Time to go short again

Good call on Apple, Goering.

time to buy em again

Biodiesel, I'm a novice but I can see how important it is to get in step, and in this regard timing is everything. It's like marching, if you start on the right foot, it is much much easier. The French have a phrase for it, no doubt.

Bio - about the SMS.  I use IG and you can set unlimited (free) SMS for price levels from their site.  Pretty useful.

Yeah biccies, but I didn't get the Apple trade on...  Never mind.  Still probably a slight negative for the short term, imo.

Cheers Goring, I use IG and never knew that.

Tried going long yesterday but it failed to move up.Iam a little unsure where this market is going, I think we could touch 9500 or Oct lows,it could build a base to go long again. Looks like were setting ourselves up for another down leg, the latter hours of the trading day will tell all.

U.S Unemployment data also being released today, so this will be a driver either way.

Apple is a bull, wer only a couple months away from the christmas retailing season, Apple products will be the number one item, Iam not into gadgets I still have a crappy phone, but Iam getting the ipad in the coming weeks, that says enough to me!!

Yeah, I can only see the data disappointing to be honest.  I will be trying to take a short wing-ding off them again just in case.  I think the direction is still down, but I'm nervous about being short because we've had however many down days in a row now.  There's room for a big pop, but it will be a sell.  Happy hunting...

I think all the Apple upside is priced in though, matey.  Watch it.

How's it going in the short camp?  Blimey, I'm short equities again, nice and long bonds and my Gold hedge has kicked in against my physical holding.  Must be some serious liquidations for Gold to go with it.

Had to make a visit to mate in hospital, **** it I was looking to short that broken trendline that I had in.

What the hell happened gold???

Bit of fund liquidation, maybe to cover equity margins.  I'll like to see it come back more and pick some up anywhere in the mid 11s.

Leave orders in the system.  IG is pretty good with the contingent stops etc.

What d hell happened the euro!! Dollar weakness on its way, more stimulus

Bodiesel - I reckon Apple will be back down to $200 soon enough. $250 now

I think it's follow on from the ECB rollovers.  Remember there were a lot of Euro shorts due to the impending defaults and that got priced in just in time for the Euro banks to rollover only 130bn of the 250bn which came due.  The consequence is that loose policy in Europe may be over soon - certaintly sooner than the US give the jobs report.  Hence - dump 'risky' assets.  I'm guessing for a week or just over of this type of scenario now and then look to go long Gold again for the push to $1400.

I missed that 100+ dow move, blast it!! Covering short my gold position. Id like to buy Gold now but experience has told me not to, support of 1170, blast off then!!

gold plummeted on the need for funds for short covering.it should resume its northward direction soon.Superfast traders hit the dow again.I read recently that about 70% of volume is now due to "rapid traders". I feel another short term rally coming on.

Mrben - thanks for the tip, that's good enough for me.

I would buy Gold on opening stops above the market though.  I could see the low 1100s before we push on and I don't think there's any rush, it could be a month or so of grinding lower on a weekly basis.  On the other hand, I might be totally wrong. :)

Time to turn from short to long

Nice call again Mrben

thanks united, hope you got some. remember to be nimble, no long term rallies, its a srtictly in and out market.

274 points on the dow, few more to come now.bulls happy today.

Market's been kind this last month or so.  Been a nice on for me.  Anyone got views from here?  I see a slow grind higher for a week or two and then another retracement.  Looking for a commodity droop (except possibly US Nat Gas where strange things are afoot) planning to sell long-dated Crude puts if we trade below $65, holding off the precious metals for a couple of weeks looking to pick up silver in the $14-16 range and Gold at 1100.

another 120 on the dow,where to from here?I say up into earnings and then take profits.

Mr B

This is a Bull market.. Th trend is up  and that is where I see it heading!

I think it's a really tough call now over the medium term.  I think some earning this week will surprise and we will go higher this week provided the usual problems (Euro etc.) don't come up in the news again.  Things will be ok with so much money about until velocity returns, then there'll be an almighty crash and bear market again, imo.

