rather than pick out individual stocks to trade, it can often be worthwhile to trade the indices themselves, especially in times of high volatility.

for those so inclined, i attach below charts for FTSE and FTSE 250, though one might equally be tempted to trade Dow or S&P, which is significantly broader in its coverage, or even NASDAQ

for ease of reading, i have attached 1 year and 3 month charts in each instance

FTSE
i have copied the following from one of GF's sites this morning .....

The FTSE this week has finally broken its downtrend on the news over and uncertainty over Cyprus. After 5 down days in a row the FTSE managed to pick up a bit on Friday, but failed to retake the trend line.
Expect a retake of the trend today but a failure to make a new high suggests a correction looming.

I'm short on FTSE and DOW today. Watching the DAX also.. 1hr Charts below

DAX daily below, thinking of going long..

Shortie, re the DAX, I noticed this yesterday (Reuters):

Berkeley Futures associate director Richard Griffiths ... said clients were looking to buy "put" options on the German DAX < .GDAXI> equity index, which give the right to sell an index in the future and are often used on expectations of a market fall.

I've closed my long FTSE at a miniscule profit as I'm not sure which way it's going to go.

Nothing much out til later today.

10:00am GBP Chancellor Osborne Speaks

11:00am GBP CBI Realized Sales

12:30pm USD Core Durable Goods Orders m/m

USD Durable Goods Orders m/m

1:00pm USD S&P/CS Composite-20 HPI y/y

2:00pm USD CB Consumer Confidence

USD New Home Sales

USD Richmond Manufacturing Index

4:30 pm CAD Gov Council Member Cote Speaks

Thanks for that Skinny.

This little snippet made me smile: 'Russian businesses are unlikely to continue to patronize Cyrus. Press reports quoted one Russian businessman’s wry observation that the EU had killed Cyprus in one day: “When the Russians leave, who is going to stay at the Four Seasons for $500 a night? Angela Merkel?” '

Thanks Toya, Jeroen Dijsselbloem backtracked on his comments yesterday and rumours of a Moodys downgrade on Italy yesterday turned out to be just rumours. I'm thinking the Euro should recover a little with the DAX being rallied as a result.

GBP CBI Realized Sales 0 consensus 12 previous 8

OK Shortie - hope it goes your way :)

MADRID (MarketWatch) -- Cypriot depositors with less than €100,000 in their bank accounts will not take a hit from the terms of the recent bailout, but those over that amount could see around 40% of their deposits converted into bank shares, the finance minister said in a BBC interview on Tuesday. "The exact percentage is not...yet decided but it is going to be significant," said Michalis Sarris.

I wouldn't be too happy about that, would you?!

USD Core Durable Goods Orders m/m -0.5% consensus 0.7% previous 2.3%

USD Durable Goods Orders m/m 5.7% consensus 3.9% previous -4.9%

USD S&P/CS Composite-20 HPI y/y 8.1% consensus 7.9% previous 6.8%

USD CB Consumer Confidence 59.7 consensus 67.9 previous 69.6

USD New Home Sales 411K consensus 426K previous 437K

USD Richmond Manufacturing Index 3 consensus 8 previous 6

we have taken a few chips off the table in anticipation of a pullback, Cyprus effect not over yet.

trouble with you hali, is that you're just a cereal de-ramper (lol!)

cynic, not so looking to capitalise on the uncertainty created when(and if) the cypriot banks re-open before/after Easter.

it's certainly almost inconceivable that they will re-open before easter, except maybe for 1/2 day on Thursday

Short @6,412.1

GBP Current Account -14.0B consensus -12.8B previous -12.8B

GBP Final GDP q/q -0.3% consensus -0.3% previous -0.3%

GBP Revised Business Investment q/q -0.8% consensus -1.2% previous -1.2%

Italian Retail Sales m/m -0.5% 0.4% -0.1%