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1:21pm
Market is setting up for a nice pop here as we approach the 61.8% retracement.

8:19am
Markets pulled back slightly before a potentially dismal job report number. A lot of it might be factored in, but I’m certainly not the one to be playing this markets from both sides just yet. Yesterday I said that playing a long at 61.8% retracement on the SPY seems to be the safe way. Even though the 50% seemed to hold pretty well yesterday, it might break today. I’ll be looking to purchase some calls on the SPY at 89$, with a tight stop.


Idan

The views, opinions and analysis expressed in this post are strictly those of the author.
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305 Responses to “Intraday Commentary 01/09/2009”

  1. dumbpainter says:

    $RUT is leading the pack…

  2. Schweizer says:

    $SPX retakes the 20ma/10m. Not shooting for the 50ma/10m.

    Ali and Fraser!

    Schweizer replied:

    “Now” I meant.

    dumbpainter replied:

    someone doesn’t want to hold the ma.

  3. Shanky "Ultra Bear Man" says:

    Either 60m MACD whipsaw or brealout or we have to wait till monday AM to see what’s gonna happen. That would suck.

  4. woo says:

    that was an interesting drop…

  5. prsel says:

    Forgotten who mentioned about the dollar, UUP just reached high of the day.

  6. Shanky "Ultra Bear Man" says:

    the 60m and daily spx are telling exact opposite. Daily almost a sell and 60m almost a buy. boy is that confusing. I’d like to see the 60m kick it up one more time just for an even better bull trap.

  7. Schweizer says:

    Sellerss I think will win as the RED team has the GREEN team outnumbered. (volume bars)

  8. Mohan says:

    I am just catching up. JPM at news lows for the day.

    Shanky "Ultra Bear Man" replied:

    you are a little late to the game professor.

    Mohan replied:

    Why am I late? I just came when bears are closing the day with an upper hand. I got back into my FAZ this morning, remember? :-)

    Ten years or so ago my mantra used to “all stocks are designed to sell. So, no wonder they go to hell.”

  9. woo says:

    this is just ridiculous…haha

  10. Schweizer says:

    FLASH.

    $INDU and $TRAN are under the 50dma.

    Uh oh.

  11. pmesdjian says:

    Feels like ES is going to close on the lows today.

  12. Mohan says:

    Treasuries were up for the day. However, the sell off in Treasuries may continue: Bull flag on the daily charts for Treasury short fund TBT abd bear flag on TLT.

    One would expect stocks to stage a rip-roaring rally in the face of recent sell off in bonds. Hmmmm.

    ZEROSUM replied:

    i think when the treasuries / stock relationships begin to act in an odd way will be an ominous sign

  13. Shanky "Ultra Bear Man" says:

    60m giving signs of a fakeout. Daily wins. South we go.

    Schweizer replied:

    The magic number is 888.74 for the 50 dma.

    Schweizer replied:

    Hit 888.31.

    OK …. maybe need a L I T T L E L O W E R..

  14. Q4 says:

    I have positions in:

    SRS, ERY, FAZ, TZA, SMN, EFU

    but I will close most of them…

    Schweizer replied:

    Smart. Congrats.

  15. draino76(uberbear) says:

    What was that James Brown song?

  16. woo says:

    my numbers hit exactly. sold my spy puts that i bought at 900 for a 15-20% profit.

    Jerry48 replied:

    nice trade woo. I didn’t get in til a little later. sold my SSO puts for a 8% profit. Thanks for the insight today.

    woo replied:

    still a really good trade jerry. glad you got in on it. This 1 wave still has room to go down and 2-3 days left to finish. right now is a perfect place for a bounce for the 4 of the 5 wave down in this 1 wave. i’ll be buying puts at the top of monday and hope to cash into the drop that might hit 866 range. but we’ll see how things go on monday.

    Jerry48 replied:

    Wish you could post a chart of your count — EWT is so confusing to read, let alone see! :-) I assume you could do a screen capture of your chart and post it as a photo. No? Yes?

    Jerry48 replied:

    that is, confusing to see, let alone read! :-)

    woo replied:

    i shall try and post something very soon.

    Jerry48 replied:

    I will anticipate it! Thanks.

  17. Valerie says:

    clunk. 888 held once….

  18. Tom (formally know as tom) says:

    oh well,….I’ve had better days…:(

    Schweizer replied:

    At least the 50 was kissed. A bit late in the day to put on any size.