Yet another shakedown.

An interesting earnings week chaps, there might be a few spikes to sell.

I have just sold my American shares:
Apple £159
Intel £13.94
Microsoft £16.47
They've not done badly for me although I shoulsd have sold a month ago but now I'm going to sit out awhile before I buy them back.

brave selling AAPL just before earnings, I'd say most analyst have it correct at over $300.

For brave read stupid. Up****ed bigtime. Would anyone recommend a good link or book to help me make share investment decisions, please?

Sam Weinstein "How to profit from bull and bear markets"

Why stupid, UB?  A month ago when you say you should have sold, you didn't know what was about to happen.  And you didn't know what would happen after you sold this week - it could have been a clever time to sell.  This from someone who should have sold up two, four, six, eight or ten years ago but didn't because he didn't forsee the various problems the financial people are so good at inventing with boring regularity.

Careful about taking any advice from any one source, there's so much incompetence and misinformation out there. Best approach is to focus on only as many stocks that you can understand really well, work out what's real and what's lies. Fundamentals are way more important than Tech Analysis BS.
AAPL a good example of a stock deliberately being pushed up and down using tools like the media, still  undervalued, but notice how it was pushed way down to $240 with no real justification.
MS could be a company in trouble though.

Also, bear in mind that the big players push the markets up or down, not always for genuine reasons, because they can't otherwise make money.  The holy grail has to be how to work out when moves are genuine or not, an art at which I, for one, can't fathom!

Thanks for the replies, I shall read that book. To some extent, I was protected from losses by the strength of the $ and so I made a small profit on the shares but feel like I squandered a good position and am angry with myself for poor timing. It's like jumping on and off a roundabout, timing is everything. Once I'm reconciled to it, chances are I won't play for a while and the upside is that I won't have to worry about my investment leeching away. A decision made in the heat of a bad decision is usually flawed, so the worst thing would be to try and jump back on straight away.

polybot Joined: 20 Oct 03
Replies: 252 23 Jul 10 08:42   
Careful about taking any advice from any one source, there's so much incompetence and misinformation out there. Best approach is to focus on only as many stocks that you can understand really well, work out what's real and what's lies. Fundamentals are way more important than Tech Analysis BS.
AAPL a good example of a stock deliberately being pushed up and down using tools like the media, still  undervalued, but notice how it was pushed way down to $240 with no real justification.
MS could be a company in trouble though. 


Hi Polybot

I have to disagree with you about technical analysis being BS I'm afraid. I believe you have to consider both. Probably 75% / 25% in favour of TA. Fundamentals are important to give you a bias. However, technical analysis can provide you with areas of support and resistance (trendlines, pivot points etc...) to tell you when to enter and exit trades.

Taking a long term view with both can help provide good results. Day trading is very difficult for an ordinary person to be successful. However, if you're after a book to give a good grounding, check out John Murphy's book on Technical Analysis. There's probably a link to download it off the net for free. It's worth shelling out a few quid for it though.

However, UB - if you're after a fairly simple day-trading forex system (never tried it on stocks), check out the link below (if links still work on the BF site). Download Metatrader. Download the indicator in post 7. Open 8 charts in Metatrader. 4 each for cable and EU. Set them each to 5mins, 15mins, 1 hour and daily. Tile them so you can see all 8 at once. Add the indicator from post 7. Add a 20ema (must be ema) moving average to all 4 charts. Add a 50sma and 200 sma to the daily chart only.

Only trade from the London opening after the Germans have finished p1ssing everyone off stop hunting. Look at the 1hr and daily chart for the overall trend (the price will have a close above or below the 20ema with the worm providing support or resistance - ie. if it's above both only consider going long, if it's below both only look for shorts).

