Tag Archive for 'volume'

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It’s the economy stupid!

Published on August 2, 2011, 6:56 pm in Trading. Closed Tags: , , , , .

We had the biggest down day this year, although the volume was not that big. I would have rather seen a big woosh down and have buyers come in instead of this slow, grinding death…on every little pop, a barrage of bears come in and sell, sell, sell! It was one of the ugliest days I’ve seen…add in 7 down days in a row…8 for the Dow…the markets are very, very oversold.

For as crazy as the market has been the past week, the VIX has been fairly tame.You would think the VIX would have shown some additional upside movement. S&P is now negative for the year. I don’t expect it to stay there, but still a significant accomplishment…for the bears.

The Arms Index, also known as TRIN says: A TRIN close over 2.0 results in a bounce the next day 9 times out of 10. No bounce? Market is in trouble! The TRIN closed at 4.64 on Tuesday!

Wow…staggering…S&P down almost 100 points…the Dow down 900 points…all in a few days! Screw the debt-ceiling, it’s the economy stupid!

Nothing

Published on July 20, 2011, 11:20 pm in Trading. Closed Tags: , .

Nothing happened today…the markets ended where they started. Some good earnings reports, some not so good…traders just didn’t know which way to go. Or maybe they weren’t around at all. Volume was low.

I continue to trade small positions, not very often. I guess I’m contributing to the low volume. On the other hand, I’m getting a lot of projects completed around the office. Trading-wise, this has to be one of the slowest seasons I have endured…so far at least!

Crazy OpEx Action

Published on July 14, 2011, 11:42 pm in Trading. Closed Tags: , .

I’ve learned to trade lightly during OpEx week and stay away from trading on Friday. I also haven’t had much luck with Thursday’s of OpEx, but today was OK. A couple of TF trades that hit according to plan. So I’m doubly giddy because I followed my plan AND I made money…yippee :!:

But, that was all in the early morning…and like yesterday when Uncle Ben helped the market move up, today he removed the foot from his mouth and spoke clearly that the Fed wasn’t going to start up QE3 anytime soon. Traders disappointment started when Ben started talking and lasted all day. The down days still have the higher volume :-(

Options expiration…here we come. Be careful out there!

Closed at the highs!

Published on June 28, 2011, 7:16 pm in Trading. Closed Tags: , , .

Markets closed near their highs as traders anticipate good news from Greece by Wednesday morning. And we did have some good news on home prices, although consumer confidence was down a bit. The VIX closed at its lows. Both Monday’s and Tuesday’s rallies were on fairly low volume, both days about the same. Can’t complain though, unless you were short.

I didn’t like the way the news reported all the riots going on in Greece without mentioning that the Greek markets were up along with the Euro as well as other European markets. I finally turned off CNBC and concentrated more on the charts. I think I’ll look back to this week as the moment I turned off financial news while trading! Should be a good habit.

Remember Thursday is the End of the Month, End of the Quarter and End of the First Half 2011. Lots of window dressing going on, and could be the reason for the buying. Money managers want to get stocks into their portfolios before the reports need to be sent out.

Earnings season is about to start again….in about 2 weeks. And next week we have the monthly Employment reports. The big question, is this the summer rally and how long will it last?

Forever Young

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

Well the market sure seems old, but I thought since it was Bob Dylan’s birthday I would play one of his remarkable songs….Forever Young. Yes he has an incredible repertoire, but this one always stuck with me.

So I listened to Dylan songs today because the market did nothing….on low volume…. ho hum. All the indexes closed on their lows…and continued after hours to move down.Futures this eveing are also moving down. ES should see 1300 overnight, maybe 1290. And if it does, I’m expecting buyers to step in for some bargains.

Me…I’m sitting in cash…mostly. I’ve still got some losers in banking and interest rates. Financials did seem to pick up in the afternoon, so this may be interesting.

No news today, no news tomorrow. Maybe it’s time to start the holiday weekend?

A new USA TODAY/Gallup Poll finds that as gas prices hover near $4 a gallon, nearly eight in ten Americans say the high cost of fuel is causing financial hardship for their families. The other 20% own oil company stock. — DailyComedy.com

Monday, Monday

Published on May 23, 2011, 10:56 pm in Trading. Closed Tags: , , .

