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Showing results for tags 'market timing'.
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In the January 30 article we published here on this thread (see above), we touched on a key psychological element of how to make consistent trading profits. Specifically, the article addressed the importance of trend trading in the same direction as the overall market trend, and continuing trading on that side of the trend as long as the trend continues. Then, in our trading blog one day later, we stressed why the most profitable swing traders are those who learn to merely react to the market's price action that is presented to them at any give time, rather than those who attempt to predict the direction of the next move. The substantial broad market rally that came last Friday, which closed out the week on a high note, perfectly confirmed the trader psychology lessons of our previous two posts. When stocks sold off on higher volume ("distribution") last Thursday, January 31, the weak price action was sure to attract some short sellers who keep trying to catch a top, despite the fact the uptrend remains intact. Traders who went ahead and sold short that day quickly got caught with their hands in the cookie jar the following day, as the main stock market indexes gapped about 1% higher on the open and held up throughout the entire day. If you are new to our short to intermediate-term momentum trading system, please be assured we have no problems selling short when our proprietary market timing system indicates the dominant trend has reversed. There were several months just last year when we profited on the short side. However, we simply do not sell short against the prevailing trend when there is a clear and objective "buy" signal in place. Top 2 Reasons We Don't Fight The Trend We'll be really honest with you here. Trying to call a top by entering new short positions when the market is still in a firm technical uptrend is something we have tried to do in the past. Upon doing so, we learned that it hardly ever works. Even in the times when we eventually got it right, it was always after several initial failed attempts, which usually led to a net wash (breakeven result) at best. Perhaps more important than the actual losses sustained from those failed countertrend short selling attempts was the psychological damage done, as it was (and always is) emotionally draining to fight a clearly established trend. It's a bit like trying to swim directly back to shore while stuck in a rip current, rather than swim parallel to the beach until the rip dissipates. Overall, you must realize there is nothing more important to your long-term trading success than protecting capital and preserving confidence. Weakness or lack of discipline in either of these two areas will eventually prevent you from living to trade another day. All these powerful tidbits of knowledge, and many other psychological trading lessons we've learned over the past 11 years, are regularly shared with subscribers of The Wagner Daily end-of-day trading newsletter, and we we proudly display the cumulative trading performance results of our long-term efforts to prove it (Q4 of 2012 will be updated this week). Moving on from the area of trading psychology lessons, let's look at the current technical situation of the benchmark SPDR S&P 500 Index ETF ($SPY), as we ask ourselves, "Can a market continue to rally while in overbought territory?" Since pictures are always more powerful than words, just take a look at the following daily chart of $SPY from the year 2007. Specifically, notice how the ETF held very short-term support of its 10-day moving average for several months before eventually entering into a correction. Note the tight price range throughout the rally, which kept finding support at the rising 10-day moving average on the way up, after pulling back slightly for just 2 to 3 days. There are hundreds of other charts over the years in which we could show the same thing. Therefore, the answer is clearly "yes"...an overbought market can continue to run even higher without a deep pullback. Nevertheless, we are not implying the current market rally will match the chart above, in terms of the percentage gain or length of time, as every market rally is unique. Still, this chart simply serves as a guide and reminder for what could and frequently happens in "overbought" (we use the term quite loosely) markets. Although Friday's action was bullish, and we now have solid unrealized gains in the open ETF and stock swing trade positions in our model portfolio, we continue to trail tight stops in order to reduce risk and lock in gains whenever possible. As regular subscribers should note on the "Open Positions" section of today's report, many protective stops have now placed below their respective 20-day exponential moving average, which should provide near-term support during any pullback in the market.
