Just look at the charts….I’ve got the S&P 500 here, but any index will do. Every day closed at about the same place as the day before. It was a week of nothing….a bunch of dojis. Are we taking a rest before making the big move up or just a topping process to roll over?
S&P Aug 28, 2009
Every day I bet on the rollover. This morning I panicked..after seeing how ugly all my positions looked in the premarket, I saw an opportunity to breakeven, so I did. I took a loss on
DXD but hung on to
DUG and
SMN…and they continued to take off. What a reprieve….cashed out and felt good.
Near the close I went short again: EDZ DUG SMN XLF puts and IWM puts. I’m hoping for some bad news over the weekend. Eight out of 10 taking the short overnite position. I’m gonna have a great weekend…no matter how Monday shows up. Enjoy the weekend and have fun 
Published on
August 27, 2009,
10:07 pm in
Daily and Trading.
Tags: AIG, BA, C, DUG, EDZ, FNM, FRE, IWM, SMN, TZA.
The bears couldn’t do it! The bulls couldn’t do it! So they’re all a bunch of wussies! There was no selling energy today, but with all the good news the bulls couldn’t get it together either. And volume has been decreasing each day this week….and why should it increase tomorrow, a Friday in late summer and a holiday weekend next week?
The markets went down big and recovered even bigger, but all said and done we closed near even. If BA and AIG hadn’t made any announcements, it would definitely been a down day. And isn’t it something that almost half the entire trading volume is trades in AIG FRE FNM and C? Since they are all government owned, is the government manipulating us? You bet. 
Why else would these junk stocks be up 100-300%? Wasn’t there a news conference recently when our President said, “Let me be perfectly clear, there will not be another down stock market day in my term.” [joke intended!]
Today was a very good day….all the short positions taken at the close yesterday were cashed out with great profits this morning. The big winner was IWM puts, DUG and SMN. EDZ and TZA were good, but not as great. 
And as I’ve been doing the last couple weeks, at the close I went short again via: DUG SMN DXD. Sure it hasn’t worked every day, but 7 out of 9 ain’t bad.
Friday morning we have Personal Income and Spending reports. Any guesses? Let’s hope it is not manipulated.
Except for yesterday morning, I’ve been pretty lucky playing the short side during this sideways correction. The Dow has been up all 3 days this week and has moved up a whopping 38 points or 0.004%. Each morning we jump up and every afternoon we move down. This is getting a little boring.
And like every afternoon I position myself for “the” down move. This evening though it is a little more aggresive and diverse. I bought some IWM puts, the usual EDZ and TZA, and the spiced it up with SMN, the basic maretials 2x short ETF, and DUG, the 2x short oil & gas ETF.
And like every evening, futures are down already, but something always comes up to bring them to unchanged or positive by morning. Asian markets have started to the downside also. We’ll wait until morning to see what the world thinks of the markets.
Then Trader’s Almanac has a little blurb for Friday: “August’s next to last trading day, S&P up only once in last 12 years.” Shows you that most traders are on vacation, or just don’t give a shit
So be careful out there….Happy Trading.
Published on
June 30, 2009,
9:39 pm in
Daily, Opinions, Other Traders and Trading.
Tags: CNBC, IWM, News, Psyche, QID, QQQQ, TZA.
Again, waking up this morning, I found my positions underwater. And for a few minutes the “good news” was that home prices only went down 18%….so much better than last months -18.7%….I feel richer already 
But then sanity came back to traders when we heard that mortgages were defaulting at a greater rate and that consumer confidence was down. The market went down, as you would expect with this kind of news…and thus, my short ETFs went up: QID TZA. Following along were some QQQQ puts and IWM puts. By mid-morning my biggest winner was the IWM puts so I sold those off and half of the TZA position. Lunch time brought the usual meandering up move in the markets, so I refilled my TZA position.
Near the close, the Plunge Protection Team was in full force, artificially taking the market up. Listen to what they were saying about the PPT on CNBC: Economic Analysis. And also read about all the “transparency” the government is removing from our markets at the Zero Hedge blog It’s hard to trade against the U.S. government.
