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

Thanks James.

Or this http://money.cnn.com/data/premarket/?iid=H_MKT_QL

I used to use Bloomberg but their futures screen isn't that great any more.

Thanks Harry, is it definitely live?

Apologies, looks to be 10 mins delayed.

This looks to be better:
http://uk.investing.com/commodities/real-time-futures

DOW is to the right of screen.

Thanks again, but is it the Dow and not the S&P?

Hmmmm............

http://uk.investing.com/indices/us-30-futures

About the best I can find and live.

And still the DOW can't drag the FTSE with it

Yup that'll do Harry.

Dow turning my way at last.

Ed: I meant the footsie.

Would seem all US indices turning towards the red zone.

indeed .... i've made a couple of very quick turns on DOW but now just sitting and watching

the only good thing about FTSE is that it is holding above 5900 - just

All gone very red again ,plus oil falling as well ..

Results due from retailers in the morning, not all going to be good reading.

Debenhams and Morrisons. :-((

Oil getting hammered again ..

extraordinary and sudden recovery on dow
managed a nice 40 point turn thanks to that, but with a tiny stake .... never knowck a profit

wonder if it'll hold through the close and reflect in london tomorrow

Yes interesting to see, but suppose it's the China overnight sentiment that will swing things for us.

Looks like another down day, at least the earlier part but we shall see.

That's better we are blue for a change ,oils kind of stable , won't hold my breath though .

good morning jimmy
like you (i am sure) i have no confidence that any decent rally in london or ny will be sustainable

however, i have had a very small dabble in both those markets this morning, and so far so good ...... but all pretty scary for all that

if you look back at the last hour (10 min chart) of trading in ny last night, it is well exampled
steadily down for 4 or 5 stints, then whoosh, then retreat and a fairly significant dump o'night
this morning sees a nice bit of blue ...... long may it last