Monday Monday, can’t trust that day. News was slow in the US but the news from Europe started the downward trend early and was reinforced with the Italy downgrade later in the day. The dollar went up, everything else went down…except for bonds of course. Advance/Decline volume was way down at -9:1

Dick Arms, the creator of The Arms Index, also known as TRIN, says: a TRIN close over 2.0 results in bounce next day 9 times out of 10. No bounce? Market in trouble. The TRIN closed at 2.23 today. We’ll see how this works out on Tuesday.

Signing off before the thunderstorm knocks me out!

Another low volume down day

Published on April 11, 2011, 9:47 pm in Trading. Closed Tags: , , , .

The indexes xontinue to move down…except for the Dow. It again eeked out a small gain closing in the green. The Russell/TF and Nasdaq/NQ again led the way down….all on low volume, but we’re getting used to that now, especially Mondays.

By the end of the day I had closed all my short positions and am now kicking myself as I look at the futures continuing to move down all evening. Oh well….a profit anyway…just mad it could have been more!

AA earnings were mixed and traded down afterhours. And even though most of the indexes were down, the VIX was down as well…a bit unusual.

Guess I’ll go to bed and get up for the European open. G’nite!

Traders are saying the scariest moment of the second quarter will be on April 27, when Bernanke will hold the first ever press briefing following a monetary policy decision by the central bank.

And they’re off….

Published on April 10, 2011, 9:42 pm in Trading. Closed Tags: , , , , , , .

By the end of Friday I had cashed out many of my holdings. I’m about 20% invested, 1:1 long vs short, and 80% cash. Just couldn’t tell what this market wanted or was going to do. Commodities were floating to the sky, budget finger-pointing and low volume made me uneasy. The Dow was up slightly while the other major indices were down slightly last week. And it looks like the Russell/TF is leading the way down…just like it led the way up.

Even though we have some sort of budget compromise, I’m not sure it’s any better. It only gets us all the way until next Thursday, averting this weekend’s shutdown. So on Friday, not only do options expire, but maybe the government as well! :mrgreen:

The big news this week will be earnings…with AA kicking off the festivities after the close on Monday. JPM comes out on Wednesday and GOOG on Thursday. Option Expiration Friday has BAC SCHW and MAT.

Now I’m going back to melting down all my silver disco chains and throwing in a few forks and knives. Good luck and happy trading :!:

Interest rates anyone?

Published on April 6, 2011, 10:23 pm in Opinions and Trading. Closed Tags: , , , , , , , , , .

Although volume is still low, it was the highest volume of the week. And crude and gold and silver are still manic bulls! And although we had a gap open to the positive side this morning, we quickly started to meander and flirt with red and green and back to red and back to green. Volatility remained low, confirmed by a narrow-range VIX.

I had a great day taking profits in F ZION and TBT. I’m all out of F and ZION, but still have several options in TBT. Banks/financials finally had their day today and am still holding C XLF and HCBK. My long hedges are SPY puts and a few SDS calls. It was a good day for the ol’ portfolio.

With the ECB announcing their rate hike Thursday morning (about 7:45AM EST), I’ll be watching TBT closely to make sure it does not become a “sell the news” event. If the UK also announces a rate hike, it could turn into a great day for TBT. Either way, interest rates and inflation will be moving up eventually! I’ve also got DZZ and ZSL on my watchlist…those ETFs are gold short and silver short….gotta come down soon, don’t you think?

“It is health that is real wealth and not pieces of gold and silver.”
— Mahatma Gandhi

Here comes the big one…

Published on March 31, 2011, 10:14 pm in Trading. Closed Tags: , .

So Jobless Claims were higher than last week’s number….BUT, they revised last week’s number higher, so this week’s number is lower!!? That’s government accounting for you!

Then, the not-so-good Factory Orders report came out, the markets popped! WTF? They did tame down and end with a narrow range day for all the indexes. And again, a very, very low volume day. Where have all the traders gone? Must be computer issues in the server room.

Can’t wait to see the shennanigans in Friday’s Non-Farm Payroll. Hope it’s more exciting than today’s snoozer :!: