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

5000 not broken decisevely (yet)!

Now I know what a crash feels like. The Dow has been known to fall pre-trading and then do a spectacular reverse however

shame i did not leave my FTSE and Dow shorts running, but that would have been very very brave - or foolhardy

I should think in the current markets, brave or foolhardy would be attempting to fight the trend.....

As the saying goes:

"Take your seat when there's blood on the street, but please don't buy until the blood runs dry."

In my opinion.

Strawbs

i know im the number 1 conspiracy theorist but why do the online trading platforms like Waterhouse always go down when anything exciting happens. Everything is stacked against the Retail investor

Yes I have just tried to place a order and surprise surprise the platform is down, it will be interesting to see if they execute some I already have in the system.

spitfire I obviously spoke too soon. i had a 5000 share buy at 1.5 on HBOS and they filled at 1.46. Pretty hard to argue with that for a change. Just sit and hold for 4 years

selftrade has been out on and off for the last 2 days just as I need to trade.

i know it has taken me over 30 mins to put a limit order on. Got it at 194.75, which will be a nice little earner if it comes off although dont have much confidence in the trade as the transaction date is showing as 22/02/91

nothing would surprise me re Waterhouse ..... see thread

lol Christ, think I might have still been a virgin then!!

selftrade down again grrr

rubbish!

what that I was a virgin or about selftrade!

Just phoned them up and they said forget it basically

i think i will buy a lottery ticket as clearly my day. Despite taking over 1 hour for a two way trade and trading blind its actually worked out at the top and bottom of the market. Set a buy at 1.5 - filled at 1.46. Set limit at 194.75 and sold at 199.25. Never happened before and never likely to happen again

Well done!

Wish I could say the same!

Well you were right to short and right that they would leave rates on hold cynic

Bit about Aig from permabear
http://market-ticker.denninger.net/

confess that though i called everything correctly, i got my stops and everything else all wrong, so got fucked! ...... anyway, at least the market has woken to the fact that "unchanged" was the correct decision, so London should open quite brightly

No more Mr. nice guy from Mr.Ben, getting strict on the wall street kids.I have had to do more hedging today than any other, thought ftse would never stop dropping live to fight another day

From yesterday's close dax down 57,ftse 149, dow up 100, ftse possibly oversold