London will give your trend for the day. If the price closes above the 20ema on the 5min and 15min chart and is support by the worm on the 20ema go long after a small retrace, and vice versa if it’s below - as long as it is also supported or resisted by the longer term trend. DO NOT TRADE AGAINST THE TREND. IF THE SIGNAL IS MIXED, EITHER MAKE SOME COFFEE AND BE PATIENT, DOWNLOAD SOME FILTH, OR GET SOME FRESH AIR UNTIL THE US OPENS, OR HAVE A DAY OFF AND TREAT THE KIDS TO A DAY AT THE PARK.

I usually have a stop loss slightly below the previous highest / lowest, low / high which is not normally more than 20-25 pips. I'll try and take half off the table between 20-30 pips, shorten the SL and let it ride until the worm overtakes the price and starts to reverse. The price will be supported or resisted by the 20ema and the worm on the higher timeframes. Better to take profit, wait for a retrace, re-enter and start again and take the pips again. Job done. Shut down the laptop and wait for the next day.

If you find yourself on the wrong side take the hit or close. After a while you’ll know when you’ve dropped a clanger.  However, the 20ema and worm are very good at providing direction. You’ll also notice that the PA touches them and reverses, or slices straight through, heads to the next timeframe, touching that and reverses etc…

http://www.forexfactory.com/showthread.php?t=6878

It's well worth testing on a demo a/c to see how the PA reacts and allow you to be comfortable with it.

I also tried responding to your topic on cable reaching $1.67. For that to happen you need to look at the daily chart. The 50sma needs to cross above the 200sma for a long-term up-trend to be supported – in my opinion! Until then it might range for a bit to wait for the MA’s to catch up and provide a bit of support.

Thanks for that Pastie. I'm not sure if I can digest all that but if I  were able, it may help prevent a repeat of past mistakes. Broadly, I have had mixed to good results over a medium term but always buy or sell on the wrong day of the week, at the worst time of the day.

Fair enough Pastie, if it works for you then good luck, but it's never added much value for me and I've seen enough experienced technicians get it completely wrong to never rely on it myself.
Since around 2007 especially (in the US) it's a new paradigm, and it doesn't seem to be improving. On one hand it's disturbing, on the other hand it's an opportunity. I was lucky enough to pick up on the shifts in the 2008 election cycle and did very well on the downside and the later correction. The key for me was knowing the value from the spin and also the timeframes, day trading would have completely eroded the very healthy margins.
Your approach works for you and mine for me, I suppose the difference is you aim to predict the market day to day, as opposed to month to month.

get ready to go short again! my timing wont be as exact or as good but I expect a bit of a shake coming

Interesting battle of the heavyweights; Biodiesel the bear versus Mrben and Goering, both shouting up the markets. Lets see.

Dow must close over 10738 this week to confirm the push to 11000 for me otherwise it's a head and shoulders back to 14 Jan.  Employment data on Friday could turn things sour, but I think it would have to be quite bad.

Wow ADP  42k.  Here come the jobs..  Even Lampus could get one.

it can go higher but I can only see a strong pull back, we can touch 10850 with talks of 11000 before heading back to 10400.

Iam not looking to call or bet on a top here but theirs more slowdown [nervous] talk from China to come, Il try and ping the call in the coming weeks. We might even have to get ahead of ourselves for a pull back.

Yes China is a worry.  On the other hand, this report showed losses in manufacturing and construction with a huge offsetting leap in services.  It's bubble/debt growth, but it will send stocks higher for now...

this is an up week, for no other reason than markets are rising.Fridays numbers may send the market lower and then lower next week.If the numbers are good expext a rally into next week.I will cash half my positions before the fri numbers.Remember not to marry  your positions in a desire to be right.

By the way-- I am writing this from the 34 degree heat of phuket thailand,  enjoying some of my trading profits. After signing off I will take a motorbike ride to an isolated beach, take a dip in the clear waters.Having  sunbaked for a while a lunch of fresh fish cooked the thai way.Tonight I will visit a few bars filled with exotic lassies and down a few cold ones.All the while reflecting on how the other half lives. Enjoy!

