Crazy! It’s like yesterday was a mistake they tried to erase.
I suppose you could say that everyone went home and reflected that they overreacted to Google’s news yesterday but that didn’t help Google, who ended the day flat, still $110 off it’s Jan high.
Although there was a lot of energy and commodity gains, the broad market was a sea of green with an incredible batch of stocks gaining 1% or more. The indices came very close to my targets just today and the way they came out of the gate I was comfortable trading all day. With Dow at 11,150, Nas 2,314 and S&P 1,291 there is nothing to complain about as it more than retraced our losses. From a technical standpoint it gives the weekly charts a nice stair up sort of pattern that looks really positive.
Have I flipped to bull? Not yet, I still want to make the new highs that we talked about this morning but I did leave 1/2 my money in which is a lot more than I’ve been doing.
Oil behaved as expected on an in-line inventory report, it was pumped up right at the close to give it a +.28 for the day, keeping it above that critical $62 mark. Try to remember this is exactly what we wanted because we need to pump these suckers back up so we can short them again!
Gold maintained $565 which put the gold stocks back on the move but we should wait for a $570 confirmation before going back there.
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I ended my day on Google with a spread of the $380s and the $350 puts – each for $8.50, looking for $20 in either direction on tomorrow’s conference. My goal is to increase my put position but I wasn’t going to leave anything to chance overnight.
In comments, Christopher pointed out THX as a potentialand I like it enough to mention it here. They are an exploration and production firm that is managing to miss estimates 2 quarters in a row on declining production. Like any good company, they blame the hurricanes (just like our friends at WFMI and look at them now!). Hurricanes notwithstanding, I’m not paying the same price for $4 in earnings as I did for $5 in earnings last year so we can take todays bounce off the 200 dma as an entry point and grab the $55 puts for .95 as long as the Valero rule permits tomorrow.
Obviously everything worked again today, but some better than others:
COST ran up another 2% today and the Apr $42.50s are now $1.75 (up 40%) I took that off the table as I’m not greedy and will hold the Jan ’08 $45s at $12.90 (up 20%) with no need to take the puts as I’m already up 25% on the total trade!
PLAY started well and ended badly, leaving me confused on that one. I will check into it but I’m not happy…
CMCSA took off today, looking very strong with a 2% gain. Jan $27.50s moved lightly up to $3 (up 20%).
MSFT tacked on a point, moving the $27.50s up a dime (just .20). This would be a big buy tomorrow if the Nasdaq continues up.
TXN, my baby, my favorite tech stock racked up 7% today! Back on the 24th I said: “TXN is on some strange little trip, hopefully it will bottom next week. The Nasdaq needs them and INTC to recover in order to break up to the next level.” You can still hope for a pullback but the Apr $32.50s are already $1.30.
CY, my baby, my favorite tech stock (I do this with my 2 daughters as well!) racked up 3.7% today! The $17.50s ended at $1.25 – up 60% for the day!!! I took 1/2 off the table as SPWR dropped at the end of the day.
INTC is dragging at $20.80, 35% off its recent highs. Jan $20s are only up .10 to $2.75 and could be huge in a real tech rally. I had said to sell the Apr $22.50s when they get to .50 and they are already at .35 so this is working out just right.
CHIR looks like it is being held down, very odd pattern:
http://stockcharts.com/gallery/?chir
Fellow bird flu vaccinator BCRX gained 2.3% today.
INFY snapped back 2.2% and looks like it’s back on the move. BTW – My new year’s pick of the India stock exchange is a real winner but I still haven’t figured out how to make money on it! CNBC is catching up on me, running a feature on the India markets tonight.
NT powered through the 200 dma right at the bell to finish at $3.01 (up 5.24%) but gave us no doubts all day with the kind of chart you put a gold star on:
http://finance.yahoo.com/q/bc?s=NT&t=1d
PD racked up 2.5% today, it’s a long way back to $162! Let’s keep the $145s on the burner for $3.70 if copper keeps going up.
SHLD was way up but got nervous heading into tomorrow’s retail report. If we get good numbers we may need to grab the calls.
http://finance.yahoo.com/q/bc?s=SHLD&t=1d
MTU looks like it will explode if it cracks $15!
http://finance.yahoo.com/q/bc?s=MTU&t=1d
TOTD BIIB gave us a nice low entry point (I took my first batch at $8 and my second at $7.20) which worked out great as the stock recovered and the Jan $45s finished at $8.30 (up 8%). This is a great example of why you should ease into a trade!
SPLS has now made an embarrassing amount of money with the Apr $22.50s now at $2.80 (up 170% from Monday’s pick). As you may have guessed, I’m out of that one!
CSCO went crazy now that it’s got out from under that $20 barrier! Up 4% today, the Jul $20s ended at $2, up 40% for the day…
GM performed as predicted. I would have rather it ran up more so I could have shorted it for the 4th time!
Tomorrow could actually confirm a real rally! Let’s keep our fingers crossed…
