Nov. 4, 2025: Interview with Jonathan Rose (Full Transcript)

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Full Interview Transcript:

Mike Burnick, Inside TradeSmith: Hello, all you TradeSmith Insiders!

Today I’m joined by a very special guest: Mr. Jonathan Rose of the Advanced Notice Service. Hi, Jonathan, how are you today?

Jonathan Rose, Masters in Trading: I’m doing great, Mike. Thanks for having me.

Mike:Good. We’ve talked before and you know, I just love talking shop with you because we’re on the same wavelength — we speak the same language.

Of course, you spent, what, fifteen or sixteen years trading on the floor of the Chicago Merc and then the Chicago Board of Trade with options trading institutional order flow. That gives you real insight into how markets move — not theory you learn in the classroom, but the real thing.

You made over a million dollars in your own account before you were 30 years old. I’m jealous — it took me till 31 to get there. So, you’ve got one year on me there.

But I invited you today because you’ve been talking recently in your editorials and in your service, the Advanced Notice, about how the Fed is getting ready to change what’s going on in the markets in a big way.

Of course, they just kicked off a rate-cutting cycle recently. We saw just a week or so ago they cut rates again for the second time. And you said it’s the biggest Fed pivot since 2019. Explain what you mean by that.

Jonathan: Sure. Well, we went through quantitative easing after COVID. Quantitative easing is just the printing of more and more money. The opposite of that is quantitative tightening — taking money and liquidity out of the system.

The biggest news I got out of the recent Fed report is that, yeah, they lowered rates — and I expect them to lower another 0.25 point in December — but what they said, which really flipped the switch for me, was that quantitative tightening will end on December 1st.

Just the math behind that — whether you’re bullish or bearish — shows that ending QT means another $60 to $90 billion per month going into the system. With supply and demand roughly equal, more money coming in is naturally bullish.

Then on top of that, if they start aggressively lowering rates, it’s extremely bullish. As we sit here now only a couple of points off the high, things are looking very bullish going forward.

Mike: Yeah, the market certainly has had a rocket ride over the last few months, and rate cuts are just going to be like adding jet fuel to the market. That results in a lot of opportunities for traders — maybe even in areas of the market you wouldn’t ordinarily think of.

And you’ve always said that the key is knowing where the smart money is moving after the Fed’s pivot. So where do you think the stocks or sectors will do best based on this increased liquidity from the Fed?

Jonathan:I started trading in 1997 on the floor of the Chicago Mercantile Exchange, but I became a market maker on the floor of the Chicago Board Options Exchange in 2010. That’s where I really learned how to trade options that follow the market.

Down on the floor of the Options Exchange, I learned that nobody was using technical analysis. People were just following the biggest orders — waiting around the pit until a massive order came in. Some customer would place a $10 million trade on a relatively small company, and we’d all jump in, giving them the benefit of the doubt that they knew more than we did.

Money drives markets. What we look for is where that money is headed. I think money will continue to flow toward risk assets — especially in an environment where they’re dropping rates and ending QT.

Risk assets like uranium stocks and AI stocks continue to stay very hot. I think being long the NASDAQ makes sense. These sectors have been strong, and I don’t think it’s a flash in the pan — more good things are coming.

Mike: That’s good to hear.

Jonathan: If we look back to April, the volatility then was just news-induced — tariff-induced. That wasn’t natural market movement; it was more like, “Let’s put tariffs on the world — how will the market react? Now let’s take them off.”

That’s not real supply and demand. Right now, we’re getting through that, and the market’s starting to rip higher again.

Mike:Yeah, it’s starting to normalize.

Now, Wall Street’s smart money is, of course, key to markets, but the big boys on Wall Street have ways to disguise their buying in dark pools — which you’ve talked about before.

But you’ve got an edge you found in the options market, where there’s more transparency. You can see the footsteps of the big money-making moves. Explain how you do that.

Jonathan: Sure. If an institution, hedge fund, or endowment is going to buy $50 million worth of a company, if they do it in stock, they have to release that 15 days later — they have to broadcast their trade to everyone.

But with options, there are no dark pools. It’s completely transparent.

The second that company buys $50 million worth of an option; we see it right away. That’s our edge.

When a stock trade happens, you see it 15 minutes later — they’ll write about it in Barron’s. But in options, it’s immediate.

