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

Right off for me tea, it had better be in the oven .........LOL.

dow
unbelievable .... all the way down; all the way up and now back to where it closed last night
doubt if there's good cause though haven't checked

Maybe this afternoons session will be worth trading... I closed my drive home position when I got in last night, it was around +20pts but was a small position.

Very volatile markets in the US.

Yep, 6330 right now the FTSE and contemplating going short.

Oil on the up.

No doubt linked to Rouble buying I think.

i keep my fingers crossed, but i think we may see a decent rally on dow that actually holds through the close
first target is 17200, but hopefully that won't prove too great a hurdle

I'm firmly hoping to see it all crash and burn... Can't change economic forecasts showing a global economic slowdown and rightly so.... Whilst prices have been increasing wages have been stagnant for years, all points one way in my eyes..

6340 gone short

Closed Ftse long for £1k profit and opened a Ftse short @ 6345 at the close. Easy innit!

LOL The above of course is on my all singing dancing City Index Demo Account :0) £25 a point. Just would not have the bottle to do that on a real live account.

i didn't say the sunlit uplands were beckoning, but as you well know, even dead cats can bounce quite high :-)

That's the reason why demo accounts are a complete waste of time for anything other than to familiarise yourself with the platform... Well said Chris, its always a completely different trade when you introduce a real risk, the secret is managing that risk!!

Exactly Shortie, I do like the platform very bright wearing sun glasses at first. Will need to study it over the Xmas hols, seems complicated but probably isn't.

The app is good also, I think for me the worst thing is having to call them to withdraw money from my account, where as you can fund online. Are you using a computer and if so are you logged into the AdvantageWeb platform? That's what I use.

IG allows you to send or withdraw money instantaneously on line

Yep Shortie Advantage Web.

Pretty hefty what the Russian central bank has done today... http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-12-17/ruble-extends-worst-slide-since-1998-as-russia-crisis-worsens.html It won't be enough though and will only delay the inevitable... Foreign currency is what the country needs in the form of loans, without it the Rouble will be worthless. Increasing interest rates can't prompt investment with the current sanctions in place, wrong tool for the job... Like using a sander to split logs..!