the S&P 500 fund and 7 for the Nasdaq 100 fund. The scanner's list holds thirty-three names at or near their 52-week pivots, and none triggered.
The house account holds no stock positions, and no orders were placed Monday. The seven puts cost $18,426 and were worth $22,734 on Alpaca's marks, up 23.4%, which is less than Friday's 35.8% on a day the market rose. The account closed at $992,451, and the idle-cash sleeve is in commodities (DBC) and short-term Treasuries (SHY).
What is ahead. The Federal Open Market Committee begins its two-day meeting today, October 27, and ends it Wednesday. Coca-Cola, Boeing and Corning report before the open today, and Visa and Seagate after the close. Microsoft reports Wednesday after the close and Alphabet is listed for the same evening on Nasdaq's calendar. Amazon reports Thursday after the close, and the advance estimate of third-quarter gross domestic product and the September report on personal income and outlays come out Thursday at 8:30 AM ET. The Employment Cost Index follows Friday at 8:30 AM ET. The levels do not change: SPY above $779.37 lifts the warning, and SPY below $629.29 turns the tape.
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The week ahead, per the USCCB daily readings calendar for the United States:
Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us.
In Christ,
Jonathan Simmons
Enoch Capital LLC
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