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

Interesting link - thanks Toya :-

"As I wrote last week, a quick deal doesn’t seem likely, and if the two sound combative after their meeting Friday, the market is going to get punished again next week."

From Reuters:

'Adding to the selling pressure, Israel launched a major offensive against Palestinian militants in Gaza, killing the military commander of Hamas in an air strike and threatening an invasion of the enclave. Egypt said it recalled its ambassador from Israel in response. "We know Europe's in trouble, China's slowing down ... and now you've got the Middle East flaring up again. It's all hitting at once, and obviously, the market is taking a 'sell first, ask questions later' approach," said Ryan Detrick, senior technical strategist at Schaeffer's Investment Research in Cincinnati.'

I have no position on the DOW currently; might set a short at 12660. Not sure... On the basis that we're heading south, it is perhaps not all that critical, so long as there's enough margin to cover any short-term, upward swings. Would prefer to be short from the 12800+ level but probably a bit late for that!

if you feel the piercing of the support at about 12700 is just a brief aberration, then my inclination would be to wait to short until say 12875'ish on the basis of a (minor) resistance at 12900 .... however, if you are trading very short term and are glued to the screen, there's almost certainly money to be made in both directions

GBP Retail Sales m/m -0.8% consensus -0.1% previous 0.5%

http://rt8.it-finance.com/FinSpreadsFlash/showimage.phtml?id=2f0df238ec4c2fde26620fa981652f8d0f392af75155b25fdc43892c22170baa&type=png

Harami off support I think today... No time to trade as I've lost/misplaced my wedding ring....

? :-)

lol, remember taking it off last night at home but can't think for the life of me where I put it.....

surely your ring is an integral part of you

Keep an eye on Facebook today as the lock-in period preventing employees from selling shares comes to an end. The shares have halved from flotation levels already. This is one share I've done very well out of shorting off the IPO.

Thats what the Mrs says Cynic however I do remove it for anything that envolves getting my hands dirty or wet.

TMI methinks!

shortie - agree that FB should be a good call to short, but curious that sp rose $2.50 (12.5%) last night ..... manipulated?

I seem to remember not being able to short it for the 1st few days.

Anything that bucks the trend 12.5% without any significant announcement has to be suspect I think. One to keep an eye on later though as there could well be some pennies in it.

Decided to short the FTSE from 5700 in the end, as it had been dithering around there.

CAD Manufacturing Sales m/m 0.4% consensus 0.3% previous 1.5%

USD Core CPI m/m 0.2% consensus 0.1% previous 0.1%

USD Unemployment Claims 439k consensus 372K previous 355K

USD CPI m/m 0.1% consensus 0.1% previous 0.6%

USD Empire State Manufacturing Index -5.2 consensus -7.2 previous -6.2

just shows how difficult the markets are ..... employment numbers are far worse than forecast, yet dow has moved very little

Thanks Skinny! Bit of a mixed picture. In the end we'll probably see the markets fretting about the same issues as it did yesterday

Using Sandy. Continuing claims up, emergency slightly down.