Friday, May 29, 2009

Thursday, May 28, 2009

Consolidation...it does it even before move down

One boring market action (for those who has not got my email on UNG long trade indeed) - I'd expect that descending triangle to be resolved sometimes by June 8th.

2009-05-28-TOS_CHARTS

 

Did you miss new The Discretionary Trader post?

Wednesday, May 20, 2009

EURO Topping?

2009-05-20-EUR_6E_daily

 

Quick Timeline for my "EURO Questions" :)

EURO Cup & Handle
EURO post as of March 1st 2009

Chart of the day (XLF)

2009-05-20-XLF-daily

Sunday, May 17, 2009

Introducing "The Discretionary Trader"

While I am on my "Birthday break" and totally away from the stock market ...damn.. /ES is down 2points... while I am not paying any attention to overseas market ... what's up with EUR - why is it down slightly ... so, while I am totally relaxed... and thinking "wine"...

Oh, the good old wine - we can enjoy it for a long time, but sooner or later we getting slightly bored with the very same backbone, slight bitterness punching our tongs and even knowing that there is nothing, but good about this wine - we want something slightly different ...may be at least once in a while ...NO, I am not alluding to family life - what the hell are you thinking?

Without further due I'd like to introduce new feature of Trading-to-Win.com:

"The Discretionary Trader"

New posts will appear on Sundays around  7-10PM EST and entire column will be written by guest writer "Hobbes"

Those of you who are regulars in the Trading Chat Room know Hobbes888, his ways of trading and expressing himself, but not many know WHO Hobbes really is - here is a little more information:

Hobbes cut his teeth on the FX trading desks of two major financial institutions, both of which are still barely with us, twenty eight years ago. Four years later you could find him at the Chicago Mercantile Exchange where he specialized in trading FX, Equity Indices, and Eurodollars. With the advent of electronic trading, he left the floor and the yelling behind in 2005 to trade behind a screen, where from 7am to 4pm he watches and waits, not always with patience, for a few good trades.

I will not be wasting your time anymore - the very first article is up on the site - read it and judge for yourselves if you will be checking this column every Sunday night (content of this column will NOT be emailed, but I'll do my best to notify readers when next post will be up or ...just remember - Sunday's nights)

DavidDT

P.S. And don't forget - TODAY is the LAST day of almost 50% off Worden TeleChart and StockFinder sale event.

Saturday, May 16, 2009

Cup & Handle 101

2009-05-16_1408

There will be no posts for few days - I am on my "Birthday Break" :)

Thursday, May 14, 2009

Just some clean family fun after stinky day







ThinkOrSwim - Best Barron's Online Broker 2009

This is what I wrote a while back in my review of few online brokers I have first hand experience with or have heard good reviews from people I trust:

"When I first discovered TOS, I was impressed as much as back in 1996 when I moved my account to DATEK. I think TOS is as cutting edge today as DATEK was before Ameritrade acquired it.
Multiple fee schedules for every taste and they are open for negotiation based on your trading volume.
Execution speed - if it is marketable order - I have not finished pushing "send order button" and message popping up confirming executed order. W O W
In addition when you place an order you SEE your order on level 2 ( based on your order ID)
The only broker I know who communicates REAL time any technical problem with traders over popup messages.
Desktop Trading software is on par with cockpit of space shuttle...and it WORKS...and it works so fast with such a huge amount of data transmitted that I keep wondering "how did they do that?". No delays, no hiccups, no problems.
( There is also Web Based trading, Cell Phone Trading, Pocket PC Trading - they got all covered )
Education they provide is THE BEST free education. PERIOD."

That was about a year ago, I was proud and happy to be a part of this newly found experience... I was.

Since then ThinkOrSwim deserved Barron's #1 ranking again - great...

Published at Barron's Online
MONDAY, MARCH 16, 2009

Blue Chips
By THERESA W. CAREY

Now, I generally agree with Barron's review and highlights, especially this one:

"There is a cloud in the sky, however, which is the recent acquisition of thinkorswim by TD Ameritrade,..."

Well, if that would be all - I, as a former DATEK customer, would not be too upset - after Ameritrade acquired DATEK they kept fees structure for former DATEK's customers and, speaking of DATEK's great trading interface (at that time) - have not changed it a bit for many years (well, they did introduce "Command Center" which is nothing more than sliced/diced original DATEK's famous STREAMER.

But here is another part of Barron's review which raised my eyebrows:

"The company had zero downtime in 2008"

Excuse me?

Well, may be if "downtime" is a complete failure of all services - including, but not limited to software AND web based AND phone support AND ... AND.... then MAY BE, then I will agree - there was no COMPLETE downtime, at least not as I know of.

BUT, there were and still going on "incidents" when applications freezes completely, data feed stops, order placement stops responding, charts freeze up (Slimmed down Prophet charts and TOS charts) and it constantly happens when market is on the move on high volume - just the time when customers NEED to be able to trade more than at any other moment.

True or not, TOS blames exchanges, data providers, traders' computers - anyone and anything, but themselves. 

