I do mean NOW as you said. I don't know what will happen once the true baseline of the ETFs is descovered. I realize that baseline can change, but at least a neighborhood should be determinable once we are there for while. Once that happens, then I think it will be safe to make trades in either for swing trading. Right now FAS is the only safe swing trade, or even position trade, FAZ is only viable for day trades, or single overnight holds (including weekends) and hope you are right because it's not going to recover.
But FAS' overnight hold reliability will vanish if this rally turns around for a retracement, and then FAZ will be the best candidate for an overnight hold. A good market direction/timing will be key into making key moolah in these ETF's just like everything else.
I think even Direxion says that the true baseline is ZERO. You're over thinking this waaaay too much. Basically, what your statements boil down to is this: "We've been in a bull market so if you've been holding either of these, then it should have been FAS." Keep it simple. Forget all that type of analysis. Find a trend, on whatever time frame works for you. Then buy dips.
Direxion doesn't actually say that the baseline value is zero, there are assets and derivitives registered and held behind both ETFs. Direxion does however say these ETFs target active traders, not investors. However you are absolutely right about trends. There is a saying, or rather two sayings. "The trend is your friend" and "Don't buck the trend"
ok I know I said I was out, but I bought FAS at 11.11 with the appearance of the current up trend. I am in profit zone now, will watch and get out as soon as things go south.
Ok price is currently 11.62, I placed a 15 cent trailing stop. worst case now is a 2.6% gain. If it climbs through to close, I'll cancel that order and get out with the profits.
I've found that inside bars and NR7 bars make for pretty good entries on FAS/FAZ. Cyan bars are inside, white are NR7. The horizontal lines are high/low/close from yesterday. I have pivots on there but don't really pay them much attention. My bias was up due to the opening gap. I sold half the position at 1R:
Stop executed at 11.66. Made an extra 4% for the week. That's somewhere near 35% for the week. Not too bad. And I am also clear in the black again, I made back all my cost basis that I lost last week. That puts a smile on my face. Now lets see if I can keep it next week, and move a step forward instead of 2 steps back. EDIT: if I had $25k cost basis I would have made over $8000 this week. Of course that means I lost $8000 last week, but if I were over $25k I wouldn't have lost that much money, because I wouldn't have trapped myself like a moron without day trades to get out of a position.