So I remain in a short position because I think all the news can’t be good tomorrow morning: ADP Employment Report, ISM Manufacturing Index, Construction Spending, Pending Home Sales, and Motor Vehicle Sales. We will also hear from California if they will be paying their bills with IOU’s or Fed bailout money. The Feds can’t backstop everything coming down the pike. Almost looks like a horrible car crash in slow motion….or some sort of crash 
It’s
Perhaps to show support for Madoff, or maybe just remembering Charles Ponzi, traders paid tribute by bidding up stocks….for no reason whatsoever. The Russell showed a little bit of sense by staying in the red most of the day and ending there.
The futures in the morning reeked havoc on my short positions, but took off running at the open. I quickly started to cash out half my positions, fully intending to get out of the rest as the markets moved down. After taking my profits I left my office to check on the air conditioning people trying to repair the A/C. By the time I got back, my remaining positions were well underwater and stayed there most of the day…and worked their way back to a breakeven by the end of the day. I even picked up some IWM puts to take advantage of some good positioning for tomorrow.
Yes, I’m still looking at a down market. But, this low, low volume is making it hard to interpret what traders are looking at and what they are trading…and why. So I’ll trade what I see and take my lumps, or profits, as I see it. So far so good, although the intra-day noise makes for some scary moments. Be careful out there 
What the $%@&* is going on? Debt holders for GM agree to something or other and now GM’s bankruptcy will be easier and faster. What king of bullshit is that? This is good news? GM needs another $50B dollars. They already got $20B. That makes for a handout of $70B to a company that is only worth $800M. What the $%@&*
The market is just crazy. I finally made some good money on my IWM puts and I closed the day picking up some GS puts (GSRI), only because it looks way overbought….and way overpriced.
Can’t get any signals from futures this evening. ES has a humongous 3 point range so far, while YM’s range is 31 points. Oh well, guess I’ll go to bed and sleep on it. 
Why won’t these charts listen to the damn indicators they are showing? So I started unloading my underwater shorts bit by bit as the market wavered in the morning. It was going to continue that strong up move from yesterday, wasn’t it? No!
I’ve just about unloaded it all by noon, except for my IWM puts and the market reverses….big time. If I would of held on to my BGZ and SRS I would have been a very happy camper by the end of the day. Sure I got back in and scalped a few dollars to relieve the pain, but still….I could have been a rich man (tongue in cheek). Lesson learned…you have to trust your signals, chart patterns and instincts.
I have a few IWM puts (IWMRX) that I’m still nursing at break even. This market is so news and event driven, it’s hard to be a trader. So I’ll try again tomorrow. Be careful out there.
I don’t get this at all! Totally insane! Home prices fell the most in 21 years! And then the Consumer Confidence stated:
…current conditions have moderately improved, and growth in the second quarter is likely to be less negative than in the first.
Do you see that? Less Negative…this is good news? Oh, and read on:
Those claiming business conditions are “good” increased to 8.7 percent from 7.9 percent. However, those claiming conditions are “bad” increased to 45.3 percent from 44.9 percent.
A whole 8.7% believe that business conditions are good! That is not 87%, but a number less than 9. And this is good? Business and markets and banks and stocks are all better? I mean “less negative?” What the $%@&*
I didn’t trade much today. In the pre-market I was pretty happy with my positions in BGZ and IWM puts. And when the Case/Schiller home prices came out, I even picked up a few shares of SRS, the UltraShort Real Estate ETF. I went about my business today, came back to my office and WHAM! What the $%@&*
My positions were well under water….how depressing. Markets took off on a survey of 5000 people (Consumer Confidence) telling us we are 54% as confident as we were in 1985.That sure is good news, huh?
Oh well. Now to develop a strategy to get out of this with my shirt on. But the markets are so spastic, it’s almost a minute by minute thing. Will need to look out for Existing Home Sales tomorrow, New Home Sales on Thursday and GDP on Friday.