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On the close of December 13, our stock market timing system shifted from “buy” to “neutral” mode. This means we now have no firm bias with regard to near to intermediate-term market trend for swing trading. The lack of substantial bullish follow-through in leading individual stocks in recent weeks, the absence of leadership in most ETFs (other than international ETFs), and the bearish pattern on the weekly chart of the S&P 500 Index (below) are all valid reasons to avoid the long side of the market now. Nevertheless, recent price action in the stock market has not yet convincingly confirmed the balance of power has shifted back to the bears, so we are a bit cautious about aggressively jumping in the short side of the market just yet. Below is a longer-term weekly chart pattern of S&P 500 SPDR ($SPY), a popular ETF proxy for trading the benchmark S&P 500 Index. Notice that $SPY will likely print a bearish “shooting star” candlestick pattern for the week. This is a topping pattern that often indicates near-term bullish momentum is running out. Since a weekly chart is a longer-term interval than a daily chart, the formation of this shooting star pattern on the weekly chart is more important than if the the same pattern occurred on a daily chart: Notice that the formation of the shooting star candlestick also occurred as $SPY “overcut” resistance of its downtrend line from the September high. This overcut of the downtrend line is significant because it sucks in new buyers, just as institutions are starting to sell into strength. This creates additional overhead supply that subsequently increases the odds of a resumption of the dominant downtrend. This would be confirmed if $SPY breaks below the horizontal price support shown above, which is merely a move below the low of its current weekly candlestick. Although the weekly pattern of $SPY looks a bit ominous, at least in still trading above technical support of its 20, 50, and 200-day moving averages on the shorter-term daily chart. That’s more than one can say about the Nasdaq 100 Index, which sliced back below its 50 and 200 day moving averages yesterday. As you can see on the daily chart of $QQQ (an ETF proxy that tracks the Nasdaq 100), a break below yesterday’s low would coincide to the Nasdaq sliding back below its 20-day exponential moving average as well: We concluded yesterday’s technical commentary by saying, “Given the lack of explosive price action in leadership stocks and the late day selling in the averages the past two days, the market could be vulnerable to a sell off in the short term…We are not calling the current rally dead, but we do not mind stepping aside for a few days and monitoring the price action.” To coincide with this statement, we made a judgment call to take profits on all long positions in our model trading portfolio by selling at market on yesterday’s open. Given that the broad market subsequently trended lower throughout the entire session, this worked out pretty well. Now, we are back to “flat and happy,” sitting on the sidelines 100% in cash. One big challenge for swing traders right now is that volume levels in the broad market will likely begin heavily receding next week, as we approach the Christmas holiday. As we have warned several times in recent weeks, swing trading in low-volume environments is challenging because day-to-day price action tends to be more erratic and indecisive. Therefore, we’re not in a hurry to enter multiple new positions (either long or short) ahead of the holidays, but will still consider new stock and/or ETF trade entries (possibly on the short side and/or inverse ETFs) with reduced share size if an ideal trade setup with a firmly positive reward-risk ratio presents itself. -
Since the listing of FB, the stock has dived. I've added AAPL, GOOG & NQ for comparison. As I'm sure you're aware, it hasn't exactly been a smooth few days for stocks since the FB IPO, but then FB has done particularly poorly. Why is this? An over-ambitious pricing of the stock perhaps? Or a less than brilliant vision in the eyes of investors for how the company intends to make money? Or maybe it's something to do with all that technical nonsense that happened on the day at the Nasdaq? Well clearly none of these things help. But that's not really why FB has done so badly is it? I don't think so. Technical strength is built on fundamental timing. When the overall market is clearly risk averse, with US and German bond yields continually dropping and the specific risk event of the Greek election looming with the backdrop of a wider European sovereign debt crisis, what is the likelihood of seeing persistent strength in any stock? So why has it dropped so much? When stocks drop they often do so quickly when they are breaking from perceived value. What then supports them as they drop? Previous accepted value which we can indentify by studying technical price charts. But there's no previously accepted value for FB is there? Noooooooooo. Whoops. So where exactly does it stop? Anyone willing to take a gamble? The lesson is that if you're a company wanting to list, think long and hard about doing so before you do. Make sure that investors really believe in you. Make sure that you list when the market is moving the right way or at least not waiting for some big risk event to pass. You are not too big for the market to turn you into a flop. Anyway, whatever. I guess that MZ is still mega loaded and I still think FB sucks. :doh:
