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

what's grabbed the market by the testicles?
it was up a fair bit earlier and i see it's now down 20+

Greece?

Only thing stopping market from falling through floor is ECB pumping 60 billion euros of QE a month into European banks.

Why not just give it all to Greece, and make them all happy little peoples again. :-}

meanwhile, the market has (at last) caught fright, though that may have something to do with greece
whereas it opened some 20 points to the good, it is now down 40
annoyingly, IG is having problems with its server(s), but at least i already hold a FTSE short

Caught me out this morning.

Cut very quickly, but did not go with the trend.

Annoying when you miss out on the wrong side

i regularly back the wrong horse, but current markets are so volatile, such positions often come right later on

however, i am not at all tempted to go long, or at least only if i was glued to the screen and could thus take a quick turn

Going long at 7089 was a dumb thing to do.

Could not have timed it any worse.

meanwhile, with the indices all over the place, there's plenty of money to be made (or lost)

no doubt fred has any profits earmarked to be given to unite, or direct to the labour party, not that there's much difference

others of more sensible disposition will just say thank you very much and stash the cash either in their current bank accounts or perhaps in their pension funds away from the ever more grasping claws of the exchequer

==========

for my sins, i opened a small dow short somewhat belatedly at 17920 to run alongside my slightly larger ftse short (7047)

silly billy me
anyway, closed my ftse short at 7033 before i frittered away all my profit
however, being forever greedy, i may extend my dow short ..... which i did at 17988

Looks like there are quite a large number of Co's going ex-divi tomorrow, so am expecting a morning drop in the UK market.

Harry - from the Trader's thread :-

Ex-divs to take 9.8 points off FTSE 100 on Thursday April 23

7000 being tested again. Thankful I got out of stupid long yesterday with a loss. May fast approaching. Another sell off looming.

though my initial recent dow short at 17920 is still showing a somewhat nasty loss, i have managed to fluke a couple of other nice short trades, both of which have been encashed for tidy profits

i remain convinced that ftse remains vulnerable for all the obvious reasons and have taken a small short at 7073.5

have the markets suddenly woken up to the fact that the election is just round the corner and a shambles is then likely, or is there another factor at work?

Any excuse to profit take?

more like defensive action
i've already sold a few stocks and the others i'll just stay with

however, i remain short FTSE (7075) and DOW (18106 and 17920)
also ASC (3906)

Right side of the trade this morning for a change.

Now all square and waiting for FOMC at 7.00

Between now and the 12th May, Greece has to pay Europe 1 Billion euros.
Is the 9th of May grexit day?

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2015-04-17/may-9-grexit-date

banked profit on FTSE short (6974) as it's bouncing about on 25 dma ..... but am sure i shall be shorting again before the election

If it's in the bank, it's safe.
Not unless it's a Greek bank :-)