Mike:Right. And I know you’ve really cleaned up recently on some of those options trades — just by following the smart money into big materials stocks, specifically those that the White House and government have been buying into.

Tell us a little about that and how you found those trades.

Jonathan:That’s been a bit of what we call “common sense trading.” What really kicked it off was ticker TMC — The Metals Company.

The CEO bought about $10 million worth of stock when it was down around $3 or $4. Where there’s smoke, there’s fire. If a CEO of a small company buys $10 million of their own stock, we probably want to be long too.

Once we got into TMC, I started realizing what was going on between China and the U.S. That was about six months ago.

TMC flew higher — we got out of that — but the best in class was MP (MP Materials). We rolled a position into that. We like to say, “Luck is the residue of great design,” as Branch Rickey said.

After we got into MP, the Department of Defense made a $400 million investment, and the stock went nuts. We covered that, and then the next one we moved to was ticker NB, another government-backed company we found early. NB went from $3 up to $12.

One we didn’t get was USAR — those four are all moving together. But instead of treating them as individual stocks, we’re trading the sector. One runs up, we get out and then move into the one that hasn’t moved yet. It’s been really effective.

Mike: Yeah, and members of your Advanced Notice service ended up cleaning up on that MP Materials trade — up over 1000%. That was a trade you were in for how long?

Jonathan: Not very long.

Mike: Yeah, like a week or so, right?

Jonathan: Again, you know, I always like to think that when Michael Jordan would make 10 shots in a row, that 11th shot—if he shoots 45% for the season—that’s not 45%. It’s closer to like a 95% chance that’s going in.

Mike: So, in other words, it’s not guesswork. It’s finding the patterns and following the big money in real time.

Jonathan: Put yourself in good situations over time, and good things are gonna happen. We did that – Quantum has obviously been super strong. All the Rigetti, IonQ—all the different quantum companies—well, we found a SPAC, ticker CCCX, that is going to be Inflection (a quantum company), but it’s not going to be Inflection until February of next year.

So, we got in CCCX—we got in at 13—and it popped to 25 just because we find these things early. It’s not necessarily brain science, but if you know where to look, and that’s what we’ve been really successful with.

Mike: And you’ll be hosting a special event to talk about all these trends and some of the best stocks you’re seeing. It’s called the Profit Surge event coming up on Monday, November 10th. And folks, you’ll see a link for that at the bottom of this page where you can sign up.

But let’s talk a little bit about volatility. I know you’ve got a unique way of looking at dark pools and institutional money—but you also talked recently about the mother of all buy signals based on the VIX index. Tell us how that triggered and all about it.

Jonathan: So, I started Masters in Trading back in 2015 and I joined InvestorPlace in 2024. I was a solopreneur for a while—and you can guess who made the product titles we offered.

So, The mother of all buy signals—that is correct. We actually have a backtest that’s phenomenal. I’m careful saying this because of risk, but it’s a very high-performing backtest.

The way it works is: when volatility spikes—volatility is uncertainty—and then retraces and comes out of the market very quickly, that is the most bullish signal we can find.

The way we follow volatility is not just the VIX (the fear index), but the VIX curve—the 9-day VIX, 23-day, 30-day, 37-day, 90-day, 180-day. Just like a yield curve, it should have a nice, healthy shape.

When the front spikes—everyone’s like, “oh no, the sky is falling”—and then it quickly goes right back down, that’s when we get what we refer to as the mother of all buy signals. And, actually, it was during the time of that show with the Mother of All Dragons—that’s how creative I am with names.

Mike: Yeah, it’s that compression you get—first a sudden spike like we saw a few weeks ago, and then it collapses again. That tends to lead to huge buy signals for the market, doesn’t it?

Jonathan: It’s so quick because markets get really extended on the downside. When uncertainty spikes—God forbid there’s something going on in the world that can really move markets—people get scared and everything goes further than it should.

Then it normalizes quicker than it should because the market’s not waiting for anybody. It’s going to go up quickly when it’s ready to go up—it’s not waiting for anybody.

So, we have a tool that gives us this alert. And funny enough, we call it the mother of all buy signals. Also, I do a live show every day at 11 a.m. Eastern—it’s called Masters in Trading Live. You can go back and see all the different calls we’ve made using this signal. The most recent one was late October—go back and you’ll see the headlines at Masters in Trading Live.

