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

and an amazing late turnaround on dow, so finish only -60 and london now predicting to open +60

Yes amazing - I've just closed @5743 +63.

Oil price drops on reserve sale

The price of oil has fallen after the International Energy Agency said that its members will sell some of their reserves on the world market.

Brent crude ended Thursday trading down $6.95 to $107.26, a four-month low. US light crude fell by $4.39 to settle at $91.02.

The IEA says the move is in response to the disruption in supplies caused by the Libyan conflict.

It plans to release an extra 60 million barrels of oil on to the world market.

I've been short twice this morning - from 5761 - 5746 +15 and just stopped 5763 - 5735 + 28.

In fact when the reserves are used up : this move could support the price of crude because there will be precious little room for increasing production.....so we could see a firming of the oilie share prices, not a drop as perhaps expected by many !.

Intraday Chart.

or here (with occasional annoying popup) Brent Crude.

10/point skinny??

Pint a point :-)

Is that a 'Fancy pint of foreign fizz' or a 'real pint for real men'?

London Pride or Youngs (ordinary these days) - used to love the Special.

Ah, 3 a point then......lol

London prices :-)

A bit of a feel of credit crunch part 2 about this.

Greece on the verge of default, spreading to other Euro countries, and UK banks are starting to be hammered.

releasing oil in smallish tranches will help to spoil the speculators game.

FTSE sailed straight down through the 200 DMA. I wonder if the DOW will follow suit?

I'm not sure if the best thing is to let the greeks win the euromillions draw next friday : 136000000 jackpot !.....enough for a weeks interest on what they owe at least......just putting things into perspective....

markets have recovered sharply in the last few days on the euphoria that greece is not going bankrupt just yet ...... however, even setting that major issue aside, don't forget that there is a long w/e ahead in usa, so some sizeable profit-taking may be on the cards

DOW futures currently -3. Can't decide whether to take profit or hold over the w/e.

3 days is a long time H/C, so If in doubt.. get out is my motto nowadays -):

I though it was " If in doubt, do nowt" ?
I was fine until Cynic put doubt in my mind! [I think I may be getting required field syndrome! ;o)]