Mrben aka a sad git who lives in a one bed council flat in Brixton.

Cable and EU have been (relatively) easy to pick over the last couple of weeks.

Just sit back and watch it range during the Asian session, watch Frankfurt push a nice fake move 30 or 40 pips one way, and then London send it the other way for a nice 80-100 pip move!

Then repeat during the US session.

Are you chaps still shorting Gold? My charts show that Gold is trading above the 1hr and daily 20ema. Could be bullish if we get a bounce off the daily 20ema. If we can also close above 1187 for the week we could be on the way back up.

Mr B
Not visiting Pattong Beach are you by any chance??

Great Golf Courses if you are so inclined. I would suggest Blue Canyon or Phuket Country Club!!

Enjoy

I have opening orders below the market with tight stops if filled.  _If_ it's topping out, it will drop like a stone on the way down.  If not, I'll pay $10 max and still be long rather a lot of physical.  I have no idea where it's going now except that it won't be here at the end of the year.  Either $800 or $1400....

Well, I got a bit squashed by those job figures, but it seems to be stabilising and things were the right way round - 200k govt jobs gone, 75k private jobs arriving.  Could be a good level to get in.

chisel Joined: 19 Sep 08
Replies: 1502 05 Aug 10 11:37 
Mr B
Not visiting Pattong Beach are you by any chance??

Great Golf Courses if you are so inclined. I would suggest Blue Canyon or Phuket Country Club!!

hahahhaha how did you know chisel!!![;)]. I'm not much of a golfer but few guys I know are going to PHuket CC and dragging me along.Are there any bars there?[:laugh

don't get live info here but I saw dow was down 130 points at one stage to finish minus 21.Thats another good sign for the markets to move higher. Good luck to all .

Goring, what trading platform do you use?

this proposed stimulus is really going to drive this market up

iliffer - for execution I use IG mostly.  I use City for long-term holds that I don't look at much - keeps it all tidy.

Bio - what do you think today?  Price action worries me that we've waited all week with weakening stochastics for this announcement.  There could be more expectation than I thought priced in for QE - which I don't think he'll announce explicitly.  I think there'll be a lot of talking up, and the usual "will do whatever it takes".

I'm quite nervous today for those reasons - I can't read who's priced in what.  I am taking all my orders out of the market and flattening out.  I am still bullish, but we could see much lower numbers intraday today and I will buy then based on momentum.

It's very exciting - I might get some pizze in.

Mr B

As with all these golf clubs, the clubhouse is great but not much around it(i Think)

When we stayed , I stayed at the Sheraton Grand hotel near to teh Banyan Tree. Absolutely amazing. Spent the next few days at Blue Canyon GC overlooking 18th Green. It was so hot I had the small pool all to myself all afternoon every day.. Golfers dont seen to like the sun!!

You really need to take up golf Mr B. Invest some of your winnings in a set of clubs and some lessons! Have fun at the shows, and be craeful of teh lady boys!

Oh, an this is why it is a Bull market... Money will be spent to ensure the recovery does not peter out, and that jobs are created.. This stimulus could last for years!

Something doesn't make sense here.  In europe, we are all implementing austerity measures to cut deficits which "the markets" say are unsustainable.  America's is every bit as bad as ours and will get worse if they stimulate further.  Is there a reason why they are different?  And unless there is, aren't they eventually going to drag us down with them?

yea the market is pricing in more stimulus talk and is looking for comments to cheer it up, if it gets any hessitation and we dont get it then wel have decent pull back coupled this with slowdown talks from China it could represent another buying op tho. China will loosen its own fiscal policies and the market will move forward again, the market eventually nearly always gets what it wants.

