WallStrip

Say what you want about the man, but this is an entertaining interview, and he comes across as funny and honest. He seems to be missing that filter normal people have between what is thought and what is said (short WallStrip?) but that's also what makes him come across as refreshingly direct.

We find it somewhat amusing how much bad press this man receives and somehow, perversely, that motivates us, in turn, to give him some good press. Sure he's into self-promotion, but that's his gig. No reason to hate. Anyway, he won a place on our blog (and no, we don't trade nor have any interest in trading penny stocks).

The Ultimate Blow-out

One of our very own, a "plain vanilla" futures trader (except of the French variety) causes a 7 Billion loss, and very possibly was one of the determining factors in this week's world plunge. Of course this makes the Fed action somewhat hilarious (ultimately it stands to reason that the Fed cut an intrameeting 75 pts because of a 31 yr old trader's fraudulent antics) .... as they say, truth is stranger than fiction.

Our guess is that on Jan 30, the Fed will still cut 25-50 points, only if to save face.

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"Separately, the U.S. Federal Reserve remains comfortable with its decision to cut interest rates Tuesday in spite of news today that the preceding stock selloff may have been related to a rogue trader, a Fed official said. The official said the Fed didn't know of Société Générale's unwinding of positions when it cut rates. Nonetheless, the Fed remains as comfortable now with its decision as it was Monday night, when it was made, the official said."


Source: WSJ

Update

We got our break of 42 support on the Q's and the subsequent bounce, all on excellent volume. If we can get this swine of a market to close on the highs, this would be an excellent indicator for a short-term bottom.

There are very few good looking longs going into tomorrow, and we'll be looking at very minor spots (30 min also instead of daily) in order to find something for our members.

QQQQ

QQQQ has support on 42 -- which is being touched as we write this post. A failure at this level and then a reversal above on excellent volume would be bullish. However, looking at things it seems that it is just a matter of time before we hit 36 support later this year. Nothing goes straight down, however, and some kind of bottoming action most likely will be coming soon. Nostra culpa for trying to game it before we actually hit support-- be it a small bet, no excuse, it's just bad trading.

We were looking for a 20% hair-cut earlier in Jan and we're almost there in Nas 100.

And to conclude, the Fed is an idiot.

Why the Fed needs a Technical Advisor

It would have been infinitely better to let the market open down, panic sell-off, and then around 2:30PM (classic reversal time) bring out a surprise cut and get the shorts scrambling for air.

Nevertheless, the market is holding well but we've still got 90 minutes to go.... we'll see how they close this pig. Any close around this area (Dow down 150 points) would be relatively bullish. Absolute nightmare scenario for the bulls would be a close on the lows.

And yes, we bought our 3rd installment of Nasdaq calls this morning. As stated before this is not how we trade, and it's a very small bet. Our buy today is very green, but two buys from last week are very red. We'll see how it goes.... even though losing it all wouldn't be a bad thing either to teach us to stick to what we know best. Short weakness, buy Strength (unless at key support/resistance level in oversold/overbought markets).