The Wow Starts Now

I read today's trading described as "erratic." That's an understatement. It was a madhouse. For most of the day, it seemed that the market wanted to freak out the final weak hands. But as if that weren't enough, at the final portion of the session, the daily lows were cracked, and the market plunged even further. All of which makes me angrier at myself for the $350,000 in profits I walked away from less than a week ago.



Those of you who took advantage of my New Zealand suggestion (made precisely at the top), send me some flowers or something! I mean, I nailed this thing totally on the head. Little did I know that this currency flux would be driving a worldwide plunge in equity markets.


Part of the freak-out today was from the continuing damage caused by feckless "flipper" real estate twits. Just take a look at sample financing company getting trashed.


My suggestion on BP continues to do well.


And Carnival, purveyor to obese, bored "travelers", continues to fall as well, as I've mentioned it would many times.


Take a look at the Fibs on the Greater China Fund. Looks like we're in for a bounce, doesn't it?


Lehman is just one example of many of stocks that seem to have had the air taken out of them but are reaching support levels. In this instance, based on Fib fans.


Another victim of the housing collapse - MTH. Once again, a short I suggested many, many points ago.


But today was just maddening, as I said. Look at SPY. The horizontal line shows what I thought would be the support level. In the morning, we started bouncing higher (as I imagine we will tomorrow morning). All day the market farted around. And then, as shown by the highlighted area, we got whacked.


One long idea for ya - UNP.


I've got to scoot. My equity puts have been doing fantastic. But I'm a complete moron for selling those index puts. Ugh. What a rotten feeling. I can only hope we get a nice fat bounce so I get a second chance. *Sniff*.

The Tireless Bull

Each day seems to bring more of the same. The market jumps down. Firms up. Dances around the +0 net change all day long. Then does a late day surge. It's teasing the bears. And the bulls don't seem to be getting tired.

One silver lining to this very big cloud is that the leadership is thinning. Take the NASDAQ 100 for instance. In spite of the Dow making lifetime new highs virtually every day, this index has been a laggard. It was even down a decent amount today.


As you can see by the chart of SPY, the market is ahead of itself. It has "overshot" the channel, just like it "undershot" it early on.


Worth considering as a short - Adobe (ADBE):


Another candidate - Allergan (AGN):


I suggested Checkfree (CKFR) earlier this month, and it's getting smashed in after hours trading today. Nice to have a bright spot in this horrible market.


Health Net (HNT) is another short candidate.


And, lastly, Textron (TXT):


I've noticed in the comments section (which is much quieter now that the anomymous people are locked out) that people sometimes append their ideas with "do your homework" or "do your due diligence" or something else along those lines. Let me save your typing fingers - - you don't need to say such things. The whole idea behind charting is that whatever knowledge the market has is already built into the chart.

Does anyone really think that by puttering around the net they are going to uncover some explosive new information about a stock, be it good or bad, that it absent from the minds of the collective body that trades it? If so, have at it. I personally think you're wasting your time.

To everyone who has survived so far - my hat's off to you. This sucks!

12K for the Sake of 12K

Have you ever heard the saying about how someone is famous for being famous? Sort of like George Hamilton......well it seems to be the market is heading for 12K (on the Dow) just for the sake of hitting 12K.


The past three months have been agonizing, horrible, devastating, and just plain terrible for the bears. The bullish march has been relentless. Just look at the 60 day intraday graph of the SPY. It's basically like someone laid down a ruler and took it straight up with almost no interruptions.......


Looking at the daily graph, with a channel laid down on top of it, you can see the market is way, way, way at the tippy-top of the channel. Does it mean there is a law written somewhere that it has to fall now? Ummm, no. I think we've seen how respectful prices are of these channels! But it still seems more likely to be lower in the next few months than higher.


All the same, the power of the bulls has been something to behold. I wish I could show you some great bullish charts with terrific breakout patterns, but I can't. This is a momentum market. Things are super high, and they are going super-higher. Sorry. I have no charts to share with you today.

Bear Goggles

Lest anyone think otherwise, rest assured my bearish view on the market is still quite intact. It's been frustrating. It's been hard. It's been expensive. But I look at a lot of charts, and I am still absolutely convinced there's a lot more potential on the downside than the up. I guess I'm wearing bear goggles.

Take a look at one simple chart - the SPY. You can see the channel. You can see the median line. Now, regardless of whether you're a bull or a bear, tell me something: based on the behavior of the past two years, do you think it's more likely this will be lower or higher a few months from now? (dramatic pause) That's what I thought.


RIMM is looking sweet. It's got a beautiful shooting star candlestick pattern, and I think we can all agree this has had a fast, furious run-up in price.


For balance, I offer something that looks like a good buy. The symbol is BLUD. This is a solid looking pattern.


Here's to a better week next week, ladies and gents. This one can soon be forgotten.