Tao of The Trade

Looking Dark

Mike — Thu, 06 Dec 2007 14:30:55 +0000

The jobless numbers and Target outlook has pushed the futures down this AM. Considering one of the reasons the market rallyed so much was the good employement numbers a week ago, i think the market will go down. Looking to short BBI and MBI.

Jubilation

Mike — Wed, 05 Dec 2007 14:17:11 +0000

Besides cable related stocks, everything else is gapping up in the morning. Sitting back and waiting for a pull back to go long. CHS might go lower and keeping a close eye on it.

Slow Day

Mike — Mon, 03 Dec 2007 14:22:17 +0000

Nothing interesting to trade except PAY which is restating financials and down almost 18 percent premarket. I will be taking it very light today and watching mostly.

Wow

Mike — Fri, 30 Nov 2007 14:18:55 +0000

Market gonna rally. Waiting till the dust settles to load up on long side on financials.

Waiting for opportunity

Mike — Thu, 29 Nov 2007 14:26:14 +0000

I’ll sit on the sidelines till the afternoon and some sort of pattern develops. Proabably, lots of jockeying for position by the big guys in the morning.

Rally

Mike — Wed, 28 Nov 2007 17:52:51 +0000

Many afraid of the afternoon selloff but it probably won’t happen today. However, stocks are choppy and trading in these moves will make you churn. Market will rally more.

Fed Speak Bounce

Mike — Wed, 28 Nov 2007 14:26:06 +0000

I’ts going to be tricky today and I’ll be on the sidelines probably. The Vice Chairs comments are definitely going to help the financials off the open but will probably be choppy the rest of the day. Nothing much else to look at today so sit tight. Lost opportunity is better than lost capital.

Resilient rally

Mike — Tue, 27 Nov 2007 22:58:35 +0000

The markets rallied after coming off their highs of the morning, but remained choppy till the close with no particular interesting moves that I noticed on my screens. I made most of my money during the selling from the gap up in the morning. I suppose if I tried to bottom pick, I could have made more but that is a very risky strategy. I’ve known many traders that got wiped out trying to bottom pick, so explore this style with caution. It might work 8 out of 10 times but the times it doesn’t work will most likely bankrupt you.

I still doubt that any move up will hold in the coming month. The U.S. is in trouble and there is no doubt in my mind that we are headed into recession which means more trouble for the markets. As always, I’ll be looking for short candidates and any tradeable daytrading moves.

The holidays have been keeping me quite busy with family obligations. I hope everyone’s doing well and keeping warm during these cold months. I’ll post commentary more regularly soon.

hmm…

Mike — Tue, 27 Nov 2007 14:21:28 +0000

I feel uneasy going long anything in this market just yet. I would look for some weakness in the gap ups to take a small short position with a tight stop. Looking at C and cfc. Aeo on long.

Light Trading Day

Mike — Mon, 26 Nov 2007 14:23:34 +0000

The first couple days after a long weekend usually means a choppy trading for those days. I’ll look at CC on the long side, while looking at abx on strong gold.

Light Day

Mike — Wed, 21 Nov 2007 14:28:52 +0000

Another gap down in the making with credit and economic fears on the minds of traders. I would wait till 10 when consumer confidence numbers come out to actually trade. Looking at financials as usual with cfc, wm and c on top of my list. Looking to short DE if it falls below 146.5.

Blowup

Mike — Tue, 20 Nov 2007 14:28:23 +0000

Freddies blowup is causing ripple effects in the whole mortgage space. Not touching them till 10 but mdt and gme looking to go long.

Feel Negative

Mike — Fri, 16 Nov 2007 14:28:46 +0000

I don’t think this market will hold up and will be looking for short opportunities within STV, CFC and C. Plan on trading lightly.

Patience

Mike — Wed, 14 Nov 2007 14:20:10 +0000

Waiting for the initial ephoria to wear off and then looking for long opportunities. Alu and Pcs are on my watchlist.

Afternoon Rally

Mike — Tue, 13 Nov 2007 23:23:39 +0000

The market was pretty choppy in the morning with not many long candidates unless you were able to hold on for most of the day. Walmart and Citi were nice longs that should have produced some good gains, although I traded way too much to realize any sizeable gains. This rally was a huge short squeeze and I don’t think it has any legs to it for the coming sessions, even if all the talking heads on TV say it is. Bounce off oversold levels? I don’t think we’ve seen any attractive levels in the financials yet to warrant such a call. These guys really seem to know a lot after the fact. In fact, I wonder how many have the conviction to actually put money on their calls. These so called strategists are nothing but PR guys for their firms that don’t know very much about trading or the markets. I know this because I was one of those guys that told these guys what to say when they were on TV. They definitely get paid well for not doing much however.

The best time to trade today was 1-3 pm, which was where the market made a tradeable move to the upside.
The rest of the day was slow with too many opportunities for slippage. I don’t know about you guys, but these kind of days frustrate me because it seems as if I needed to make more than I actually did. I’ve never done well in these slow upmoves during the day so I guess being positive is a good thing. One good thing about today; at least we have some more room to go down now.