As it’s the last day of the month I’ve been totting-up my results for November.
I couldn’t really say that I trade completely full-time as there are quite a few days where I am not in front of a laptop due to holidays/day’s out/hobbies etc. but out of the 12 days where I did trade, I managed a total of 1153 pips from my 3 trading systems – and my beginner’s evening strategy (Trade With A Day Job) contributed nearly 300 pips of that total.
09:55am (CET) ~ No trading for me again today – there will still be low volume in the markets I usually concentrate on, and the S&P500 is only open for a few hours today so that traders can adjust their positions ahead of Monday’s trading session which sees the release of PMI manufacturing data for the main European economies. This means there’s no evening trading for me either as my “Trade With A Day Job” uses that one index.
Despite the absence of the US yesterday, Europe’s markets saw another positive day yesterday with the German DAX 30 continuing to make record highs and broader European markets also remaining bullish despite concerns over the strength of the recovery in Europe. One bit of bad news is going to be the Italian unemployment numbers which are not expected to improve, remaining at 12.5%, another record with youth unemployment remaining above 40%. The FTSE ended broadly flat as an initial rise was cancelled out after the Governor of the Bank of England Mark Carney announced that he was slowing bank assistance for house buyers in the UK, which resulted in housebuilder’s shares heading south.
09:20am (CET) ~ There will be no trading for me today as the U.S. markets are closed for their Thanksgiving holiday so there will be a distinct lack of volume on the S&P futures, one of my favourite instruments to trade. There is only limited opening of the U.S. stock exchange tomorrow so I’ll not be in front of my charts now until the new month starts next week.
As the U.S. markets are closed today, the European markets are likely to be fairly subdued and expected to open mixed this morning, with the Dax 30 in particular expected to open higher as positive consumer confidence gives a boost to the market plus German politicians have finally agreed a deal for a grand coalition that should see a government in place by Christmas.
Asia markets have had a fairly positive session overnight, reacting to a positive US session with the Nikkei closing in on its highest levels since May this year as markets continue to respond well to Japanese economic data. Over in the UK, the London FTSE 100 generally takes it’s lead from Wall Street we may see subdued trading for the next few days although the overall outlook still remains bullish with relatively low unemployment and fairly good GDP figures expected.
WTI Crude prices took another drop yesterday after it was revealed that stockpiles have grown more than expected, they are now sitting at 391 million barrels, an increase of 3 million over last week.
I have been asked a few times recently about my “Daily Trade Target” so I thought I would include a short explanation here today.
My daily target has been 20 pips for as long as I can remember (certainly back to the 1990′s) and traders who have been in the markets for any length of time will know that this very small daily profit, if compounded, will result in phenomenal earnings over a few years. There is no real need to strive for hundreds of pips per day, it is just not worth the stress, it is far better to just trade for a few hours a day whenever the mood takes you, rather than working long hours in front of your charts – if you want to work 30 – 40 hours a week, get a normal job !
My beginner’s trading system (Trade With A Day Job) has this small target for each trade and when you are learning to trade having this small target to aim for promotes confidence and keeps stress at bay, which is needed in the beginning of any career.
For more info on compounding, just email me here
09:25am (CET) ~ I was up quite early this morning – and have already had a cycle ride down into Calpe and back together with 20 lengths of the pool to finish my exercise session. I have a few meetings here during the day and there is talk of some clay-pigeon shooting at a friends house further up the hill. Light volume in the markets ahead of tomorrow’s U.S. holiday may quieten any trading opportunities today, I will come back to my charts every so often to keep an eye on them.
The U.S. markets yesterday ended broadly flat after a very choppy session, the S&P500 seems to have hit another resistance point and with light trading today and the Thanksgiving holiday tomorrow, I cannot see it extending it’s rise this week – unless we have some favourable numbers out after lunchtime with the raft of economic announcements detailed here. WTI Crude prices are still on the wane, and today’s inventories number probably will not stem the fall, although the chart shows the price is getting close to the $92.60 support line, so we may get some technical traders reaching for their wallets at that stage. Gold is still out of favour as a safe-haven investment due to the rise in equity markets and continues its downward movement although we did see a brief reaction upwards a few days ago when the price hit $1225 so we could see a rise in the near future – the yellow metal is also quite a way from its main moving averages so a move back up towards them is expected soon.
09:55am (CET) ~ I’m in a Gold trade after quickly glancing at my charts a few minutes ago, maybe the rise is coming earlier after my comments 30 minutes ago ! It is a ‘long’ position with a stop-loss of 32 pips.
12:30pm (CET) ~ I am happy with my profit on the Gold trade so I have just come out of the position with +65 pips. Time for some lunch shortly down the road at the Yacht Club and the shooting afternoon has been confirmed for 3pm.
Daily Target Reached ? YES (+65 pips) I traded for just over two hours this morning
09:55am (CET) ~ A bit of a late start for me this morning, last night’s party did not finish until 4am this morning, but after a cycle ride out in a few minutes, I’m going to be in the study doing some emailing and chart watching for the rest of the morning.
