I love it when this happens. I made a nice compelling case for why you have to own stocks, be a buyer, be a bull, be BOLD!! and then today the market is very weak. I would not be suprised to see a trend day to the downside in fact, and that is how I am playing things. My longs in MDY and IWM have both been closed, i got a nice profit out of both of them. I closed KF on the open as well, any stock that just gaps like that overnight, I don't want to be waking up in a sweat worried about a stock, so it's best to just get rid of it. I broke even on KF. EWJ and EWS are both still open. I think that Asia is at the beginning of a secular bull market very much like we saw in the US beginning in the early 1980's. LCAV is doing very well, but its a trade and a bit extended so I took half of that off and have moved my stop to breakeven on the balance of it.
My only open positions are now shorts. UNH, SMH, WLP. I am no longer long a single share of a single stock.
<brandon> one thing I want to address <brandon> this is obviously a very nasty welloff <brandon> and much stronger than I had thought we would get <brandon> However there is a ton of bad news out there <brandon> the yield curve is of course inverted <brandon> this has a 100% correlation with a recession <brandon> ONE HUNDRED PERCENT <brandon> the situation with Iran continues it seems to get worse every single day <brandon> and there is no solution in sight <brandon> also if you look at earnings <brandon> they have been coming out bad <brandon> and companies are guiding lower going forward <brandon> so far this has been a very disapointing earnings season <brandon> However <brandon> up until today the market has shrugged all of this off <brandon> and moved higher <brandon> this is what bull markets do <brandon> bull markets are also subject to large moves down <brandon> days that scare the hell out of everyone <brandon> bring the bears out of their caves <brandon> and then move higher <brandon> for any of you who are serious about trading <brandon> I would strongly encourage you to go back and look at the Composite <brandon> see how it traded from about Oct of 1998 till March of 2000 <brandon> this was the "big bull" <brandon> you will see that big flush outs are common <brandon> even nasty scary end of the world days like today <brandon> it happens <brandon> am I saying thats all today is? <brandon> No <brandon> I dont even know what im having for dinner this evening <brandon> so im not going to make a long term market call <brandon> but this selling is accelerating <brandon> and its pretty broad based <brandon> we have all the iran stuff as mentioned etc etc <brandon> you can make a strong case either direction <brandon> so <brandon> what is a trader to do <brandon> anyone with some suggestions? <brandon> what do you guys think should be done? <brandon> How do we best approach this? <brandon> lets have some thoughts <brandon> make a list <brandon> that is something you should always be doing <brandon> pullbacks are golden opportunities to find leaders <brandon> PRAA is also a stock that will do well in a recession btw <brandon> it recovers bad debt <brandon> PRAA is like the repo man <brandon> and thats a good business to be in when times are hard <brandon> also pawn shops <brandon> these are all good <brandon> and these are things to be looking for <brandon> for me the plan going forward <brandon> it will remain the same <brandon> that is to say <brandon> I have seen very bullish signs <brandon> if you look at the monthly chart of the Nasdaq composite <brandon> (very nice find mike) <brandon> its a strong breakout <brandon> the type that normally has wings <brandon> but what i have found is this <brandon> during the course of the day <brandon> if i change course <brandon> it is not as well thought out as if i do it in the evening <brandon> I do much better to give up a little in terms of flexability (ie not change course intraday) <brandon> so right now my idea is still to be a buyer <brandon> however <brandon> this weekend i will certainly evaluate that closer than most weeks <brandon> and i will be making the list of stocks to short <brandon> sectors and groups <brandon> single stocks <brandon> a few things that i can think of right off the top of my head are semi's and health maintaince <brandon> and right now we have good positions there in SMH, UNH, WLP <brandon> each of these are formly strong groups/sectors that have very recently turned negative <brandon> they each have a lot of institutional sponsorship <brandon> and that means a lot of people doing the same tired thing <brandon> and when they hit the doors <brandon> they will do it together <brandon> You know trading markets is doing the playboy contest <brandon> were the playmates are picking their 5 favorite stocks <brandon> and the winner gets i think 50K donated to charity <brandon> as of monday a few of them were beating almost all of the nearly 12K mutual fund managers in the country <brandon> but that is easy to do <brandon> any of you <brandon> if you go out there with the goal to beat the market <brandon> can do much better than most of these guys <brandon> anyone want to tell me why? <brandon> thats one edge you have <brandon> and its a big one <brandon> but another you have is thsi <brandon> most mutual fund guys are not trying to beat the market <brandon> most of them are happy to be average or worse <brandon> they are a bunch of clowns <brandon> thats not to say all of them suck <brandon> they dont <brandon> there are some very talented traders and analysts in mutual fund land <brandon> and in fact some of the very smartest people i know are analysts and portfolio managers at mutual funds <brandon> I make a strong effort to put myself out and get to know fund managers