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 couple more weeks and I'll soon be back to trading with a decent stack, have to say though, its quite nice building it up even if the risk is a little greater.

i've been lucky of late, perhaps because i persuaded myself not be too greedy and benefited accordingly

as we are heading in that direction again, i'm looking for 17800 or just of shy of that for a new short

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other way :-)
long 17703

out at 17727.6 ..... haven't got the time to stay glued, but def better than a kick in the balls

oil has clunked again
dow is tapping at 17790 which was a support but now possible resistance
ftse at 6530, which i think is no-man's land, but await shortie's view on that

bugger ..... dithered and didn't .... dow now down to 17750

No position on the FTSE currently, could go either way, right now a few points up back to 6540 I expect but not worth playing. I'll continue to twiddle my thumbs and may drop in this afternoon.

Rome burnt while Nero fiddled!

and bugger shit damn and blast :-)
have been out all day, but clearly missed lots of fun and games ...... still, at least i didn't caught on the wrong side, so nothing lost either

Lol, relax, there's always another trade! I've been busy today also and only made a few points...

Welcome back Alf, hows the scrap metal trade in town these days?

quite difficult it must be admitted
as i've mentioned before, the collapse of oil prices has wreaked havoc with international trade
it'll all settle and resolve in due course

i wonder if we'll see dow tracking all the way back to 16400 again
my own gut feel is that a rally, or at least a decent bounce is imminent, but shall probably sit out this evening's action

had a little dow long dabble at 17600 as that looks to be supporting ok

and out (20:18) for +45
that'll do nicely so shall go and keep beloved company :-)

crude continues inexorably south
i am therefore somewhat surprised to see FTSE holding its ground to better, not least because it had a relatively strong showing yesterday

6532 gone short, as this ranged flag narrows it'll break out either way but I think profit taking will see me right for a few points.

dow
17900 was a step too far, and now drifting south once more
i guess the q is whether or not 17800 will be breached again

i've a couple of small shorts running - 17803 and 17871 - so may cash in the higher one and let the other run

I've managed some 20pts profit trading today, lets hope things improve over the rest of the week otherwise I'll be wasting more time on the 'talk crap thread'..

first one done at 17782.9 so that approx +88 :-)
off home so banked 2nd for +20

may have a little play later this evening

Long FTSE @6457.8.

it would have been nice to have been greedy for once :-)
now what's that i always preach about never going broke if you bank a profit?

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good call skinny .... well done

the dow looks as though it had a very quiet day, showing a loss of <30, but that disguises yet another roller-coaster day where it rose above 17,900 then fell below 17500 and finally settled a little above 17600