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

Harry - I traded it 3 times yesterday against a SIPP holding - not a comfortable day, but Ok in the end.

skinny - mine was merely precautionary .... the longer term prognosis for dow remains very strong, but the indices are very much for trading .... meanwhile, i continue to hold amzn, goog and aapl over the pond

cynic - I agree.

Further to post 8684 above - I do think facebook has lost the plot and is looking desperate.

i don't like FB as a product so would never buy into it

BoE slashes UK medium-term growth outlook

LONDON | Wed Aug 8, 2012 10:32am BST

(Reuters) - The Bank of England has sharply cut its forecast for medium-term growth in Britain's economy due to worries that factors hurting growth since the financial crisis may be more long-lasting than first thought.

In its quarterly Inflation Report, the Bank said that growth in two years time was likely to be around 2 percent a year, down sharply from the forecast of 2.67 percent just three months ago.

This marks a break with previous Bank forecasts, which have usually shown strong rebounds in growth, even after short-term weakness.

German 10-y Bond Auction 1.42|1.8 previous 1.31|1.5

German Industrial Production m/m -0.9% consensus -0.8% previous 1.6%

USD Prelim Nonfarm Productivity q/q 1.6% consensus 1.5% previous -0.9%

USD Prelim Unit Labor Costs q/q 1.7% consensus 0.5% previous 1.3%

GBP Trade Balance -10.1B consensus -8.5B previous -8.4B

all very much running out of puff ..... hardly surprising after such a strong run

French Industrial Production m/m 0.0% consensus 0.4% previous -1.9%

GBP PPI Input m/m 1.3% consensus 1.4% previous -2.2%

GBP PPI Output m/m 0.0% consensus 0.1% previous -0.4%

I reckon weak data from China will probably cause the markets to pause, and maybe fall.

... unless, of course, we hear some more ECB rhetoric

CAD Employment Change -30.4k consensus 9.6K previous 7.3K

CAD Unemployment Rate 7.3% consensus 7.2% previous 7.2%

USD Import Prices m/m -0.6% consensus 0.1% previous -2.7%

Mistress - looking ever braver to be short of the markets

Hmm - so much for my idea of the markets going down eh?

'fraid so :-(

Why keep shorting something that wants to go up?
If it's going down, short it, if it's going up, go long.
Ideas don't work with Indices, going with the trend mostly works.

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