    Ben replied:

    Same here. Holding long (slightly in the red) position till I’m either green or inauguration–whichever comes first. I do not think we’ll be hitting new lows till February at the earliest.

  19. ckeltner says:

    Q’s still above support

  20. transform2012 says:

    Phew! Was that shoveling coal or what! That took some real patience and perserverance. Congrats to the shorts. If you made money today, you earned it.

    transform2012 replied:

    Oh and how about that PPT? They were so active you could smell ‘em.

    Schweizer replied:

    Well called and played. I was thinking about you and had the 1m playing out on one of my screen.

    Awesome man!

    So what’s next? You suggested the Bears could take a rest now right?

    transform2012 replied:

    Well, it’s going to require some homework this weekend before I make any decisions. Oscar, Peter Eliades, Bob McHugh are all saying we have more downside with targets in the 850-860 range and possibly lower. But I have to be honest, that was a tough count today — really threw me for a loop when it went sideways all day. I’m curious to see what DanEric has to say about today’s action. I’m real curious about that.

    Schweizer replied:

    The 50dma needs to come into the discussion. It won’t give way very easily since we lost it once, which can be expected. This time there will be more emphasis to have it hold.

    Perhaps a deep stab Monday and close above. Hmmm ….

    Have a good one Mr. T. We enjoy your insights.

    farsighted replied:

    yep, more downside; we need a small correction however. Maybe gap up on Monday, then more of the slide…

  21. moved alot to cash with 3 minutes to the close. ahhhhhhhh … i will sleep well this weekend. still have some srs. srs will go to 60 after all? made me sweat :)

    Q4 replied:

    Same, I have sold all 6 of my leveraged short positions in the last 4 mins. Have some good sleep during the weekend haha.

    transform2012 replied:

    Same. Sold out of SPY puts and TZA. Did OK. Time for a cigar. Have a great weekend.

  22. Tom (formally know as tom) says:

    I have a new trading rule for myself. Never trade while on Vicodin. Have a good weekend everyone!

    Schweizer replied:

    Glad you’re back in the grove Tom. I still held my DXO. Thanks for prompting me to look into Oil. I may be cursing you on Monday though, so save some of that Vicodin, I may have to ask you to mail some to me. :-)

    Mohan replied:

    Are you Rush Limbaugh lurking here? :-)

    woo replied:

    lol. another rule is: never text message while on morphine. one time i was in the hospital after a surgery and was on tons of morphine. later that night when i got home i checked my text messages and realized i could not type or spell words correctly and i had cuss words in every text i sent.

    Schweizer replied:

    LOL

  23. Schweizer says:

    Good chat today everyone, even though I ended flat. We learn a lot from each other.

  24. dumbpainter says:

    just counted 9 empty big ships anchored in the San Francisco Bay…never seen that many just hangin’ out before.

    Schweizer replied:

    Look at this:
    http://social.stocktock.com/profiles/blogs/picture-worth-a-thousand-words

    dumbpainter replied:

    holy joly moly, that is beautiful in a twisted unabomber kinda way…thanks for sharing.

  25. GenXexec says:

    Not an expert, but I’m looking at the daily SPY and it looks SUPER bearish to me. If I’m drawing it correctly, it looks to me as though it broken 20day sma, 50day sma and broken below the rising channel (or is it a wedge).

    Let me know what you guys think. I held my SPY puts. Don’t normally like to, but it looked pretty nasty.

    Q4 replied:

    why not exchange w/ a lower strike put to reduce risk?

    draino76(uberbear) replied:

    Agree. I’ve been 100% short since the low vol drift up at the new year. Re evaluated my shorts in the last 10 minutes and ‘feelin good’ abiut holdin over the weekend.

    woo replied:

    i actually got out of my spy puts, but was really debating buying some feb puts to hold into monday, or some closer strike puts going into monday. 3 waves generally extend about 1.618 of the 1 wave. since we’re looking at intraday waves, it might not apply as much, but so far this down movement has only been 12-13 points compared to the 23-24 points of the 1st movement down. this 3rd movement could easily extend down to the 860’s making the bigger 1 of 3 end between 862-866.

    i see the 842 range (50 retrace of 741-943) almost certain and the 818 range very plausible before this complete wave ends and a rally into february begins.

    but this 888 is supposed to create some good bounce and could easily start the 4 already. so i guess we’ll see how things go monday.

  26. Mrinmoy says:

    Even the average volume nowadays is low, but relative higher volume is coming on upside in 10min, daily charts and hooping 120Mil shares in just a minute gave S&P a 4 pt pop at eod from the 50d MA. This tells me that market is preparing for another upside move.
    Let’s see next week if that becomes the case. I cleared my shorts yesterday and became long today.

  27. pmesdjian says:

    NY ROUNDUP – Friday, January 9, 2009

    HIGHLIGHTS

    · US December non-farm payrolls drop 524,000, unemployment 7.2% – near expectations
    · US Treasury Paulson: More bank capital needed for recovery
    · Richmond FED Lacker: Sharp rate cut was the right call
    · US ECRI weekly inflation gauge at 50-year lows
    · US November wholesale inventories drop 0.6%, sales drop 7.1% – worse than expected

    COMMENTS

    The US jobs report usually is the “prime mover” of markets. As usual this leads to a blindness about other risks and news. Today with a 7.2% unemployment rate and over 1 mn jobs lost between December and November we saw other stories dominate as expectations for a very weak report proved sadly true. Markets had pre-priced the mayhem of a miserable economy. But then the real stories started and the jobs myopia began to disappear for a different set of concerns: 1) Lennar. A website blog accused the building company of running a “ponzi scheme” effectively using its subsidiaries to book contracts. This was denied by the CEO who noted that the joint ventures were reduced because of the economic downturn – but the damage was done and stocks went down on the risks of more trouble. 2) TARP 2. The comments from Barney Frank on the new legislation purposed: “a certain amount is going to have to go for foreclosure relief.” The better spreads for corporate debt – Libor – increased CP – all have been noted in the GS FDI improvement. The comments of Obama and Frank today added to view that TARP 2 would shift focus from banks to consumers. Banks that already received money from TARP began to underperform today. 3) Morgan Stanley and Citigroup in talks about merging Smith Barney brokerage unit. This headline confused the market into the close but it foreshadows the consolidation that many expect to happen in the US financial industry. Rubin also said he plans to retire from Citibank joining ranks of other senior professionals. The equity close remains bearish unwinding the nascent rally from January 2 as the S&P500 ends well below 903. 4) Gaza. While the headlines remain less plentiful than the start of the year the sad outcome of a two-pronged war with the truce ignored matters and the oil market continues to waffle with each inflection point even as we close the week with oil at $40 rather than $50. 5) Ukraine. The Russian game of shutting off natural gas flows in winter has shifted into a higher gear and hopes for a compromise from EU intervention hasn’t yet worked. For the weekend this may change but for now its one important driver for destabilization in EU and the EUR reflects this. EUR also reflects some doubt that the ECB gets the risks ahead as all the data pointed to a terrible economy and yet financial conditions remain very tight. The risk for more Greek like riots in other parts of Europe should be one risk not yet priced should ECB hold to its hawkish talk of inaction. S&P cut Greek and Irish debt outlook to negative. 6) Lacker. The Richmond FED hawk continues to warn on inflation – something market wasn’t hoping to hear and added to concerns that the FED remains quick to reverse the QE program. This comment was far different from the one market hoped for. Bottom Line: Put on some glasses! Markets are not chasing momentum but trading on a new set of fundamentals – this is a trading market not a trending one. Consolidation in the FX market this week was the surprise result as we opened Monday with the EUR at 1.37 and close the EUR at 1.3450 – well off the 1.3312 low but below the key moving averages. The same story holds for AUD, CHF – but that isn’t the case for JPY or GBP – which close stronger and holding well to a USD bear trend. So expect the crosses like EUR/GBP or CHF/JPY to be the key debate as markets doubt fiat reserve currencies into next week.

    CURRENCIES

    Cross Low High

    EUR/USD 1.3415 1.3754 Close: 1.3433
    USD/JPY 90.15 91.66 Close: 90.48
    EUR/JPY 121.16 125.23 Close: 121.54
    GBP/USD 1.5127 1.5350 Close: 1.5131
    EUR/GBP 0.8838 0.8990 Close: 0.8877
    USD/CHF 1.0909 1.1191 Close: 1.1146
    EUR/CHF 1.4948 1.5055 Close: 1.4972
    AUD/USD 0.7015 0.7108 Close: 0.7040
    USD/CAD 1.1784 1.1970 Close: 1.1870
    NZD/USD 0.5888 0.5948 Close: 0.5931

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