Trader MD

Ended up with singles in each of the above names, before I was shaken out as the MBI/ABK downgrade news was released. In some cases it was good, in other cases they stabilized to run higher. Kind of hard to work on letting profits run when the market feels like it can reverse @ any minute... But maybe thats just my feelings about it right now?

I'll post the charts later tonight.

I may and take tomorrow off as I've had a very solid week. It depends on what the market looks like tomorrow morning.


*** Sorry no charts tonight. I spent the majority of the afternoon and evening taking care of errands as I'm preparing to move later this month. A lot of my free time this week has been spent towards prepping for the move.

I'll try and post the charts tomorrow or sometime this weekend.


** Updated***

Here are the charts (4 decently managed trades and 1 bad one in CLF):











Again nothing special, just hitting a few singles.

Posted by Trader M.D. at 1:52 PM 4 comments

Labels: AKS, CLF, MTL, SOLF, STP

Here's AAPL which had been steadily trending up over the last few days. Today's entry provided a good short if the market weakness continued and stocks broke down. From what I've noticed recently, when AAPL falls, it usually falls in a hurry.

The market didn't end up breaking down, and AAPL ended up bouncing at the confluence of the top of yesterday's base & the 78.6% fib retracement from the recent low to high.



Here's a look at the AKS daily chart. It's been trading up in a channel over the last few weeks and bounced off of the lower trendline in the channel on Friday & Tuesday.



The AKS trade had a good result, but it was still poorly managed.



That was it for today's trades.

I wasn't filled on the Base & Break in CMP @ 74.00 (HCPG Watchlist). It basically ran right by my stop limit order. I pulled the order, as I didn't want to enter on what could have been a reversal.

I also lost focus a few times and failed to enter trades in RIMM (beautiful gap up & falling bullish wedge), CLF (gap up & bull flag), NUE (Cup & Handle type pattern at the top of Friday's high), & AMSC (A focus list stock with a base & break @ 33). Ouch.

I'm going to spend some time thinking of ways to force myself to stay in solid trades & better manage my screen space so I don't miss out on setups I've been stalking.

Posted by Trader M.D. at 1:05 PM 0 comments

Labels: AAPL, AKS, CupnHandle, Trendline Break

The market was generally weak all day and the morning trades had little follow through (essentially turning into scalps). It wasn't until the afternoon that the market really started to break down.

Aside from managing my swing trades in IPI, MTL & AKS, I was watching the Ag sector.

The annotated chart for POT basically says it all.



Speaking of those swing trades, I'll post up some charts later of my entries and exits (They've all been closed). I'll also try and post some index recaps.

Right now we're either going through a flush out or the market could be starting to break down. It's a bit early to tell, but one key area I'm watching on the S&P is the 1370/1380 area. IMO a break below 1380 could bring in more selling pressure.

If you are still in any swing positions, I would consider tightening my stops here.

Posted by Trader M.D. at 12:54 PM 5 comments

Labels: AKS, CupnHandle, IPI, MTL, POT

Market action improved today. We gapped down on the indexes, and gradually pushed higher through the day.

The Ag group was showing relative strength from the open. I saw POT and AG gap up, so I looked for an entry in the group and found AGU.



While I used a wider stop than I would have liked with AGU, the trade still still had a good result. I would have closed part of the trade at the fib extension and let the rest run, but the market has had little follow through over the last 2 days. AGU pushed higher, but I didn't miss too much.

V on the other hand, had a better formed handle (more distinct volume contraction) which let me use a tighter stop.



Taking a look at the V chart, you can see how either a conservative or aggressive fib level would have worked. I tend to use conservative fib extensions (drawn to the generalized base of the cup, as opposed to the very bottom of the cup).

Seems like the commodity areas (oil/energy/steel/ag/coal/etc) & solars just roar on.

Quite a few steel stocks hit new all time highs / recent highs (X, SCHN, MT, NUE, GGB). I also like to include CLF in that space (although they are an iron ore producer). The price action in CLF today was amazing. They report earnings and miss by something like 40 cents & gap down as a result. Buyers stepped in and pushed CLF to new all time highs.

Speaking of steel stocks, I picked up MTL today as a swing, and keep an eye on AKS as it sets a new all time high just above 69.62. RS looks very compelling as well (although it has lagged recently, it has formed a nice base and breaking above 64 could really push it higher).

JRCC (coal) & JOYG (machinery) had similar price action to CLF. Speaking of machinery stocks, CAT looks like it wants to push higher and test its recent highs of ~85.50.

Current swing positions:

• Picked up AKS, MTL & IPI.
• I was stopped out of my DZZ today for a small loss.

Posted by Trader M.D. at 12:42 PM 0 comments

Labels: Ag, AGU, AKS, CupnHandle, IPI, MTL, Steel, V