And one last thing….Did you see that Facebook is valued at $10 Billion? The new valuation of Facebook makes it worth more than 310 of the S&P 500 companies, according to data from Bloomberg. Of course that valuation is only two-thirds of last year’s valuation when MSFT bought in. But who cares? Let’s party like it’s 1999
Except for my premature stop loss at mid-week of my short positions, the week went according to plan. Yesterday (Thu) afternoon, a down day, I began accumulating long market positions with TNA BGU and SSO. Today the market took off in the morning, allowing me to take a very nice profit….yowzaaa
Then, today, I began accumulating short market positions using BGZ and IWM puts. I thought I was setting myself up for Tuesday, but the market sold off Friday afternoon, that I just had to take some profits. I sold half my positions with unexpected profits and am still ready to take more on a Tuesday down move. I just love it when a plan comes together.
Please remember to shake the hand and thank a living veteran, and please remember our fallen veterans. We couldn’t be doing what we do without them. God Bless America
Many companies looking for money by diluting their outstanding shares…thus making their stock price go down. And they all were going down…until about 2PM EDT when the bulls came back from lunch and wanted to skin the shorts. But boy, what an opportunity.
So, as I wrote last night, I had QQQQ puts and FAZ from yesterday, which were looking pretty ugly in the pre-market, but turned at the open and made for a very profitable day. I also picked up some IWM puts during one of the intraday rallies. I covered all short positions during the lunch hour and thought I was done until about 1:30 when the Dow and S&P500 charts showed some bottoming action. About 30 minutes later it looked like a confirmation and quickly picked up some QLD and BGU. I held on for about 45 minutes and cashed out again on the long side. Oh what a glorious day….well, profitable anyway.
Tonight I sit in cash trying to figure out something with the market. Being options expiration week, and tomorrow being Wednesday, usually the most bullish of opex days, I’m looking for some bull action. If you take a look at the S&P500 5min chart, you can see a cup and handle formation, usually a bullish formation.
I’m just going to see what the market brings in the morning.
Published on
March 22, 2009,
1:44 pm in
Opinions, Trading and Weekly.
Tags: AIG, DJ30, DXO, Fed, IWM, Nasdaq, SP500, SSO, URE, UYG.
I’m looking for an up week. I think there is enough upcoming news that may bring some optimism to the most downtrodden of bulls. And if the Arrogant Idiots and Goofballs (AIG) ever get out of the headlines, we may really takeoff 
With announcements about toxic assets, TALF, FDIC and public-private partnerships, if this isn’t the start of a new bull, we should at least get a dramatic bear rally. We’ve also got some economic reports this week that may be a catalyst…Existing and New Home Sales, Durable Goods Orders, 4th Quarter GDP, Personal Income and Spending, as well as the weekly Jobless Claims.
Yes, I’m cheer leading for the bulls, at least in the mid-term….but I still watch the daily trend, either up or down, and base my daily trades on that. For the mid- and long-term in my IRAs and retirement accounts, I’ve been accumulating bit by bit, dollar-cost averaging new purchases, mostly in ETFs like the financials (UYG), real estate (URE), crude (DXO) and some indexes (SSO and IWM).
And speaking of indexes, they’ve had a great 7 days:
- The Russell 2000 up 21.7%
- The NASDAQ up 17.5%
- The S&P500 up 17.4%
- The Dow Jones Industrial Average up 14.4%
So last week the S&P500 got knocked down from its January lows and the Dow from its November lows. No big deal. I think the next time we approach they will breakthrough….maybe after the S&P tests its November lows and bounces.
OK, time to check out some basketball and a few Bud Lights
Oh No! for the non-Yiddish. That was one helluva train wreck….and I couldn’t see it in any indicator…those indicators haven’t been working well in this environment 
It was impressive! 2 back-to-back 4+% down days…relentless selling! Today I saw the wisdom of always being both long and short so you can take the loser off and let the winner run.
I did get in to some IWM calls. I first tried to get some 6 months out, but couldn’t get a fill. So I grabbed some in the short term near the low…and they’re still at the low.
I did a scan after the market closed and couldn’t find any stock chart that looked interesting. Oh well, some days are like that. Keep the powder dry 
