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

when the market calms down a bit, assuming no throats cut or similar drastic action taken, i suggest it would be well worth looking to short both SOLA (especially) and WPP

Can't short SOLA on iG at the mo

interesting how the market reacts to even slightly bearish news if bearish at all with IBM. It just shows how nervous they are after citibank yesterday, and as always the negative sentiment in the media. Markets have always been too optimistic and pessimistic in the past, lets hope this time it will be the same.

For sure there are and will be great buying opportunities about, probably best to spread any purchases from now through 2008 so that I'm not too exposed if wrong.

steveo - that was rule 1, but I have been traking the ftse over the last few months, and over last three weeks it hasn't even followed the trend apart from the last two trading days, very unsporting behaviour.

Lets hope it settles down from now.

amazed one can't short SOLA at IG ..... is that S/B or CFD? ..... have not tried, but implication is that they have a lot of clients who already are ..... unless there are no willing lenders of stock

Coming up today:
"Financial firms JP Morgan Chase (JPM, Fortune 500) and Wells Fargo (WFC, Fortune 500) are both due to report their quarterly results before the market open Wednesday.
On the economic front, the government is due to release its Consumer Price Index, a key measure of inflation, at 8:30 a.m. ET.
Also today, the latest data for Industrial Production and Capacity Utilization will released. The Federal Reserve is also due to release its Beige Book of economic conditions."

DOW futures currently flat, so presumably everyone waiting to see what the news is going to be.

flat!!!! .,.... that has to be the understatement of the year ..... Dow indications are currently -86, which it has to be said is a modest recovery from earlier

JP Morgan Chase (JPM, Fortune 500) reported fourth-quarter earnings that fell short of Wall Street's estimates due to a $1.3 billion write-down on subprime assets. The company's net income fell to $3 billion for the quarter.

interestingly, following the above news, Dow indicators have recovered some more and show only -50 .... perhaps the perception is that Fed will have to cut rates at least 0.5% and before the next meeting at end January

Apologies. On the CNN site the DOW futures are & were showing 0.00 but I think that is a glitch on their system.

currently -35 at 12465 .... that is cash prediction which may not be quite the same as futures

two to ponder .....
how high can a dead cat bounce?
will 6 dead cats bounce higher than 1?

No, but it will make a mess! :0)

at the moment all shit anyway!

Not if you are a sugar daddy about the only flier today!

Dow struggling to blue (+41) though techs still being whacked (GOOG -$13.00 after -$24.00)

I'm not surprised goog is falling. At its recent peak if it had been in the FTSE its earnings would have been equivalent to ITV's and it would have had the 3rd. largest market cap in the index. I know everyone uses it but people only tend to browse the first 2 pages and most of them have been paid for.

disppointing that Dow finished slightly down (about 35 points) especially as it had been +70 about 30 mins before close ..... however, this was far from dire especially considering early indications of another fall of >100 ..... techs finished very weak with GOOG (my arbitrary bellweather) being down another $22.00.

My guess is that London will open marginally higher and for myself, i hope that the miners stage a bit of or even a significant recovery after the last 2 days of total massacre

Due today:
"Merrill Lynch and a number of other financial services firms due to report quarterly results before the start of trade in the U.S.
The December housing starts and building permits reports are also due before the start of trade."
Don't get your hopes up too much!

"Merrill Lynch reported a quarterly operating loss of over $10 billion Thursday that was much worse than expected, and the company also announced an $11.5 billion writedown related to the subprime crisis."

DOW currently tipped to open down 33 points.