What Did I Say?

I love it when a plan comes together.

At it's worst levels on Friday YHOO was down 15% or so for the week.

Earnings: Pain In My Ass

Saturday morning of a three day weekend and I'm at the computer trying to read the tea leaves. Going through earnings reports for next week and damn there is a TON of them. No less than 33 companies I follow report on Tuesday. I'll be spending a good long time going through the week's list. This exercise isn't going to make me any money. The idea is to keep from getting blown-up unexpectedly.

Funny. Friday afternoon (after the close) I'm in the shower and I think to myself- "you know I probably should be doing my earnings (to report) list on Friday because if an issue held reports on a Monday morning I'm screwed." Sure enough. I go through this excruciatingly long list of reports for Tuesday and get all the way to the U's and there it is, the one that's going to get me- UAUA. That thing will move 10% in the blink of an eye. Truly it's a beast. My 200 share short position could impair me to the tune of a G-note, no problem. Nice. Vegas style. Have that to look forward to when we return on Tuesday.

Come On Now

Damn it this bounce better hold. We need it to suck in more losers (bulls).

UPDATE: These bulls really suck. Bounce has been completely erased. I managed to find some ideas to take advantage. Maybe I'm not going to get trimmed today after all. (?) Also, watching BXP closely- I know that puppy wants to break.

UPDATE II: Scratch all that nonsense about my first real losing day of the year- just turned green. HAHAHA... Unreal.

It's About Time!

This is the first trading day of 2008 that I've had real losses. Sure I think there have been a couple days where I dropped maybe a couple hundred bucks but nothing significant. Losing is never fun but frankly I'm real glad to see a bounce and even if I have to run for cover I hope this bounce continues. It's been getting real hard to find good entry points with the market so oversold. Hopefully the bulls can remain in control for awhile.

The unfortunate part is that it's Friday. I hate losing money on a Friday because I'm a loser all weekend long- and it's a long weekend. I remain modestly green for the week but overall am disappointed in my performance this week. Better believe I bring it next week.

Sweet Anticipation

Pssst. BXP. I'm still waiting. When (if) you finally break I'll be there.

Last Mention of Missed Opportunities

Covered it yesterday on my way out the door. Down 8% today. Feel my pain. Although I suppose it's less acute than the pain of the longs. HA.

Shut Up and Take the Money

The market was eviscerated today. No surprise here as it's exactly what I've been looking for. To my dismay I had a solidly profitable day instead of the obscenely profitable day it should have been. Shut up and take the money.

If we bounce? Shut up and take the money. Get out of the way. We are oversold and aren't likely to go straight down. Unless we crash. Ha. Also I'm seeing a lot of broken support and broken trendlines and we could bounce to test the underside of these confirmations.

The VIX broke out which augurs for more downside but I'm not convinced it means anything.

So here we are. I still see a variety of bearish trade ideas but the best (and my favorites) have been missed. Insurance stocks look vulnerable.

One thing that surprised me today was the severity of the sell-off in commodity names. This weekend I noticed ominous looking patterns in steel stocks. Other basic material names looked ripe for a fall as the week went on. I sort of missed the fall in the oil stocks altogether. This again goes to show that when in a bear market there is no where to hide. Oil will come down with slowing demand. Of course the long-term bullish supply/demand story with oil is still intact but over the course of several weeks or months it may not matter.

Friday (tom.) is OP-EX. I just want to survive. Get out of the week intact best I can.

Sitting here tonight at my all-time highs. Best month ever (so far). One quarter of the way to my profit goal FOR THE YEAR. Damn I'm due for a reversal of fortune. Not that I plan to give too much back. I will protect gains. Rest assured -this is my year.

Bulls Win in a Blowout

The Bulls won. 126-96 over the Heat. How can Miami be so awful with DWade?

I think it's fitting my two favorite sports teams are the Bulls and the Bears.

Had fun last night. Perhaps too much. Now back to work.

The downside is that I closed out a bunch of shorts yesterday mid-day simply because I was leaving my office and didn't want so much risk. It was nice not having to worry about it while I was on the road but from a trading perspective it was not my best move. Oh well. Easy come, easy go. To compound the situation I didn't get my homework done last night, woke up late in a fog after sleeping through my alarm and was a deer in the headlights when the market opened today.

It's been a good week but I can't be taking days off. Opportunities were missed as a result. Also closed out some very nice trades that had room to run. That's two days off in two weeks and really it takes me another day to catch up after taking one off.

Yet I did make money yesterday (not near what I could have) and I'm making more money today (despite my aimlessness and general confusion). Breaking the routine is bad. I think I'll recover. It's still the best month I've ever had despite my lapses. I'll have more to say on this later.

That Was Quick

Just covered half of my YHOO short down over a buck. Nice-nice. The remaining position is still of significant size as I believe this stock trades much lower in the near future. So why cover half? Simply because when things work so beautifully it's best to take some profits. Besides it was a big position and I tend to get jittery with large positions. Better to cover some on my terms. I'll be travelling and away from my desk this afternoon and don't want to be wondering/worried about whether or not I'm getting run over.