Goring: Do you participate in other forums?

tempeted to go short now we could get a nice sell off in the closing hr or a good op to buy for tomor,eeerr aah!!

jayyceee 10 Aug 10 11:32

Something doesn't make sense here.  In europe, we are all implementing austerity measures to cut deficits which "the markets" say are unsustainable.  America's is every bit as bad as ours and will get worse if they stimulate further.  Is there a reason why they are different?  And unless there is, aren't they eventually going to drag us down with them?

Yes, there is something different about them - being the world's largest economy (the EU is larger, but not quite a country yet) and, as a result, having the status of reserve currency.  As most of their trade is internal, they can afford to trash their currency whenever it suits and revive their exports.  However, as you say they can take us with them to an extent as 70% of their GDP is consumer spending - large parts of which go to China and Germany.

Both cable and EU getting a pounding today.

Theirs ur short for you!! bit of a bloodbath today, nice pull back to 11400 could represent a nice buying op,I wont dare go bottom fishing tho, fed going to be forced into doing something

Stimulus is not a good thing although looking at some of the comments on here its to be lauded.

Cable short from the daily pivot (1.5693). Looking for 1.555

Half closed at 1.562. Rest @ break even.

Rest closed at 1.559.

Will wait for a retracement and another leg down when the US open.

for the month of july the USA deficit for the month was 165 billion$.Thats for one month!
More stimulus? come on surely these sorts of monthly deficits already the USA  is in permenent stimulus?

permenent stimulus, agree! its stimulus package on top of stimulus package, but the packages will be given a different title all the time.

Whole us system is a massive ponsi scheme, how much oil they got left, when that goes they are baankrupt 20 yrs ?

Don't be too despondent chaps. See it as an opportunity to makes lots of $$$!

The US is fine, the trump card is their gas reserves

Mr Ben

Do you think the market has priced in the potential of a significant slowdown in Chinese real estate?

I think they have to a certain extent but theirs more to go in this move, once it does and theirs a good over reaction the market can only shoot up providing Chinese fiscal policies are addressed, thing Oct-Nov could be a very rocky months

All very scary.  I've put my longs back on here 10270 level in the Dow - bit nervous though.  Lifted Gold hedges and am quite long ahead of next week's bond buying etc.

maybe bio, chinese real estate is ludicrious on any type of analysis.A chinese student here told me that a mortgage in his home area would take 50 years to pay off.He and his friends all say they are not willing to  spend all their life paying off such a mortgage.

I used to be super critical of the chineses system based on fundamentals but the govt there  has the luxury of pull the levers in any direction it wants to achieve its goals without the annoyance of having to answer to anyone.Hence they can manipulate their economy to any desired level. Hence I don't belive in any china based catastrophy.
  Based on this week on the dow I'm betting the month will close to the downside.Reality is that its a trading range over about 9600 to 11000. Taking that as a given, its a fantastic time to be trading. Sell when it gets towards 11k and buy back in under 10k.

u want to be using wide stops tho. Was talking to a Chinese embassy official that worked in Dublin and he said he could see real estate prices fall 30%. The RMB is to be gradually appreciated this will provide good support for commodities and the markets in general.

The Chinese student payback period of 50yrs is a perfect example that this market is going to come off by 20% at least.

http://uk.reuters.com/article/idUKPTIP42198520100813

gone long on crude now,could rise during asian trade, its forming a base wel hope for some positive economic news to lift the market, wels see and watch it closely

Yeah, nice trade.  I've been shorting medium-dated puts every month instead.  Good vol and profit from stagnation too, but it might be time to get rid of the neg. gamma.

I hope you all bought some equities down here, because it's off to the races now.  It refused several times to drop any further.

Got knocked out at the support levelof $75, we are now at $74, IAM IN AGAIN!!

Goring, do u trade options? What are your experiences with them?

Sure, all the time.  How do you mean exactly?  I did it for a job for over a decade so I'm pretty comfortable with them. :)

Ow, got a bit rogered on that Phili Fed number.  I'm out of short-term spec length in Equities and just long Gold and Crude (short puts) as biggest positions.  Looks like we might be in for another few months of down down down and more stimulus nonsense...

