{+++}The markets had a down day to start the week, but it wasn’t too severe. The day started out with a down move on sharply lower futures, but they immediately started rallying and shook off the swine flu blues. The market is smarter and tougher than it used to be, and really, what is a flu bug compared to 9-11 or the complete collapse of our financial system? I’m really not trying to downplay the severity of this pandemic, but we all thought we had six months to live when the SARS virus broke out a few years ago. It’s scary but at the end of the day it’s, just fodder for the media in terms of its impact on the market.
Net on the day the Dow closed at 8025, down 51.29. The S&P 500 at 857.51 was down 8.72, and the Nasdaq 100 down 3.34 to 1369.94. The Philadelphia Semiconductor Index (SOXX) was down 2.85 at 250.80.
Advance-declines were a little worse than 2 to 1 negative on New York and around 2 to 1 negative on Nasdaq. Up/down volume was 3 1/2 to 1 negative on New York on total volume of 1.4 billion. Nasdaq traded just under 2.2 billion and had about a 2 to 1 negative volume ratio.
The gloomy macro picture caught up with the market too as U.S. Steel reported a number that was even worse than analysts expected. This comes on the heels last week of Nucor which was even more depressing. Newsflash, the reflation trade might be on but not for organic reasons. No one wants this stuff. It didn’t help that the greenback caught a bounce either.
I had a tough time navigating today and was constantly at the mercy of the chop. There were many fits and starts and moves that looked real at first, only to fade away. I left at about 3PM for a meeting and I usually leave my screens kicking and screaming but today I didn’t feel any love from Mr. Market and welcomed the break away. If you don’t feel it, or if you’re entries aren’t working out as planned, there is nothing wrong with reducing position size dramatically or just taking a break. Sometimes, as in the case with me today, some set ups were picture perfect, only to have the market break the set up. That’s what happens in extremely choppy conditions.
On that same note, I want to give you as much idea flow as I can, but I won’t do it for the sake of quantity over quality. There are times when the charts just aren’t jumping out at me and I won’t give you anything short of what I think are high probability setups.
I believe today is the one week anniversary of the new blog and so far the tech issues are fine and most of the problems that you may have seen were a direct result of yours truly as I am a creature of habit when it comes to new technology so thanks for bearing with me. Next on the agenda will be live video of charts, and I will be describing in the best detail why I entered a trade, and what it was I saw at the time.
Also with regard to housekeeping, check the blog a few times a day for updates. I will always have a post in the morning before the market opens and one in the evening. I know that all of you aren’t on twitter so the best way for me to post a breaking trade or an update on a prior stock “during trading hours” will be done through a blog post to you, the premium subscriber.
Also, remember after you log in to click the actual title of the post so it will bring you to all the premium content. Sometimes I will post a few sentences or a small paragraph on the free blog with a lead in to premium content. I just want to make sure you are getting the whole enchilada. It’s a work in progress and I appreciate your patience, but so far so good.
Here are a couple of names:
