Friday, March 09, 2007

Friday's Wraps

Watching paint dry. I thought we'd go down and I guess after this morning's irrational exuberance we were for much of the day. To finish some in the green after that took a lot of courage on the part of the bulls. But as expected we had an up week. Next week is just as likely to be down as up. Unfortunately, the INDU ATR actually went back up today so I'm not holding my breath for next week to be up. I think we might have one or two up days but the rest will probably be down.

Added to my TRA, AKS, and GGB positions, picked up RHT and was stopped out of AMMD. No loss on that - in fact a good gain but for the past two days it went nowhere and you know I hate those low volatility stocks. It isn't anything against the stock just the feeling that I could have the money working rather than resting. And it turns out that I sold off both GRA and TIE at the wrong time - but that's how it goes.

I read a guy's Blog today and he said he's holding 60+ stocks. That's a crime - just wasting opportunity - that's a guy who doesn't know when to let them go. Not every stock is going up all the time - if after a couple of days of no activity you might consider that it is done for this cycle and start looking for something new. Or dump it and put the funds into one of your more active stocks. There is nothing that says you can't reinvest in a stock you already own.

Nothing that I had selected to watch today went anywhere and while I'm sure something was moving somewhere it wasn't on my screen - except RHT and I had wanted a position in that one for some time now. After putting on an initial position this morning I added a bit this afternoon just before COB. I picked up RHT from the BOB set-up filter. It wasn't the only one that went up today but the only one I was interested in owning.

And if you are still doubting pivot points (I know you aren't but it never hurts to see a good example) -

You see how the Q's dropped down, hit S1 around 2 P.M. and then went back up again? That was when all of my holdings went back up too. Except I had added to a couple of them when they were down at their pivot points.

Everyone who thinks that this is a healthy looking stock - well - I don't obviously -

My latest theory regarding GOOG is this - people are selling to get their profits out to buy more shares of other stocks that are on their way up. Since 2/28 GOOG is up .78%, AAPL is up 3.967% and MSFT is down 3.16%.

Some stocks are behaving like nothing happened and I guess that's pretty good. I showed you GLBL the other day and it was just rolling along without a care in the world. Unfortunately I think yesterday it printed a maximum top. I won't publish it here but you know what that looks like - a Doji on the third gap-up day - and that's exactly what happened. Went down a couple of cents today - wouldn't be surprised if it dropped more on Monday.

The VIX is back to 10% below its 10-period moving average and we all know that that is not a good sign. And although the up/down ratio went down to 50% that is dead neutral and can't be relied on to give us a hint. 3 of the 4 major indices we follow (DIA, SPY, and IWM) all printed a white/green candle in the last hour as did GS. Only the Q's didn't but still output a Doji following another large white candle.

The 20 day high/low ratio remains neutral at 1 to 1 --- so in the face of all the evidence - especially this guy -

I'm going to forecast a down day on Monday.

Meanwhile the coin says ... tails - down day too. I've got to get the wheels balanced on that thing.

I'm calling today another stupid tie. The score now stands at Marlyn 19 - 13 and 6 and the coin is 17 - 17 and 6. This has been a bad year for Mr. Marky.

Marlyn will be going on one of his many vacations Monday and Tuesday next - I doubt that I will publish while I am out. I will put a few up over the weekend though and will be back on Wednesday in time for a wrap.

8 comments:

L.J. said...

I like that RHT chart a lot. I might have to consider that one on Monday.

Bought a couple stocks today, Marlyn. Would love your take on the charts. I posted my reasoning with each and I'd be curious what you think.

GOOG is dead money right now. There, I admitted my second largest position is asleep at the wheel. The first step is to admit you have a problem, right?

L.J. said...

I'm biased but I'd stay away from GOOG on the short side. There are plenty of richly valued unprofitable companies to focus on for shorts. GOOG actually makes money. I'd short Yahoo first, particularly with today's beating putting a damper in their uptrend. Just my opinion...

Anonymous said...

Regarding the Enhanced BOB (and your use of QT)---"COO" was a symbol that appeared on my Prophet.net (also the charts you use) gapper scan this morning. I would have taken the Enhanced BOB trade on Prophet's info but not on QT's due to conflicting volume reports on the 4th and 5th bars respectively. Have you ever seen such a variance? Are you satisfied with the feed QT is providing you, or do you just use their service for the charting features and obtain your data feed from somewhere else? The trade would have been a good one yielding over $.50. Any thoughts?

Thanks,

Philip

Marlyn Trades said...

I agee with Bullish Jim on shorting GOOG - one day could bust a moderate sized account.

Philip - I use the prophet.net data source in QT so I don't expect to see a variance - but I will look at the charts and see if there was a problem - if so I will let them know.

Joseph - I'm going to post the method for NewMoMo this weekend.

Anonymous said...

Marlyn---thanks for your response. I just noticed that both ISRG and FCS were in the same category as COO yesterday (volume-wise). My feed is provided via Ameritrade. I'd appreciate a quick comment on whether you found any variances on the volume bars reported by both QT and Prophet. If none exist, I might have to switch data providers. Missing 3 profitable trades on a lackluster volume day like yesterday wasn't good.

Thanks again and enjoy your vacation.

Philip

Marlyn Trades said...

Philip - I just looked at COO on QT and Prophet.net and they both look the same to me (makes sense since they are both the same data feed). The 5-bar volume is lower than the 4-bar.

Mow you could have taken that trade as a return to R1 (or EMA 21) either way it would have worked. That's why I use pivots too. A BOB or enhanced BOB just makes me more confident in the trade. A bounce off a pivot level also gives me confidence. I don't have many tools in the box but this one hit two out of three and that isn't bad.

I have had problems with the data feed in the past. But it's not prophet's feed - they are just a pass through from the markets themselves - can't blame them for this one.

Anonymous said...

Thank you, Marlyn, for taking the time to look at the charts and respond. Somehow, I feel it's not right to impose. After all, it IS your time. But, thank you. I do have the Pivots set-up now as my default setting. I've been watching their interaction with price behavior this week in trying to get a feel "for them." So, as understood from your commentary, you use them as a "return to" like you do the ema's. Good to know. And you're right, in fact, all 3 of the symbols I mentioned had the "return to" feature and would have been decent trades.

Thank you for your generosity.

Philip

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