Tag Archive for 'USO'

Solid day, low volume

Published on July 7, 2011, 11:09 pm in Trading. Closed Tags: , , .

The first of 2 employment days went very well….ADP was good, job claims were good also. The markets gapped up and stayed up. There was a bit of faltering near the end of the day, which may be a set up for tomorrow morning’s NFP report. If it doesn’t meet or exceed newly revised estimates based on ADP, we could go down….hard! Yes, we need to to watch the charts.

I took a small position in USO puts thinking that oil may have topped-off the tank today. It will react to the US Dollar that will react to bonds that will react to the employment report. See how easy it gets? :-(

Was that wild enough?

Published on May 12, 2011, 8:22 pm in Trading. Closed Tags: , .

Yesterday I said we should end the week in a wild way…I guess I just didn’t know how wild! After gapping down and moving down hard the first 30 minutes, the markets started reversing and really took off after the European bourses closed. Key reversal day?

At first I was really disappointed, and disillusioned, that my USO moved down hard also. First reaction was to bail, but it was a small position. So… I took a chance and doubled-down. It brought my average cost down and was quickly in the money after the reversal. I cashed out in the afternoon. Sure wish they all worked out that way. ;)

I also added some TBT Jan 35 calls figuring that rates have to go up somethime in the next 7 months! We’ve got some European GDP reports overnight before the US CPI and Consumer Sentiment. Go TBT!

And don’t forget….Friday the 13th!

Dive, dive, dive!

Published on May 5, 2011, 9:32 pm in Trading. Closed Tags: , , , , , .

Well, volume was up, oil was down…as were all the markets…way down! I switched from USO puts to USO calls. There’s got to be some sort of bounce here. TBT continues to move down, down, down. Yes, I was stopped out, but am looking to re-enter. Cashed out of DZZ and ZSL….big winners.

Oil really popped those stops today! And brokers were on the phone making margin calls all day long! Along with gold, silver and all commodities. Do you think speculators have cashed out yet?

More jobs data tomorrow….the big one…monthly BLS employment. This could really shape the market tomorrow. If it’s good, market should be happy and go up. If it’s bad, market should go up because QE3 is on its way!

It’s about time

Published on May 3, 2011, 10:43 pm in Trading. Closed Tags: , , , .

Finally, a pullback, as small as it is….so far. Except for those TBT calls, which are still stinking, the USO puts and the DZZ and ZSL shares are doing their job. I’ve got trailing stops on them now, so at worst case I’ll be out for a small profit… at best case is still to be seen, but I’m expecting more.

I guess I’ll go have a drink.

bin Laden Martini … 2 shots and a splash!

Got the bastard

Published on May 2, 2011, 7:38 pm in Trading. Closed Tags: , , , , .

You would think that the U.S. markets would have been a little more patriotic today…but no. Amazing AMZN keeps moving up, even when the indexes moved lower. Either way it felt good to get back to the trading desk after a week of jury duty and power outages.

Fading the gap up this morning was the money-making move….missed by me. :-(     I was bullish until about 11AM when I stepped aside and said WTF? After lunch I joined the bear camp and picked up some TBT calls and USO puts along with a few shares of DZZ and ZSL.

Three out of four worked, with TBT being my loser for the day. Oh well, can’t win’em all.

But the U.S. Navy Seals sure can! Thanks and good job guys! Ding Dong the Witch is Dead!

Don’t short a dull market

Published on April 19, 2011, 9:24 pm in Trading. Closed Tags: , , , , , .

And it was a dull market. It looked good in the premarket with GS’s good report. And GS took off, but it, along with most of the bank/financials turned around and went down. For much of the day the market hung around unchanged, but in the afternoon began a steady climb up and closed near the high of the day.

I got out of the USO puts first thing in the morning, but re-entered and re-exited twice during the day. F didn’t do much but C was strong. AAPL also was strong and popped afterhours. Don’t forget they report on Wednesday.

After hours we had some strong earnings reports from IBM INTC YHOO JNPR which bodes well for the markets tomorrow. Seasonally it’s looking good also. According to the Stock Trader’s Almanac, The Nasdaq is up 14 of 16 the day before Good Friday and up 10 straight since 2001. Should be an interesting couple of days.

Slippery Slope?

Published on April 19, 2011, 8:23 am in Trading. Closed Tags: , , , , , , .

Ok, we’ve known about our debt problems for a long time. Today sure seemed like an overreaction and this Debt Market Reaction Raises Some Questions??

The panic sure brought up the volume, especially for a Monday and a holiday week! I picked up some USO puts and F calls to hold for a couple days. My bank/financial plays may be helped out by a great GS report this morning.

“Obama called on Americans to have more grandchildren. Probably so there’s more of them to pay off our debt.” — Jay Leno

5 more days

Published on September 23, 2010, 11:40 pm in Trading. Closed Tags: , , , , , , , , .

Yeppers! Only 5 more trading days left in September. That means the 4th quarter starts a week from tomorrow. Have you started your Christmas shopping yet? Well, fund and money managers will need some money to start so watch for a lot of window dressing in the week to come.

My late day yesterday and pre-market oil plays worked out well today. Still holding on to some USO calls and a couple shares of UCO.

I won’t harp on volume …I guess the “new normal” average volume is not about 10-20% less than what I always thought was average volume.

I’m not sure if we have had enough of a pullback….I think so. The S&P, along with the SPY, did close below the August highs. We’ll have to see on Friday if we pop back up through or feel around in the gutter for more. If we do get a down opening, I’ll look to nibble on some Bull ETFs like SPY SSO TNA BGU and the like. Watch out for 2 reports Friday morning: Durable Goods and New Home Sales.

“The National Bureau of Economic Research announced the recession actually ended in 2009. What idiots we were! So that recession you think you’re in, that’s as imaginary as the job you used to have.”

“What they don’t tell you, the next recession started in July of last year.” – Jay Leno

Woe is me

Published on September 23, 2010, 9:07 am in Tools and Trading. Closed Tags: , , , , .

I had about 24 hours of hardware and Internet issues…all while trying to trade and attended an online webinar….those things don’t mix!

That also didn’t allow me to update my trading journal. For the past 18 months, I’ve been keeping a journal in Microsoft’s OneNote. While I jot down all my trades, I also write about what I’m feeling at the time, my reasons for buying, profit and stop targets. While it feels therapeutic during the day, the real value comes each weekend when I not only review the weeks entries, but also review some entries from months before…especially comparing recent winners and losers with “old” winners and losers.

I digress. The markets were pretty mixed up on Wednesday. Oil really got slapped around. At the end of the day I thought I’d nibble on some UCO and nibbled a little more in the pre-market this morning…average cost 8.65…we’ll see. May also look into some USO calls at the open.

Porbably a big eco number at 10AM…Existing Home Sales….also Leading Indicators. A pullback is not a bad thing…we just want to stay above the S&P’s June and August highs…Maybe a little poke-through, but nothing drastic.

Good Luck and happy trading :!:

Oils well that ends well

Published on September 10, 2010, 8:53 pm in Trading. Closed Tags: , , , , , .

Not much you can say about today except….oil, oil and oil! Which meant that UCO USO ERX were the place to be. And of course the calls I bought yesterday were golden.

Speakin’ of gold, it didn’t do so well today. Sure it closed in the green, but it took a dive. And if you look at the daily chart, it has a bearish evening star candle pattern. Better watch out!

Oh yeah, and the volume today just sucked. Can’t say more than that.

I’ll have my weekend reading out soon! Have a great weekend. :mrgreen: