216 replies to this topic

[lawdog]

what's the old saying, watched paint never dries? no tha's not it. it's "a watched kettle never boils." but somehow the watched paint metaphor seems apropos.

[SemiBizz]

I guarantee you if you boil a pot of paint, you won't have to watch long before something dramatic happens...

 

[lawdog]

The spx and DJIA the last 3 days have consolidated their recent gains, putting the various oscillators and call/put readings and other sentiment indicators back to levels which should support an immediate continuation of this advance that began 2 weeks ago. but as I posted yesterday, I am very concerned at how quickly the vix plunged. I don't know the implications of this other than my vix sentiment indicators suggesting a possible jump in the vix, which in turn suggests a drop in the market. so, i like the way the market has consolidated these gains, but this vix situation concerns me. a rapid move down in the vix normally suggests a good chance for market strength, which did happen on Monday and Tuesday, so maybe that is played out already. Also,my concern is in how low the vix has gone, with this 4 pt drop in one day. we had a 4 pt drop on 11.9.16, and the market continued higher, but that was from 18 to 14, not 14 to 10, and that coincided with the beginning of the trump rally. so precedent suggests this massive vix drop is bullish, but I wonder how much is left, considering how low it has gone. I am at 65% long; right now I wish I were just 45%, but that does not mean I am necessarily lightening up on Monday; just concerned about a weak opening. April was a good month, making up for a flat March. Don't want to start May needing to dig my performance out of a hole, as happened to me with the March 1 gap and go with me holding short positions.

 

So the market "should" resume this advance. Failure to do so by Tuesday, May 2, will cause me to worry, i.e. worry more than usual; I always worry.

 

there is an article at safehaven.com by Gary Tanashian that explores and expounds upon what I am trying to explain here, which may be helpful. This is the same site where blustar has posted articles, but have not seen much from blustar, Brad Gudgeon, lately. he has expended too much effort tryng to call a correction. i have spent some time looking for a correction here and there as well, but none of them got anywhere. maybe soon, or at least by august.

[NAV]

 

Nobody ever said this would be easy ! 

 

 

It's not easy trying to trade every day, I think that's where the problem is. There are really only 2-4 decent setups per month

on a daily chart. There are opportunities on the lower timeframes, but they can turn on you quick, usually soon after you become profitable.

 

 

True !

 

I make about 60-70 trades a year on my VST system (average 5 trades a month). Out of those 5 trades a month 2 of them turn out to be good setups and the other 3 either losses or breakeven kind of trades.

 

On my intermediate term system i get 20-25 trades a year. I can reduce this further if i don't trail my stops and re-enter. But doing that could cause you to give all your profits in one fell swoop when the markets takes a nosedive. It's a trade-off. 

 

Trying to trade everyday is tough. As i grow older, my tolerance for frequent entries/exits is going down. I use only 40% of my account on VST trades and 60% on intermediate term trades. I completely quit day trading about 5 years back. I am not saying money cannot be made day trading, but it's not good for your health.

[lawdog]

cut back to 55%, no big reason, just normal Monday nerves. may buy them back if mkt hangs in here the first hour.

[SemiBizz]

Nasdaq hung up on that 6073 Fibonacci again this morning...

 

Today's high 6073.99 - 5 cts short of the ATH

 

I read a white paper this morning with pages of mathematical models and analysis dating back to late 1800s.

 

Author's conclusion is that the high is going to be this week, tomorrow likely and down into 2018...

[lawdog]

some may remember about a month ago I ststed here that the technical condition at that time terrified me. i by no means suggested the c word, but was concerned about a good chance for a 5-7% plunge that would happen over just a few days. I am not now seeing the conditions for that to occur now, but it's probably not going out too far on a limb to predict that a 7-10% correction is likely some time before November 1. many indications of long-term significance are getting stretched, so it seems inevitable that such a decline will hit. Margin levels have expanded, the AAII stock/cash allocation is very high, vix is quite low, so some more rally, then some churning, then a few rally attempts in quick succession might be the setup. again, I don't see that yet. but when it comes, vix is going to at least double in a matter of days. I hope to catch some of that event in a profitable manner.

 

as for now, naz is holding on but spx has lost most of its gain. might just be fear of heights. it would be nice to get past spx 2400 and djia 21,000. this seems likely, but it took 3 weeks to get past 20,000 in January.

[lawdog]

Wish I had more in the NAZ, only 5%. What a runup; could be terminal. But maybe money will just rotate into spx so it can catch up. Don't see anything wrong with this rally yet other than that this is the fourth day of not much happening in the spx and dow, which is a genuine concern. It seems most recent posts are looking for some downside; but all you can do is play it as you see it. Would love to put these round numbers behind us and then trade upon normal technicals.

[lawdog]

That's more like it; spx up 10, nearing all time closing high and that pesky 2400. It's tempting to take some more profit, but I believe there should be enough gas left to get us to 2440-2450 spx. And NAZ is going crazy, so I'll just ride my small position there (but I don't think it is 1999 or 2000 yet). Really tempted to sell a bit more here, but there is absolutely no reason do so. 

[alexnewbee]

Nasdaq hung up on that 6073 Fibonacci again this morning...

 

Today's high 6073.99 - 5 cts short of the ATH

 

I read a white paper this morning with pages of mathematical models and analysis dating back to late 1800s.

 

Author's conclusion is that the high is going to be this week, tomorrow likely and down into 2018...

We have 3 peaks and a doomed house on NDX now.