Mike: Yeah, still fresh.

That’s great. So, it’s almost like a perfect storm here: we’ve got the Fed cutting rates again, the rate-cutting cycle; we’ve got the volatility compression buy trigger you spotted a couple of weeks ago; and you’re also seeing a lot of institutional options activity lighting up your scanner across materials, semiconductors, AI—across the board. If you had just one trade to make over the next two months, what would it be—what sector or stock would you focus on most?

Jonathan: Great question. I’ll give you one today—I shared an idea after the Trading Live show that I love. I’m extremely bullish on uranium—I’ve been bullish since 2016—but extremely bullish now.

The problem is the uranium names like LEU, UUUU, CCJ—they’ve all run so much. I love UROY(Uranium Royalty Corp.). It’s a uranium royalty company: as long as uranium continues to go up—and I expect significant moves not only over the next two months but the next five years—this just gets you long a uranium “clipping” company.

It’s more volatile than I’d expect; it’s trading about $5 right now. My approach: I’d buy at $5, but I’d also be a buyer at $4.50 or $4.20—give yourself one extra tranche to get in because it’s volatile. It’s a great way to get long uranium in a really hot sector—finding where you can still get value in these really hot sectors.

Mike:So yeah, that is a hot sector. What’s the ticker again?

Jonathan: UROY—a little off the beaten path, but it’s a ~$4–$5 stock. And Mike, it’s a sensational IRA play. Just stick it in there and forget it.

Mike: Set it and forget it, right?

Jonathan: Set it and forget it—like, “oh wow, I am long uranium—this is great.”

Mike: Now, you mentioned a minute ago you recently joined InvestorPlace a couple of years ago.

InvestorPlace is the home of the King of Quants—a guy I’ve known for decades—Louis Navellier. Great guy. I followed his research back in the ’80s when I was a newbie stockbroker and have followed him closely ever since.

What are you doing with InvestorPlace in conjunction with Louis Navellier and his stock-rating system?

Jonathan:We’re actually doing our first big launch with InvestorPlace November 10th—I think we’ll put a link below.

I’m super excited—it’s something we’ve been working on for a long time. A year ago, we launched an unusual options activity program.

The guarantee was: if you move forward, we’d give you at least 10 trades over 12 months that would earn 100%+. We accomplished that in just five months.

When they threw that out there, I thought, “OK, we’ll do our best,” but the trades have been great and there are a lot of pockets of the market moving really fast. We teach people to trade those with options.

And the way I teach options is: we look to buy options with a fixed amount of risk. If an option is trading at $1, you decide what you’re comfortable risking before the trade. If you want to risk $1,000, you buy 10 for $1—$1,000—and then you’re in until expiration: either you make a bunch of money or you lose what you pre-decided you’d risk. It’s a different approach than many are used to, but because we have a community, it really helps people get a hold of what we’re doing.

Mike: That sounds great—and that event is coming up again on Monday, November 10th, correct? And Louis Navellier—you’ll be working with him on that, right?

Jonathan: Yes, Louis is going to join us. Luke Lango is going to join us. Eric Fry is going to join us. It’s a really great, welcoming event for InvestorPlace—I’m really excited about it.

Mike: Indeed—like an open house. I love it. So, folks, again, that’s the Profit Surge event with Jonathan Rose, coming up Monday, November 10th.

You’ll see a link on this page and other links to follow if you want to join and hear what’s on their minds. I think it’s a great concept, Jonathan—taking Louis’s stock-grader system with those A-rated stocks that have proven to beat the market like 20-to-1 and then finding unusual options activity (which you do really well) on those same stocks. It’s like quant on steroids, I think.

Jonathan: I couldn’t be more excited. I was a solopreneur for nine years when this opportunity came across. I didn’t think I was looking to work with anybody—and to be invited with these guys? No-brainer. I’m a trader; these guys are futurists.

Luke is awesome at seeing where we’re going down the line; Eric too; and Louis has such great quant background and performance. It’s a natural fit. When it was presented to me, I was like, “In. No-brainer. Let’s do it.”

Mike: Sounds exciting—I’ll certainly be tuning in. Jonathan Rose, thanks so much for joining me today and catching up. I love talking shop with you. And to all our TradeSmith Insiders—thanks for joining us again today for this special video. As always, good investing.