Wednesday Wrapper

Another! Record! Day! - I've covered this in my earlier post regarding volatility so let's get to business - it's hard not to make money as long as you dump the weak ones and put good ones in their place.

I did that today - I dumped KEP after expecting it to go up on a record in Korea last night and it didn't and that's what you get for buying a stock with a 37 cent ATR. Keep that in mind when you are faced with choices in the market - if the stock looks like it is about to run - a low ATR is a good thing as long as there is a high ATR at the end of the rainbow. But it wasn't looking like it was going to run having missed a wonderful opportunity.

I replaced it with another shot at DNDN which I held this time for an overnight trade - I'm hoping to catch a jump tomorrow. The fact that it didn't participate in today's festivities doesn't leave me with much hope. I also bought JST which is a stock that Bullish Jim bought and I liked the chart so much I had to have it. About mid-day it came up with an RSI(2) < 2 right on the 15's around a support point so I jumped in. It's a nice looking stock and I think it has some room to run.

Still holding AKS and GGB although GGB is starting to disappoint. I think on Friday I'll put on a tight stop and if it hits it it's gone.

A couple I could have had but chose to ignore were PKG and NI. These would have been classic Return To 4 day trades and here are the charts -




PKG was the best of the two and it turns out it announced at 10 A.M. and made triple earnings last quarter. The country runs on packaging.

Why did I choose not to participate - to be candid I'm not feeling all that great and while I can make longer term decisions with a head cold I don't like to day trade with one.

Anyway there is an interesting feature on both of these charts that I wanted you to see and remember and that is that little doji about 5 candles in on PKG - we call that an NR7 or narrowest range in 7 bars (counting two from the day before that I didn't show - it's 6 candles in on NI). That's another one of those "buy me" indicators that day traders snap up as quick as they appear.

The other thing I wanted you to observe and remember if you can is the ATR action on these two stocks. A moment ago I said a low ATR was good if the stock appeared to be ready to run again and both of these had that look about them even though they flattened out for much of the day.

The three Amigos all made money for their loyal fans today and AAPL did the best with a two buck increase. GOOG of course, that stock where one share costs 477 dollars brought home 46 cents for its fans - $4.60 on a hundred shares won't get you a happy meal folks - kids go hungry tonight. And MSFT - what a piece of crap - 20 cents - of course that's 20 times the profit from yesterday. If given the fact that not only did the DOW break records today but both the SPX and the COMPQ went up significantly as well and between them these three megacraps couldn't scrape up enough for carfare home - I have to ask again - why in hell are you holding them? Don't answer to me - answer to yourself - I'm sure you have a good reason such as "just because" or "because I wanna" or "someday that GOOG short squeeze will happen and Marlyn you'll just look stupid! stupid! stupid!"

Of course AAPL earnings rose (after hours) and the stock is up 7 and a half putting it over the magical 100. We'll see tomorrow if it can hold it. The paltry IPOD increase doesn't appear to me to be enough and, we already knew about that for about two weeks now (read Notable Calls) so what the exuberance is all about I haven't a clue.

GRA and OI, two of my former holdings, both announce after market close tonight - GRA actually went up a buck today and OI did what its been doing lately - went sideways - usually this means that GRA made and OI missed but I don't know how with the way PKG came in this morning. If they get it out before I end the wrap I'll let you know what the outcome was.

This guy went back up again -


Which as I've noted is pretty meaningless but the INDU ATR came back in a little to 109.05. That's OK - the rally continues.

The model portfolio is up another 1.09% today to 16.71 and the benchmark went up .91% to 6.47. If I get to it tomorrow I'll print out the model portfolio, the starting and current values.

The VIX remains in neutral and that's not a surprise - no one really knows what to do right at the moment - this week is all about writing options and getting inventory back up again so I doubt it (the VIX) means anything at all.

But the up/down ratio is printing 59% and that should be enough to get us a breather tomorrow. I forecast a down day.

The coin says ... tails - also looking for a down day.

Having both hit the nail on the head the score stands at Marlyn 27 - 26 and 11 and the coin is 30 - 23 and 11.

