Closing Market Commentary For 03-08-2013
The best way to describe today’s activity, both volume and trading, is that it is ‘funny looking’. You know, you see some fellow on the street with died green hair and it is combed ‘perfect’. One isn’t just sure how it got to be that way, but it isn’t right either; you know, set up, phoney. Well, that is the way I viewed the session today – fudged. It would appear the HFT computers were having a ball bouncing the numbers higher than they should have been, crashing them back down and then suckering ‘sheeples’ back into the fray melting them back up.
Session closed on time again with some manipulation, I mean profit taking towards the end on relatively heavy volume. Thus closing out the week with historical new highs for the indices. One can only wonder what new surprises we can expect come Monday.
The RRR** has been narrow at the opening bell for the past several months, over a year actually, and has continued the trend again today. This continuing trend makes predictions of session movements nearly impossible making trading futile and unprofitable. As of right now, it is too late to jump in to catch the highs and still may be too early to start shorting.
As long as market volume remains light or the trading range is narrow, one can expect successful, or at least profitable, trading to remain elusive. The RRR** has been wider on some volatile sessions lately and is expected to become more so as 2013 enters the first quarter, but unfortunately a lot of guessing remains. Correctly ‘guessing’, of course, is the tricky part of the successful trading equation. Any trades today will probably end up on the meager side of profitability if you are lucky as most trades have been less than optimal during the past several years.
I also have continuing issues with some pundits, writing almost every day, that there are setups for day trading. Best Stock Market Indicator Ever: Rises to 86% and Secondaries Confirm “Tradable” This might be true (for last week anyway), but difficult to deal with. The trading range is so narrow that way too money has to be put on the table just to get back meager gains. Do not fall into the trap of money burning a hole in your pocket, sit tight better days are coming. I keep hoping for increasing volumes to signal improved trading.
Swing trading is also at your own risk for all the reasons mentioned above although guessing overnight trades would have been most profitable over the past year. Again, guessing where the market is going to be tomorrow or next week, at this time anyway, can be a foolish and costly endeavor.
The DOW at 4:00 is at 14397 up 67 or 0.47%.
The SP500 is at 1551 up 7 or 0.45%.
SPY is at 155.38 up 0.60 or 0.39%.
The $RUT is at 942.50 up 8 or 0.85%.
NASDAQ is at 3244 up 12 or 0.38%.
The longer trend is up, the past months trend is bullish, the past 5 sessions have been bullish and the current bias is down.
WTI oil is trading between 92.04 and 90.85 today. The session bias is actually neutral as it is bouncing from its lows and highs and is currently trading up at 91.83.
More Widening For The Brent/WTI Spread Ahead?
Brent crude is trading between 109.76 and 107.99 this morning. The session bias is positive and is currently trading up at 109.54.
Gold fell from 1585.00 earlier to 1561.36 and is currently trading up at 1577.83.
Dr. Copper is at 3.52 falling from 3.53 earlier.
The US dollar is trading between 82.00 and 82.94 and is currently trading down at 82.77, the bias is currently bullish.
The 500 at the close.
The DOW at the close.
** RRR = Risk Reward Ratio
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Written by Gary
