Like I had said, there was no sell-off in the first half hour, I went long SPY at 140.60 and long ES at 1405.75. ES started selling-off after that so I decided to get out at 1401.75 (which ended up being the low too). I have my stop at 139.60 on the SPY. If today is a valid break-out then SPY should not come down to 139.60. Since the market went up without coming down to its 13WMA, I'll put a trailing stop about 0.25 below the weekly low. I do not think that I want to touch ES here, I might try that again in 2007. Right now nothing to do besides sit tight.
You're overtrading and churning your account. You can last for a long time doing this with the SPY, but the ES wil eat-you-up. You should commit your ideas to paper before you actually trade them, then see how they work with real cash only after giving them several weeks/months of paper trading (of course, once you commit the cash everything will change anyway). JJ
I exited with a profit of 1 pt. in SPY. I do not really like to stay with a long position if the Russell and Nasdaq underperform the SP. I have tested and traded this strategy for a while and I have been making money. Most of my losses were when I was trading ES not SPY. Here is when I'll get long. 1) SP comes down to 1380. 2) SP closes at the high of the week on coming Friday.
Do you short the SPY (or buy SPY puts) when its overbought?, or do you only look for bullish opportunities when the SPY is in an uptrend? Jeff
I never short SPY, if I have to short I'll use ES. With regards to SPY, if I'm bearish then I'll go to cash and wait for another opportunity.
I agree with staying out of short trades when the market is this bullish. In the last 4 months since early August (when the SPX had a 20dma/50dma bullish cross), the market has only had follow-thru price action to the downside on a few rare occassions. The majority of any short attempts have been stopped out. On the other hand its been nearly impossible to loss on a bullish index position, if you discontinue the use of stop losses. Lets face it, we are in a strong uptrend. a lossing bullish position has to come back and make a new high and save any ailing bullish position, or else the indexes would no longer be an uptrend. At least that's what I have found. Jeff
Jeff: That's not how I trade. Just because this market is in an uptrend is no good reason to "not" have a stop. In the last 4 months it has certainly seemed as if all long trades have made money but the market can turn on a dime. I am basically trading the trend and momentum. If I enter and the momentum dies, even though the market is in an uptrend, I'll get out. Utilities, Russell and Nasdaq have underperformed SP in the last few days which is a little alarming. The yield is going up too. With all these scenarioes I would rather sit out and get back in either 1) when the market pulls back or 2) if it closes at the high of the week tomorrow.