Let me ask you that - for me, as a customer, trader, ACTIVE trader, why do I care "whose fault is that"?  And I was not born yesterday and I can separate brokerage's SERVERS and datalines bandwidth being inadequately beefed up from "bad quotes from exchanges" excuse - in my past life I was not the last grade computer professional, it is an insult to my intelligence when "3rd level tech support person" (who is in reality, most likely, simply an "in house" trader who gets some freebies for answering calls/chat) tells me that "I did not set something right" and wastes my time.

It saddens me indefinitely that (and I'd like to give credits where credits are due) one of the best (REALLY) brokerages out there, with the best software platform, ingenious people in charge (I respect Tom and Scott greatly for their ability to build unique kind of brokerage house and for the way they deal with customers, and educational resources they provide for their customers - for free) in attempts to increase customers' base (Per Barron's: "to $3 billion from $1.1 billion") to increase the value of the company - they let infrastructure lag as mush as it does now.  And at the end it does not matter if they added "30% or 40% capacity" - IF IT DOES NOT WORK - then it is NOT GOOD ENOUGH.

Brokerage, no matter how good it is, how good people are, how software is sophisticated - is ONLY AS GOOD AS CUSTOMER's ABILITY TO PLACE THE TRADE BASED ON RELIABLE INFORMATION/EXECUTION WHEN CUSTOMER NEEDS IT.

Otherwise - it is just a fancy GPS device with movie viewer, book reader, stars counting GPS - WHICH DOES NOT PROVIDE ROUTING RIGHT WHEN YOU NEED TO MAKE A SHARP TURN.

Wake up ThinkOrSwim - you CAN fix things...

It costs money to your customers, it costs health to your customers, it costs loss of respect for TOS and people who work there.

It costs ME loss of respect for MYSELF after calling you on the phone after one of "inexistent" hiccups and cursing my brains out in savage anger.

And least of all I need to hear from customer service who forced to listen to me shouting on the phone this question:

"What can we do for you?"

Because there is only one thing I might possibly need from online broker which is:

"I NEED TO BE ABLLE TO TRADE WHEN I NEED TO"

Wake up ThinkOrSwim - you CAN fix things...

CAN YOU?

Wednesday, May 13, 2009

One juicy (GOLD) Short

At the current time I am long GLD via 93 calls, I expect GLD to stall in few days @92.70 area, therefore I am looking to short Gold via miners - (GOLD) seems to be a prime candidate in few days.

Oh - I heard my friend T.K. liking it long...well, I will lose on that trade then :(

2009-05-13-GOLD

Tuesday, May 12, 2009

Natural Gas / UNG /NG

[This video was originally posted on Contributors Website few weeks ago]

Natural Gas / UNG /NG

Thursday, May 07, 2009

(AMGN) Trade Quiz

Do you see multiple possible trades here?  Timing of trades?  You do?  You are sooo goood...

AMGN-monthly 

If you are in doubts - it will be explained on Contributors Site this weekend.

Shall you be interested - here is how to get access to Contributors Website

P.S. Interestingly enough, after I posted Gold to the rescue Adam from Market Club made a video on gold...

Gold to the rescue

As I mentioned in Contributors email as of May 5th - I bought GLD Jul93 calls. Why? I like this chart (Can I be any more vague?)

2009-05-07-GLD-daily

Wednesday, May 06, 2009

Market Local Top

Exhausted today, so just a quick opinion - today marked "Local Top" for this move from March 6th lows. I will change my opinion if SPX will go above 936.61 on daily close.

Worden TeleChart / StockFinder Sale Event

You don't see me running lots of commercials here, but today you may say whatever you want because I will - today.

 

 

 

Worden TeleChart / StockFinder Running Sale Event magnitude of which I cannot recall for the last 4 years (Not once in the lifetime chance, but still once in a LONG time chance for those who understand that StockFinder is THE BEST STOCK MARKET SCANNING / Charting software bar none)

Platinum Service is $53 per month instead of regular $89.99 (don't you all love those "0.99"s? Only in America people are suspected of idiocy before proven otherwise) - that is right - you get PLATUNUM Full Intraday Data Service for the price comparable with Regular End of Day Gold Service!



 

If you are not able to find this offer online - calls 1-800-776-4940 and tells them that

DavidDT sent you (mention affiliate ID 638

and I will give you 1 month of FREE ACCESS to Contributors Site  with intraday updates, indicators library and almost daily market videos )

Promotion ends May 18th

Saturday, May 02, 2009

Tom DeMark Indicators Explained

There are very few resources available for traders who are interested in utilizing DeMark indicators.
Original Tom DeMark's books
The New Science of Technical Analysis (Wiley Finance)
New Market Timing Techniques: Innovative Studies in Market Rhythm & Price Exhaustion
are not an "easy read" and newly published Jason Pearl's book in spite of being detailed - is, sometimes, slightly confusing in some respects.
DeMark Indicators (Bloomberg Market Essentials: Technical Analysis)
I've been using DeMark indicators for many years now and over the course of running blog I have received number of questions such as "what, how, when" in respect to these indicators.
I spent a lot of time answering individual questions and I've come to the point when it has gotten slightly boring, too time consuming and unproductive to say the least.  So I decided to start a series of posts and educational videos.