Verge of a Breakdown?

That's my bet on YHOO. I hope to be getting some help from a weak Nasdaq today. By my standards, the bet I've placed here is an aggressive one. Let the games begin.

Impending Market Meltdown?

Today was huge. The DOW sold all they way down to the August swing low (12,500). After the close, INTC disappointed and the futures are down to where we would open convincingly below the major swing lows on several indices. This is it folks. Wouldn't be the least bit surprised to see 500 more points come off the DOW. In short order.

Also wouldn't be surprised to see some sort of intervention in an attempt to prop the market up. Bernanke and Paulson are pure evil and they've pulled shady exercises repeatedly.

Barring unforeseen intervention, tomorrow should be a rich day for the bears. But we'll see. I'm anxious with anticipation and I have a lot of skin in the game. I'm certain Wednesday will be very interesting.

Unfortunately (from a trading perspective) my day will be cut short as I will be out of the office @ 2:30 due to travel arrangements. Looking forward to my trip but it will be a hectic day.

Prepared to Pillage

There will be no more rooting for a bounce around here. I am now officially up to my eyeballs in short sales. Still have some longs on my books so I'm not entirely lopsided but I'm solidly net short.

To reflect the considerable opportunity that I believe awaits us directly ahead I have even broken my own rule. I religiously remove substantial profits from my trading account in order to keep from getting too aggressive or unbalanced. Recently I did just that, removing a fat wad of cash. Well, it just went back in. Every penny.

If the opportunity to aggressively attack this market from the short side does in fact present itself I will be ready. Bulls you have been warned. I will burn your huts to the ground. I will rape and pillage. I will slaughter all your livestock and pollute your well.

OK. Maybe I'm premature. We'll soon find out.

I leave you with my best trade of the day: came into today short 200 RCI. Doubled my position after it tasted resistance @ $40.50. Got it @ $40.25, covered 100 @ $38.40 and it trades now @ $38.60.

Churning and Flagging?

Is that all we are doing right here? Starting to feel that way. I have been hoping for a sustained rally but it hasn't happened yet and I feel like the clock is ticking. As a result I'm getting more aggressive on the short side.

Covered...

...the aforementioned BKS short. Could it trade much lower still? Sure. Do I care? No.

Give me some props for this one.

On the Important Matter of Being Wrong

Watching NFX for a breakout. I've been waiting for this one for quite awhile. Added to my (long) position this morning.

As for IBM, well sometimes you're wrong. When that is the case, you close the trade. Period. You don't give it more rope. You don't try to justify it. You don't make it an investment. You close it. Get out. If your thesis is proven wrong you exit.

In today's example I got a bit lucky. IBM traded $107 and change pre-market then has traded down since. I covered at $102 and change. The total hit wasn't too bad considering. I still feel that IBM goes much lower and will revisit the idea shortly.

IBM Pulls a Fast One

We are just tipping off earnings season and already I've gotten burned. According to Earnings.com IBM was due to report Thursday after the bell. Well, to my surprise, they announced this morning and I'm getting run over by the strength in the name (which I come into the week short). Not happy.

The upside is that we are looking to bounce again, which I did expect. As a result I will not be looking to initiate new positions into this strength today. Ideally we can carry this bounce through the bulk of this week's trading and I can get more aggressive on the short side towards week's end.

Good luck out there.

Weekend Review

This market is mortally wounded. Frankly I'm somewhat surprised we got hammered the way we did on Friday. Obviously, I had been anticipating a more extended bounce. It may still play out that way but, on the other hand, if we take out 12,500 on the DOW it's incredibly ominous.

Speaking of Friday, mine sucked. We dropped 246 pts on the DOW and I was flat on the day. Awful. I have consistently made money on these big downdrafts and feel as if I missed out. To be honest, I have to admit to losing focus last week. Wednesday afternoon I was up 3% for the day when we rallied hard off the 12,500 level -completely erasing those gains. Anticipating follow through on the bounce I took down a lot of my short exposure. For the rest of the week I basically sat on the sidelines instead of putting my cash to work.

Too much defense being played on my part. Time to be a man and claim my stake.

Going forward, we are heading into earnings season. Next week we have economic news in the form of CPI, PPI and jobless claims. A handful of financials report, including C, JPM, MER and WM among others. I'll be watching for IBM, a name I'm currently short, to report on Thursday.

The watchlist is ripe with (primarily short) candidates. As I went through the list this weekend the opportunities were just jumping off the page at me. I expect the upcoming week to be a good one. I'm a terrible trader really but my substantial predictive powers seem to be at their peak.

If I had to guess, I'd say we bounce higher early next week. Should that be a poor guess I will look to get aggressively short on a break of the lows. Hoping for a bounce that sets up the shorting opportunity of a lifetime. Could happen or could just be wishful thinking but I'm relatively certain of the end game.