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

both dow and ftse amazingly robust all things considered

I figure CPI should come in 3%+ in which case a knock on consumer confidence should follow. Still running my Wall St Future for May, under 100 points from the money and counting on a good fall. If not an expensive lesson come the 18th May if I've not closed before hand.

Thank you to whoever it was that introduced me to scalping. have been doing a bit today with small amounts and have been reasonably successful - thank you.

I also closed my long outstanding short this morning at a small loss - but it was much much better than it was a few days ago.

Lesson learnt - let the trend be your friend.

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I may join you tomorrow with a little scalping, the problem I have is that if the weather is nice, I hate sitting at the computer too long. And if a take computer outside I can't see the screen.

ftse seem strong against other indices, I think it was better than expected interest figures, so now market is hoping for another cut next month.

It felt like FTSE wanted to head higher and so it has proved, up 144 as I type. Had a Long running from this morning, but out before DOW opened for 4 points, I never anticipated it to be so strong, but plenty of results out today.

I was thinking about a short on FTSE at 5960 for a target of 15 points, very lucky I didn't but in my defence DOW was begining to look stronger. Could be heading higher now, but the queston is, at what point to go short?

Hit button twice. oops.....

Depends how your playing Spitfire, a rolling bet could well cost you daily but has a cheaper margin to maintain. I prefer a future, a May Future against the the FTSE 100 would probally yeild good results at over 6000. The margins however at twice the price of a rollling bet and waiting could well prove costly if you don't take profits as they appear. Each to their own though trading spreads or CFDs, I will only say try and match your target with the term of the investment. By this I mean simply if you think the FTSE will be lower this month at any time why trade a daily rolling bet.

UK DMO auction of 4.5 percent Treasury gilts maturing 2042 tomorrow.. Wonder what the takeup average is going to be, looking at consumer confidence and bond markets a surprise could well present itself. After all the big boys will be looking to preserve against inflation against us small players who can do little to prevent it eating away at our pockets.

I don't like the idea of leaving a rolling bet overnight, and always close position before DOW opens. I'm more comfortable using CFDs with companies on a longer time frame than indices.

But may well look at a FTSE short soon, and hold with fairly generous stop/loss, at least with a short position there will be no daily charge.

Must admit I have really looked into using future contract yet, still trying to get to grips with the basics at the moment.

Google results better than expected after the bell

Banks and financials may come under pressure today.

we live in a strange world ..... CNN reports

Citigroup posts $5.1 billion quarterly net loss that is worse than expected as it takes hefty writedowns. More soon.

and on that back of that Dow indicators rocket .... currently +110 to 12730

Ftse also shot up - a strange world indeed.

FTSE shot up because Dow did ...... apparently there is some relatively good news behind the headlines and CITI are up about 6%

The news we're hearing and directional movement of stocks and markets makes little sense I agree. The only logic behing this is the amount of analysts who think we're at the worst point in any slowdown indicating that moving forward things will get better and implying a higher shareprice future trading..

exactly... the city is prob relieved just to see CITI can remain solvent...

it's actually a bit better than that and GOOG's figures were very good too

Maybe, wonder if the city will be so happy when dilution occurs as banks re-capitalise?