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

.

a nice little crumb of comfort ..... 60 points banked from 17878 to 17818

"Falling oil prices, meanwhile, are driving down expectations for global inflation, putting additional pressure on central banks to step up economic stimulus programmes."

so how gloomy a pic does that paint?

i'ld hazard a guess that it does quite a lot of damage to the US economy as it has been shale oil and gas that has given it (and the dow) a considerable boost of late as US suddenly became a nett exporter

i'm usually wrong on these things, but not always, but then even a blind pig will occasionally find an acorn :-)

Or even a truffle.

dogs have been favoured over pigs for many a long year, not least because dogs are unlikely to want to eat them .....

however, i read that HSBC think low oil prices will benefit the markets

Dow 20,000 within a year?

Think I might have to do some work and make some money for Christmas :-(

6723 gone short

Seems that the oil futures traders are happy to buy at $65 (WT crude) and then to sell at $70 with a subsequent fall back to $60 pb. They don't see any strength in the crude price beyond $70 pb at present. With that in mind, I'm not sure that I would be buying any of the oilers at present.

Video link to the right of the futures page. Worth a quick listen.
http://www.bloomberg.com/markets/stocks/futures/

apart from the shale oil producers being clobbered, the following is also an indication of the downside of low crude prices ......

Falling oil price tests Asia
Malaysia derives almost a third of state revenues from Petronas

OPEC failing to cut supply has forced price down as the world is oversupplied. Their playing a long game as from OPEC standpoint as price gets driven down wells around the world will become uneconomical thus choking supply.

i think it's primarily the shale boys they're after, but there will of course be collateral damage elsewhere too ..... like with PFC and LAM for instance!

Cost of shale production isn't that great, where as North Sea and platform oil production is another story. Faroe petroleum immediately springs to mind as one to investigate for a short play.

Renewable sector looks more expensive every month if this trend continues with oil.

more so than XEL?

Never traded Xcite, but a quick look at their 2013 highlights and "Strengthened balance sheet, with new debt financing of US$80 million unsecured 12.5% loan notes, with repayment in full of the existing US$60 million unsecured 14% loan notes." does make you wonder if they'll be easily tripped up..

i don't know the quality of FPMs oil finds (light or heavy or what), but certainly XEL's are heavy and difficult and sell at a (considerable?) discount to light, and that is once they can even extract it

A day of small runs on the FTSE, debating a large stake play now...

made a small turn on dow just now - short
may have another dabble, being very wary of psychological 17900 barrier

I'm waiting for 6740+ then I'll drop a large short position.