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Yesterday the governments got the banks to take a 50% haircut on the Greek bonds, vs the 40% they had wanted. Also there were tacit assurances, that the governments, in effect, have the bank’s backs.
Not surprisingly, Dow futures are up 215 pts.

Between our July 22nd high at 12679, down to the double bottom at August 9th low at 10,338 and again with our October low at 10,328: That was a 2,351 point break.

As of 9:41 AM, our high is 12,094. That represents a 1,766 point rally from the October 4th low at 10,328 we’ve had a nice bounce back.. How nice? […]

On Wednesday October 19th, just a week ago I wrote the following:

“More interesting, our August high at $44.00 sucked a lot of bulls back into their longs, which precipitated the puke sell off down to the $26.00 level. $33.00 an ounce is resistance I’d look at now. I’d sell it at $35.00 as well. A rally back to $37.30 would be a gift to sell into.
So what to do?
I like being a small buyer here at 31.50 to 31.00. If 30.50 holds then we should bounce up to 35 or maybe 37.00 In any event, risk one unit to the down side […]

First the meeting in Europe is off, then its back off. Like I wrote and have been writing, for 3,000 years Europeans have been finding reasons NOT to like one another.
What is so different about 2011?
In the end, its more about politics and perception rather than reality. The reality is that there is a huge debt problem which needs to be addressed. 20 people in a room is one thing. When only 2 of the 20 people have what the other 18 want, that’s another.
The euro zone wants what France and Germany have. Working economies where people work and save and […]

I am still short Dow Dec Futures around the 11,700 level The high so far has been 11,838.There is an old high at 11,900 back on August 4th. I’d be willing to take some heat here. As always, though, you have to manage your own trading account.

Sitting here, I am watching the Cable news stations touting the fact that “The Dow is on track for its best monthly performance since 1999?” Seriously? There is a whole week left to trade (one) and (two) what is so magical about this week that we won’t have some political blow up in Europe over the amount of […]

11,700 has been a wall since August began. August 31st 11,700/ September 1 11,705/ Today’s high?? 11,715 so far.. its 11:20 AM here in Chicago.

Next chart target is 11,900. Sell some here and risk 100 to 200 ticks. Why you may ask?
Seriously, its the weekend. Anything could happen over the weekend. We could come in Monday morning and have stories of Greece defaulting, or the G20 changing its mind about some aspect.

Also, Flas back to October 4th…. We were down at 10,328…. We’ve rallied back to the top of our 1,300 point trading range..

We’ve rallied 1,300 points: Does that […]

One of my old friends called me this past Spring full of bullishness for Silver.
Granted silver had a nice pop. In the last week of April, we almost got a $50.00 print.
Fast Forward to the end of September. Silver prints 26.150. That’s a loss of 1/2 of its “value” in 6 months.

What happened? Evil speculators? Evil someone? Corporate Greed? Or just plain old fashioned human nature.
I vote for the latter.

Since that $26.00 print, we had a $6.00 bounce, or a 20% return if you bought the low.

More interesting, our August high at $44.00 sucked a lot of bulls back […]

Gold spiked to a high of 1925 an ounce on 9/9/11. On 9/30/11 it melted down to 1533 an ounce. What’s $400 dollar an ounce when the guys on the AM Radio are touting it? It’s not their $400.00 that evaporated.
What happened?
A lot of hedge funds were long stocks and long gold as a hedge against those stock longs. Surprise, Surprise, both markets melted lower and the “masters of the universe” lost money on both positions. Lost money on the longs in stocks and lost money on their longs in the precious gold. What “seemed logical and pertinent risk management hedge” turned into […]

This week could be interesting for the stock indexes. We’ve rallied up to the top of our 12 week extremely wide trading range. How wide? 1,300 points in the Dow, bordered by 10,400 and 11,700. 140 handles in the S&P bordered by 1080 on the bottom and 1220 on the top side.

In effect, you have program trading pushing these markets to their extremes; followed by them picking up the pieces of what’s left of individual speculative traders. The “disruptor programs” have been very effective and have are living up to their name.

What to do? 1)Play the extremes of the ranges 2) trade small […]

Sometimes its better to be lucky than smart. Back on the 9th an 10th of October I put in some resting orders to sell Dow Futures at 11,475, 11,500 and 11,525. They all were filled yesterday. Quite honestly, I thought we were going to run up to 10,800 level.
Fortunately, We never got above 11,600, so my buy stops never got filled.

I mentioned yesterday that it might be a good idea to fade the bullish fervor I saw and heard on the Cable business channels. We are trading at 11,350. I have covered 1/3 of the shorts. I am leaving the stops on the […]

Neutral to bearish for corn. Very bearish for wheat, with the world and the US awash in wheat. Pretty friendly for Soybeans.
I think Thursday and Friday will be more important than today’s action. Quite frankly the volume today was less than I had expected.

On a bearish note, China has retaliated for Currency Tariff bill by fixing the yuan. Is this the start of a trade war? I hope not. History shows that trade wars generally lead to hot wars. Not a particularly enticing thought to imagine.

It certainly would be negative for commodity prices here in the USA. Take away Chinese demands […]