I was introduced to options trader well his engineer but he uses options to give himself a very good return on his money,he mostly uses straddles, whats ur experience with them. His on holidays now but his going showing me in a week or so.like to know ur opinion on them

Cable closed below 1.55 and finally broke through support.

EU also opened up the week below 1.275.

It 'Should' be a short week. Will wait for Frankfurt to push cable higher before shorting. A good area of resistance will be the hourly 20ema (1.549ish), the previous area of support (1.55)or the daily pivot (1.553). Not sure it'll go as high as the DP though.

Blimey. Horrible numbers coming out of the US.

Mrben Joined: 25 Oct 03
Replies: 2499 14 Aug 10 06:27   

  Based on this week on the dow I'm betting the month will close to the downside.Reality is that its a trading range over about 9600 to 11000. Taking that as a given, its a fantastic time to be trading. Sell when it gets towards 11k and buy back in under 10k.

you heard it here first!
month will finish lower and next month, september, will finish higher.Pyramid in over the next 2/3 weeks and bail mid october.

Standard way to put vol curve trades on.  Example, sell short-dated straddle, buy long dated.  The theta comes your way and you're long vega (vol).  I don't do that much PA because it's two spreads to pay (or 4 for the curve trade), but I do diagonal spreads a lot which are similar.  So, say I think Gold is going higher but don't know when.  I buy Dec 1250 calls and sell Sep 1250 calls (possible in smaller number and possibly even with lower strike).  That way I don't have theta decay, but keep the vol exposure.  It's bad if the market rallies very quickly so it's not an extreme bull position, but a mild one.   This trade is really the same as the straddle spreads without neutralising the delta.

In bonds.  :)

dow up 164 then down 140.Market is going nowhere.The daily news does not really matter for the monthly picture.Total range trading. Great for option sellers. Looking to buy this week now and keep for less than a month.

Just bought
Apple £158.
Intel £11.60
Microsoft £15.45

What was the FSTE price at 4.30

Feel ive been cheated by betfair

I like this rally...I think it could go much higher

Why do you like it?

Do you actually have a position?

huge rally  now after the friday close. Must be nearly 600 points by now.Off what I ask? just the range trading through, the closer we get to 11,000 the more profits I will take.Goes over 11k and I will look to short at a suitable point.

Mr B

It is a strange trading idea from you . Surely you will make your decision nearer the time depending what news is coming out of the States. My view is that the recent "bad news" is not quite as bad as was reported, if you know what i mean?

not really chisel.If I base my decisions on what  the news is going to be I will get whippsawed around by  the reactions.Also as Im sure you know, the media hints at the news b4 its realeased, the markets react in anticipation.If the actual confirms the rumour most of the move has already happened.If the actual is less than the rumour theres big reversal.This market is neither bear nor bull, its range until proven otherwise.

Mr B

The point is that if teh market hits 11000 and there is only good news flowing from teh States, would you still sell?? I obviously hope you are buying it all the way up to 11000, in which case taking a slightly more pessimistic view may not be a bad shout.. To be fair to you though you generally have the trend sussed out , and have made some good profits.. Fair play to you !  How was teh remainder of your Thailand trip?

Yes chisel I have been buying  but wont't buy all the way up to 11k because that would leave me little room on the reversal.These days I'm playing mostly volatilty with options.Im not a believer in any great rally, nor do I believe that catastrophy is around the corner.Playing the aussie miners has been treating me well.The AUD continues to be strong and buying the dips has been good but im only playing that small.

re the thai trip, I ended up extending it by nearly 2 weeks.Fell in love a few times hhahahah. Actually played a round of golf.That game is pure torture if you want to treat it seiously! I played 15 holes and gave up.My interests centered around the feminine persuasion rather than that little white ball bouncing off into all directions!!!!!!
  BTW chisel you must be rich,I drove past bayann tree, I think you mentioned you stayed there? Very very upmarket!