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

US recession is already here, warns Merrill
By James Quinn, Wall Street Correspondent
Last Updated: 7:41pm GMT 07/01/2008



The US has entered its first full-blown economic recession in 16 years, according to investment bank Merrill Lynch.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/money/main.jhtml;jsessionid=O0MW51JSETJOBQFIQMFSFFWAVCBQ0IV0?xml=/money/2008/01/07/bcnuseco107.xml

Still very confused picture for ftse, with Banks and Housebuilders still tanking it must be oils and mining keeping this market up.

I heard on Bloomberg this morning that large Investment companies are in the process of switching large amounts of funds to the oil and mining sectors which will push the sector up further. as usual they are about 6 months behind.

Apologise for going off ftse thread, but is anyone brave enough to predict a good entry point for (bdev) Barrett. Down 85p to 368 since Thursdays after a broker reduced forecast EPS from 110p to 108p. It's down from over 12 one year ago, and forward pe now is 3.5 with yield over 8% covered over 3 times.

I wouldn't buy yet myself, but will keep a keen eye on it.

Careful with housebuilding, spit. Am watching Persimmon for a good entry point, but so far the trend is firmly down. There is the odd bounce, but I would not recommend the sector at the moment.

I was looking for an entry point as well and I got into TW.@ <195p but then read that Omer Bhatti has predicted a FTSE100 housebuilder to go bust in 2008, I believe Persimmon & TW. are the only 2 in the FTSE, although BDEV may have been. I sold out of TW. @ 208p>. Even with my contrarian hat on I feel a bit nervous now re the sector, no doubt there is/will be bargains, but maybe not quite yet. Spitfire if the herd is heading for mining & oils maybe time to leave soon.
2517

Interesting comments, as you Harrycat I'm just waiting for entry point for Barratts, but will wait for things to settle first. And with the oils & mining I have a feeling that the herd are investing heavily, so be ready to take profits in near future. The only contrarian company I will investing in this month will be cattles CTT.

Nice to see ftse making steady gains with no nasty surprises, first time this has happened for a few weeks.

Just a shame I had no position.

I hold CTT & have traded in & out for a few years, but have a look at the 5 year graph 'cos that stock is cyclical. Very good divi & a certain amount of capital growth if you time it right.

Whoops US consumer credit nearly double the anticipated 8 billion according to forex thread!

Here we go again, another dow drop, oh it's great : investing !

Ah well, I presume the shorters will be out in force tomorrow morning.
Another reminder for the equity holders to keep locking in profit at the moment.
The U.S. sneezes & we all catch a cold!

all looking very scary evben though indoications as i write are for Dow to recover 70 ..... whether or not that holds is a good Q

One of the largest US independent SIVs, Victoria, has been downgraded by S&P to practically junk status,onlys a few months ago it was triple A. Barc & RBS with fingers in the US pie down this am, not taking advantage of high yields until more is known about the us side of these uk banks.

Boy am I glad I did not write that, cynic.
2517

pericles - the yield is tempting with UK Banks like Barclay's and RBS, but I have a feeling they haven't been as honest with writedowns as the US and European Banks have, best to wait for next month's finals.

I gather Buffett won't be interested in tucking into banks until at least the third quarter,presumably because it's impossible to assess their fundamentals

spitfire,yes I agree, and even though the results season may not (yet!) reveal any results which are worse than those admitted to at the moment, I will have difficulty in beleiving that there is no more bad news to come. Sadly I now put the banks in the same category as political parties esp gordons lot, and I tend to think that whatever I see or hear from either lot is not likely to be the whole truth!

Might see the red turn to blue this afternoon as the DOW is tipped to recover a little, with bright outlook from DuPont but to counter that, not such good news for holders of Apple. Futures currently +30.

I am short on banks up to next months interims, especially A&L as I can't see anyone wanting to buy the bank as it will only get cheaper in the run up to next months interims. Target 550p for me. Long on yen against dollar as well, currently short on gold as due a short term correction. Should've shorted ftse but will wait now until boe decision.

Good interview on bloomberg last night, platinum is the place to be, safe haven, best metal for diesel catlysts, which are in increasing demand due to oil price not to mention fuel cells etc, but will wait for a pull back, expected to give better returns than gold apparently.

I'll put down the stock tips in relation to this when I find the scrap I wrote them on!

Would think banks will continue to head south until we have more writedowns. Will wait for the price to book values to fall further and use as a guide. In the 1990 banking crises US banks were down to at least 60% of P/BV which proved to be the bottom.