Yesterday’s results: No trades triggered. 

Today’s Best S&P Futures Turning Points: Short 5954.50 stop 5960.25. Buy 5965.25 stop 5959.50 if price retraces down from above. (Filtered out during PCE release). 

The World Index: (+100/-100) dips from -50 to -64 with all major world markets Bearish on increasing volatility. 

Catalysts: PCE, Personal Income & Spending and Fed’s Williams @ 8:30. UofM Consumer Sentiment (revised). 

Quick Tip: Manipulation

Courtesy of the WSJ newsletter – “On December 19, 1868, Cornelius Vanderbilt bought additional shares of the New York Central Railroad. He then convened an emergency meeting of the board of directors, which declared an 80% dividend. The stock shot up over the next two days, at which point Vanderbilt dumped his new shares for a $5.5 million profit.”

Today we have the SEC and regulations to prevent blatant manipulation like Vanderbilt did. But...

Yesterday’s results: Neither trade suggestion triggered. 

Today’s Best S&P Futures Turning Points: Short 6091.75 stop 6095.25. Buy 6017.25 stop 6012.25 (filtered out during CPI release volatility). 

The World Index: (+100/-100) remains at -7 with sentiment mixed on very low volatility. 

Catalysts: CPI @ 8:30. Crude Oil Inventories @ 10:30. 10-year Bond Auction @ 13:00. Federal Budget Balance @ 14:00. 

Quick Tip: Off The Chart

All markets are influenced by the forces of supply and demand. More demand than supply will push the markets higher. This natural law works on every tradable asset. 

But is all demand visible on a price chart? For indexes, currencies, and commodities, I would argue yes. They are mostly institutional markets, and the footprints large traders leave can be found. Our team trades a chart-based Supply/Demand strategy that has a real edge. 

For individual stocks I would argue yes, but not always....

Yesterday’s results: Neither trade idea triggered.

Today’s Best S&P Futures Turning Points: Buy 6100.00 stop 6096.25 if price retraces down from above. Short 6079.50 stop 6083.75 if price retraces up from below. 

The World Index: (+100/-100) remains at +7 with sentiment mixed on low volatility. 

Catalysts: Trade Balance & Jobless Claims @ 8:30. Fed’s Barkin @ 11:30 and 12:15. 

Quick Tip: Outperformance

If you search for the “best mutual fund manager in history” you’ll find an article listing the top 5. On this list is Peter Lynch, famous for making Fidelity a household name by growing the Magellan fund to $13 Billion in assets while simultaneously doubling the S&P return. 

Clearly Lynch was a talented stock picker. Part of his research involved Insider trades. He commissioned a research firm to collect and analyze all the filings with the SEC. This was before the...

Yesterday’s results: Shorting 6035.50 stopped out. Buying 5988.00 offered 8.25 points before reversing. 

Today’s Best S&P Futures Turning Points: No great levels today. 

The World Index: (+100/-100) falls from +21 to -29 with most major world markets mildly Bearish on low volatility. S&P futures slightly higher. 

Catalysts: S&P Home Price Index @ 9:00. Consumer Confidence, New Home Sales & Richmond MFG Index @ 10:00. FOMC Minutes @ 14:00.  

Quick Tip: Big Picture 

Regardless of your trading timeframe, daily, swing, or position, using a “big picture” analysis to your entry decision adds edge. It’s the higher timeframe. 

Traditional technical analysis suggests that a multiple of 3 to 6 is appropriate. For example, if you’re a day trader using a 5-minute chart for your entry, aligning with the trend of the 15- or 30-minute chart will help. A swing trader using...

Yesterday’s results: Buying 5909.50 picked the bottom of the session and ran 66 points to the suggested short at 5975.50, which only offered a 6.25-point scalp. 

Today’s Best S&P Futures Turning Points: Short 6002.25 stop 6007.75. Buy 6007.00 stop 6001.50 if price retraces down from above. 

The World Index: (+100/-100) drops from +29 to zero with sentiment mixed and volatility low. 