Neither GRA nor OI have made any splash at all AH so I guess they were adequate. We'll see in the morning.

Tuesday Wraps

Another pitiful day. I made money but only because I held AKS though earnings. Of course the fact that it was booming for the past 5 days or so and announced another early pension trust fund contribution on Monday didn't hurt my cause. In fact - if you are thinking about holding a stock through earnings those are the kinds of things to look for. AKS also guided higher so I believe I can hold it without a problem for a bit longer.

GGB on the other hand, the other steel company that I am holding, acted poorly yesterday and started sliding today so I sold it off - all of it. Then I reacquired a starter amount at a lower price and took on a second portion this afternoon. I'll build it up again if it resumes the upward march but I had too much profit in it to let it drift away. It will either go up and remain in the portfolio or drop and be kicked to the curb.

DNDN didn't work out as well as I thought it might - I truly expected another one and a half to two dollar day and it stalled and crashed. I dumped out this afternoon for a small loss ($130). I also dumped out of ANR this morning for a break even (including commissions) and added to KEP. I'm not sure why I like KEP except I expect the Korean's to come back tonight and that will reflect nicely on that stock tomorrow. I'm in it until Friday at the earliest (or stop out if it drops over the next couple of days).

The INDU ATR is at 105.87 and that is rising which is OK. The rally will continue. The VIX remains in neutral and NewMoMo continues to drop.


The model portfolio gained a few today to 15.46 and the benchmark printed 5.51% which is also up a small bit.

The three Amigos reflected the psychotic nature of the day with both AAPL and GOOG dropping a bit and MSFT rewarding its legion of followers with a 1 cent gain. Now that might not be much to you or me but there are over 5 billion shares in institutional hands alone - you do the math. I don't know why those 5 billion + shares are worth one cent more today than they were worth yesterday but - whatever.

The up/down ratio is at 38% so I'm going for another up day tomorrow.

The coin says ... heads - also calling for an up day.

Another tie day - the score stands at Marlyn 26 - 26 and 11 and the coin is 29 - 23 and 11.

Wraps Monday

Stocks Drop on Rising Oil Prices

You betcha they did - rising oil prices and no volatility and no liquidity and nothing to buy - oh my - oh my.

Still holding AKS and GGB and one went up and the other stayed about the same. Dropped AMAT - actually it hit a very close stop that I put in place because I didn't like the action and I was correct - see I don't need to sell them - I just put my stop up under a pivot and say - this far and no further. Try it - you'll like it.

Added to ANR at the end of the day on an RSI(2) < 2 indicator which was also at a pivot point. And I put KEP in the trading portfolio for a 5 to 10 day ride (or stop out whichever comes first). KEP comes in from my new filter - LRS going up and RSI going down that I wrote about over the weekend. The other pick from that filter was TWX and I don't like Time Warner or AOL.

Day traded DNDN off a gap up, pull back, and reverse crossing formation on the 4 minute charts - I wasn't going to stay in for a buck and change but I did.


The volume increase informed the trade and the hanging man at about 1:30 said let's get out of here. In at 15.12 out at 16.79 not a bad piece of work. I used my "gap-up" filter from stockfetcher to catch it for my gap-up watch list. I like trading stocks I've traded before - I understand how the traders work with them.

The NewMoMo is reversing again (down) and that is good -


The INDU ATR is up a bit to 100.67 which suggests a continuation of the rally. The model portfolio is at 14.97% which is up a little today and the benchmark is 5.4% down a little today.

AAPL is up a couple of bucks on news (see Notable Calls) and GOOG has lost the love from last week and dropped a couple. Still don't know what anyone sees in that stock or what they are expecting from it.

Is range bound one word or two? - Oh that's right, it's one word and it's spelled MSFT.

The VIX remains in neutral and the up/down ratio prints 40%. This is probably enough to get the market up tomorrow but I don't know how far it will go.

My forecast is up -

The coin's guess is ... heads - up also.

Wonder of wonders - technical ability beat luck for a change - the score stands at Marlyn 26 - 26 and 10 and the coin is 29 - 23 and 10.