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

jkd ..... you waffle a lot ...... charts are only guides and tools and neither the gospel nor the koran ...... "my mate" merely reads the runes, but with a fair degree of accuracy

Still gambling playing the DOW @ FTSE ... play it day in and day out ,,its luck if you gain. Going to bed its 11.30 over here ,we've got a thunderstorm coming..

jb
my apologies, apologies to Bb also for my misunderstanding. my memory aint what it used to be, must remember dmor(dyor) lol.
cynic, thanks for that comment. made my own once, runes that is, hand picked and selected from brighton beach. pretty good at it as well, so i am told. nice to know i can still waffle. so thank you once again.
regards
jkd

Are we heading for a deep recession or depression that is the question.

The SM has a horrid look to it atm and conditions are as bad as pre-credit crunch with stocks now falling below rights issue prices. It is very difficult to predict where we go from here but atm I fear the worse with investors getting burnt a second time around. I guess the next few mnths will give us all the answers we need.

Well that's all clear then! I thought you were going to answer your own question dd!!!!

Short term, don't forget all that it's thanksgiving day in the States tomorrow and a short trading day on Friday.

Rough ol' day today on the markets, unless you happen to be heavily into utilities. Profit taking maybe before the w/e, or maybe everyone freeing up cash for the LLOY R/I ??? Or maybe just the LSE giving us incorrect figures!!!

Anybody with any news on this crazy drop ...why ?....

Dubai.
2517

Is that a flight number...?

I've enjoyed today less than a live turkey on an american menu .....

RF An extract from money morning
Then yesterday, state-owned conglomerate Dubai World, which is responsible for about $60bn of that $80bn in debt, turned around to its lenders and said: You know that money you gave us? Well, we need a bit more time to pay it back. Despite Dubais clear problems, the news came as a shock, to say the least. The cost of insuring against governments defaulting on their debt jumped, not just in the Emirates, but across the Gulf, reports Bloomberg.

And it couldn't have come at a worse time

So whats happened? The Government of Dubai has asked Dubai Worlds creditors to agree to a six-month standstill on the conglomerate's debts until at least 30 May 2010, while the company is restructured. Thats worrying enough. But what also concerned investors is that the Government of Dubai had also just raised a further $5bn from Abu Dhabi.

Now, according to FT Alphaville, traders had expected this money to be used to repay $3.5bn in bonds issued by Dubai Worlds property unit, Nakheel (the company which built the artificial palm tree resort much beloved by footballers). This $3.5bn loan falls due on 14 December. But now it wont be repaid until at least the end of May.

And just to add the icing on the cake, Dubai has now shut down for Eid, until early December, which could mean further details will be a while in coming.

As RBS analyst Okan Akin told City AM: The timing could not have been worse. After all, its not as though Nakheel investors have been given a lot of notice here. If youd been planning on that money being paid back soon, you might be a little annoyed, to say the least - particularly as Dubai has been swearing for months that it would meet its obligations without any problems. The Emirates ruler, Sheikh Mohammed Bin Rashid Al Maktoum publicly pledged his support for the group and its obligations earlier this month, notes the FTs Lex column. Investors, perhaps foolishly, took him at his word.
2517

Thanks 2517 GEORGE.....well the investors in that property group will have to foot the bill...at least we are not talking trillions here...a snip at only a few billion (for the moment).....markets perhaps overreacting on the downside here...

Markets also looking at all other companies, particularly banks, which have a financial stake in Dubai, as maybe they are looking at loan defaults.

It's the wider implications that a government backed loan default has.
a further extract
this case may show that lenders cant depend on the notion that governments will always make sure that apparently state-backed companies will repay their debts. And that would make an awful lot of other Dubai-backed debt look far riskier than investors have been accounting for.
2517

Frankly as a bank you must be nuts investing in anything like those massive construction projects out there......those luxurious properties depend on loads of wealthy people .....and we are experiencing bad times...no, not the thing for banks to invest in !.

i hear, on pretty good though unproven authority that The Palms is already sinking and that the sewerage systems have ruptured, with the result that there is now a plague of rats ..... sounds merely apocryphal, but i am told it is truly so

good job Dow closed today - and tomorrow too i would guess

Still....one bad big egg in the middle east should not send shivers like it has.....very strong rebound to come now with bargains being snapped up ?.

Not sure you are right rf. One very unexpected, wealthy, oil rich bad egg can shake confidence in all the other eggs. The bad egg in question being the Dubai Sovereign wealth fund. Repercussions going to ripple out for a while, imo, & Dubai World creditors are also going to be short of cash.
DOW closed today so "A good day to release bad news" !!!!! Incredible that the LSE was also out of action for almost half the day. I feel a conspiracy theory coming on! ;o)