at hedge funds, insurance companies, mutual funds etc <brandon> you have to stretch yourself to learn <brandon> and i have learned a great deal talking to them <brandon> there are some guys out there who know more about picking a stock and looking at a balance sheet etc than I could dream of knowing (though I am trying to learn from them) <brandon> but the biggest reason is that most <brandon> and i must stress MOST <brandon> because as i said there are some remarkable guys and gals out there <brandon> but most of these people dont want to stand out from the crowd <brandon> they want to run with the pack <brandon> why? <brandon> because to be exceptional <brandon> you run the risk of being exceptionally wrong <brandon> and if you do that you will lose your job <brandon> and most of these guys when it comes down to it are 9 to 5 corporate ass kissers <brandon> and all they want to do is match their benchmark <brandon> or not miss it too badly if they match it <brandon> if the index is up 6% <brandon> they want to be up 6% <brandon> if they are up 13% <brandon> they probably had to go out on a limb <brandon> to think <brandon> to take the chance of being wrong <brandon> and if they were only up 4% the marketing department could not sell them as easily <brandon> and they might lose their comfortable job <brandon> but if they just pretty much index themselves <brandon> and if bob makes sure he is pretty much doing what joe is doing who makes sure he is pretty much doing what suzy does who is making sure she pretty much does what alan does <brandon> you get the picture <brandon> its pretty bleak for your money <brandon> but it keeps the system in place <brandon> you as an independant trader also have a ton of flexability they do not have <brandon> you can go to cash <brandon> you can go short <brandon> you can be in any damn stock you want <brandon> and THAT IS YOUR BIGGEST EDGE
<brandon> when you find a stock that the mutual fund, pension fund, bank and insurance guys would LOVE TO OWN <brandon> but <brandon> no analysts are following it <brandon> or very few <brandon> and its got a small market cap for the time being <brandon> and small volume for the time being <brandon> you have hit gold <brandon> thats one of the things I love so much about TRLG <brandon> This is a company that grew its earnings by 560% last qtr and sales by 376% <brandon> the qtr before that earnings grew by 800% and sales by 442% <brandon> yet there is not a single major analyst following this stock <brandon> and only 18% funds own it <brandon> 18 funds rather <brandon> and together they own only 13% of the shares outstanding <brandon> once True Religion catches on <brandon> once it becomes acceptable to them <brandon> they will dog pile this stock <brandon> and we will be sitting in something that will go up 300% or more <brandon> and we can then sell when the ducks are qwacking <brandon> This is the kind of situation you want to spend your entire trading life looking for <brandon> stocks just like trlg <brandon> becasue they will make your career <brandon> and you only need to find a couple <brandon> if you find one or two a year <brandon> your going to go great <brandon> let me give you an example for illustration purpose <brandon> lets say based upon your points of purchase you put 15% of your port into the buddah (True Religion) <brandon> now lets assume that trlg continues to grow its revenues like crazy and its earnings the same <brandon> also the market cap gets above 500million so some funds that can not buy stocks with market caps under half a billion can now all of the sudden buy <brandon> its revenue continues to grow <brandon> so that it finally gets above 100million for the year (currently its 90) <brandon> so all of the funds that cant buy stocks with less than 100million <brandon> it all the sudden shows up on their radar too <brandon> now a few analysts start to follow it and write a nice report <brandon> a couple hedge funds buy it <brandon> then a few mutual funds <brandon> maybe even some banks and insurance companies (but probably not) <brandon> anyway <brandon> before you know it you have a stampede on your hands <brandon> and the buddah goes up 400% <brandon> what does this do to you? <brandon> it sure as hell doesnt hurt <brandon> your sitting with a 60% gain on your entire account even if you dont do ding dittly ding dang dong with the rest of it <brandon> and you guys are in a position to find these kind of stocks every year <brandon> they dont come around every day <brandon> or even every qtr with a setup <brandon> but they are out there every year <brandon> before they became big names we had tzoo, tasr, mcri, bxxx, knot <brandon> KNOT was taken here in August when it was under $7.50 per share <brandon> and at that time its volume was only about 10K a day <brandon> but it was one of the best stocks in a hot sector <brandon> its gotten picked up now <brandon> and there are some people here who still have that who are doing great
I took gains off on UNH from 58.35, put stops @ breakeven on the balance. I am covering my short in the SMH here with a nice profit. Also closing PRAA, I may look back # this in a couple months and realize I was eral stupid - but right now too many people are hot on this idea since JJC gave it as well. Other open is WLP short, I am also ligtening my load on this one. If SCHN trades under 29.75 I will be shorting.
Brandon. When I went on the sec.gov website I could only find an advisor with the name Brandon in either CA or TN. Since your profile shows you in FL I assume these are not you. Can you give me your firm name or a link to your Your SEC Form ADV? http://www.adviserinfo.sec.gov/IAPD/Content/Search/iapd_OrgSearch.aspx I need either your IARD/CRD # or your SEC #. Thanks.