Catalysts: S&P MFG & Services PMI Flash @ 9:45. UofM Consumer Sentiment & Inflation Expectations @ 10:00. 

Quick Tip: Simplify 

One of our trading teams, the stock/options swing traders, uses a long-only strategy that has extreme asymmetrical results. The risks are very low. The rewards are sometimes parabolic. 

While there are dozens of options strategies you could use, why complicate your plan? Simple call option buys work fantastically with these trades because the real edge comes from...

Yesterday’s results: : No trades triggered. 

Today’s Best S&P Futures Turning Points: Buy 5936.25 stop 5931.25. Short 6002.75 stop 6007.75. 

The World Index: (+100/-100) drops from -7 to -21 with all major world markets neutral to Bearish on low volatility. 

Catalysts: Retail Sales, Empire State MFG Index, Import Prices @ 8:30. Fed’s Collins @ 9:00, Williams @ 13:15. Industrial Production @ 9:15. Business Inventories @ 10:00. 

Quick Tip: Tuning Your Watch List 

Stock and option traders have a challenge that futures and Forex traders don’t have. How to winnow down your trading candidates from nearly 9000 stocks. 

There are some common filters that are easy to implement like price and volume. Picking stocks that are between $10 and $50 reduces the selection to 2200. Add in average volume over 1 million daily and you’re down to 562. 

You can keep adding filters to get to a manageable number,...

Yesterday’s results: Buying 5996.50 stopped out. Shorting the retracement to 5993.50 offered a 6.75-point scalp.  

Today’s Best S&P Futures Turning Points: Short 6032.75 stop 6037.75. Buy 6037.50 stop 6034.75 if price retraces down from above (filtered out during CPI release). 

The World Index: (+100/-100) soars from -71 to zero with the major world markets mixed on falling volatility.  

Catalysts: CPI @ 8:30. FOMC speakers; Kashkari @ 8:30, Logan @ 9:45, Musalem @ 13:00, Schmid @ 13:30. Federal Budget Balance @ 14:00. 

Quick Tip: Trading in the 5th Dimension

You could argue that chart trading is 3-dimensional. You’re analyzing price, volume, and time on a chart.

If you add fundamental analysis to your plan that would be your 4th dimension, and it would very likely improve your performance. Knowing more about the assets, sectors, and economy can only help you. 

There is a...

Yesterday’s results: No trades triggered. 

Today’s Best S&P Futures Turning Points: Buy 5996.50 stop 5992.75. Short 5993.50 stop 5997.25 if price retraces up from below. 

The World Index: (+100/-100) plummets from +36 to -71 with all major world markets Bearish on rising volatility. 

Catalysts: Fed Speakers today: Waller @ 10:00, Barkin @ 10:15, Kashkari @ 14:00, Harker @ 17:00, Barkin @ 17:30. 

Quick Tip: Diversify Re-Defined

One of our teams day-trades in the futures market. There is plenty of focus on the S&P 500 contract. Yesterday it traded in a relatively narrow range (31.75 points) and closed down 8 points from Friday. The other indexes weren’t very different. Ho hum. 

Our other team swing trades options. You might think that given the lack of movement in the indexes that the options portfolio would be flat too. It wasn’t. In fact, there were specific options that moved substantially. My...

Yesterday’s results: No trades triggered.

Today’s Best S&P Futures Turning Points: Buy 5996.50 stop 5992.75. Short 5993.50 stop 5997.25 if price retraces up from below. 

The World Index: (+100/-100) soars from -50 to +36 with most major world markets Bullish. 

Catalysts: Nothing on the economic calendar.  

Quick Tip: Windfalls

Not nearly enough, but on occasion your trade becomes a windfall. Not so much in day trading but swing and position trading for sure. Maybe you bought NVDA 2 years ago and held on. Windfall!

Our swing trading team experienced a remarkable windfall trade last week. The strategy we used had to do with Unusual Options Activity. Simply put, these are huge bets on unlikely outcomes. The concept is that anyone who can bet that big must know some non-public information. 

Following the chart above you’ll see we uncovered a Smart Money bet on 10/21. $2.1M was bet on this $160...