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

in that case, i expect they've been hit! ...... dow now 13090 ...... did any of you do as i suggested?

Yep, got in when 13000 breached. Got stopped for a nice profit, now looking for a re-entry point. any suggestions?

well i wouldn't have put in a limit, which is what i assume you mean ..... 13005 was the key, but not sure where to look for re-entry

Trailing stop to lock in profit. Any key levels to look out for, or is it blue sky thinking for run up to November elections? Thanks for the heads up, by the way.

Good night - still short - pint a point (London prices) :-)

Yep got stopped out, still thinking downwards in the short term though.

I'm also short skinners (reasonably tight stop though)... same as you, 8 pints a point (Manchester prices) :)

nothing goes in a straight line but 14545 is the target and, having broken north, the upward run could be very fast and sharp, notwithstanding that there has been a very quick recovery from just 10 days ago

splat :-)

Markets look overbought in the last week and the rise was too sharp and quick to
sustain neaterm trends IMVHO. It will certainly be a nailbiter for the Longs on
this and would advise you have guaranteed stops in place !

We could have a nervous and twitchy week ahead, i think it all pivots around the
DOW at moment which looks massively overbought last week ahead of another
round of QE - question is will the market have faith in the next round of crisis
management ??

I doubt it

I reckon the Dow (and hence FTSE) could continue to go up until sometime on Tuesday: Geithner is coming over to Europe for some key meetings on Monday, and the FOMC Statement is published Wednesday evening. After that, I reckon we could see a pull-back as the market will have been over-excited.

Cynic: where do you get your "14545 is the target" from? Recent highs of the Dow were around 13280

I feel the fizz has gone out of the market late afternoon, and am now short at FTSE 5690 but with tight stops! Ready to reverse if there's any hint of concrete action after all the politicking.

I closed my DOW this morning @13,050 and re-opened this afternoon @13,115.

hic!

I'm short UKX 5697, to much sun on hols, hic as well skinny:O)

Stop to 5687 to lock in + 10, I'm not that confident.

I'm going to let mine run to 5620 - reckon it'll fizzle out overnight. Though I could well be wrong... Had thought we might get some sort of a woolly politician's statement following Geithner's jet-setting today, but I guess they've retreated to a sumptuous dinner and will leave us to fret.

Very quiet day on the indices, working off their 'over boughtness' leaving room for further rises without getting too hot.

I'd probably prefer to be long than short right now, but not with much confidence, hence no position.

Phew - managed to close my little short with a tiny profit before bedtime, having heard something on the news about Germany wishing to support the Euro following discussions with the US.

Could be quite volatile over the next 2-3 days. Think I'll work only with guaranteed stops!

It's going up for now, simples. Le trend is your friend, why fight the most basic principle in trading, investing?