The main indices were broadly positive yesterday after the Iranian deal at the weekend, the Dow Jones posted another record high at 16123 but succumbed later to some profit taking mainly due to the slow down that’s going to occur because of the Thanksgiving holiday on Thursday. Airline shares did well yesterday on the hope of cheaper oil prices – again due to sanctions being lifted that allow Iran to export more of their oil reserves – and as a consequence we saw Brent Crude gap down substantially at the beginning of the trading session but then recover once traders realised that the glut of Iranian oil was not expected for a while yet. Gold started off in the doldrums once again during yesterday’s European trading session but once it kept hitting the $1227 level over a period of hours, traders began to think that it had found support so they began to buy on the back of that. There also seems to be renewed interest from Asia, so that may help prices gain slightly over the next few days, previous resistance at $1250 may turn into support.
12:30pm CET (11:30am UK) ~ There’s not been a lot of movement in my charts this morning mainly due I suspect to the low volumes that’s expected in Thanksgiving week, but it looks like a ‘short’ opportunity is lining itself up on my Gold chart – if the price moves down to 1250.6 it will trigger a trade, although support at 1250 may well make it a very quick trade – I will report back later.
13:45pm (CET) ~ Well, the Gold 1250 support has well and truly been broken (1247.7 currently) so I’m going to stay in my new Gold position for a bit longer. My stop-loss on this trade is 29 pips so I am currently around a 1:1 profit/loss situation.
15:35pm (CET) ~ The price on my Gold chart has slowed slightly and as I had a profit on my screen of +62 pips I am now out of my earlier position.
22:10pm (CET) ~ I was out earlier this evening but got back just before 8pm and had a chance to switch on my MT4 chart for a short while. At 8:20pm I got into a ‘long’ trade on the S&P500 with my evening strategy and although the index hit a high around 1810, it then retreated quite sharply towards the end of the U.S. trading session and I came out of the market with a 13 pip loss.
Daily Target Reached ? YES (+49 pips) I traded for a short time this afternoon and again in the evening
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11:40am (CET) ~ We have just arrived back home from our weekend away up in Barcelona and before lunch I am off out on a cycle ride with a neighbour. I am then having a relaxing afternoon catching up on jobs around the house and taking a friend to Alicante airport – then we are off to a restaurant opening party in Denia this evening.
After the markets closed on a high last week, there’s more rises in the pipeline after the U.S. had deal with Iran at the weekend over their nuclear ambitions meaning sanctions will slowly be lifted and the restrictions on the worldwide sale of Iranian oil will be eased – this of course has resulted in the value of crude coming down this morning. With Thanksgiving holiday in the U.S. this coming Thursday we are likely to see low trading volumes on Wednesday as well as traders leave their desks early to get back for the bank holiday celebrations. Gold is still suffering from the rise in equity markets, it has still not halted the decline that began at the end of October and we are now heading for the next big support level at $1200.
08:25am CET (7:25 UK time) ~ No trading for me today – as it’s going to be another sunny day there are a few of us who are going down to the Embalse de la Pedrera lake near Torrevieja this morning, about 45 minutes drive from here. We’re doing sailing and Quad biking and a bit of horse riding if time allows.
As I hinted yesterday, the markets realised that they may have got it wrong regarding tapering so they staged a revival upwards yesterday and regained all of Wednesday’s losses. The S&P500 was bullish all day and I joined in on this rise with a few trades, and the Dow Jones 30 followed a similiar path northwards. Over here in Europe, markets remain concerned about the French economy and its prospective slide back into contraction in Q4 the German economy appears to be going from strength to strength despite the fact that there has been no government to speak of for the last three months. Maybe we should adopt this simple model worldwide, if you keep the politicians busy they can’t do any damage. Gold had a quiet day, taking stock after the large push downwards, but it’s still in bearish trend for the time being. There was a small drop in value when the U.S. market opened due mainly to the main indices over there shooting upwards.
08:25am (CET) ~ I’ve just had a phone call from a neighbour to say we’re off on a cycle ride at 9am, so I had better get up ! After that I’ll be back here for the morning doing some emails and Skype calls plus some chart watching.
The markets last night reacted strongly to news that the FOMC voted to start ending their fiscal stimulus programme as earlier as next month, and this had the effect of sending the Dow Jones and S&P downwards. It seemed to me to be ‘crowd-behaviour’ with traders acting very sheep-like as the news last night was three weeks old so there was no real reason to take it that seriously and start a sell-off. Last week Janet Yellen hinted at keeping the money-printing programme (fiscal stimulus) for a while yet, so that’s the latest facts we should be concentrating on, not 3 week old news. Will the markets recover once they’ve realised this ? A return to 1800 for the S&P will signal that.
11:45pm (CET) ~ I’ve now completed my Skype calls for the morning so I am off to do a supermarket shop at Mercadona then some lunch after that. Not much occurring on the 3 charts I have been watching for the last hour.
14:30pm (CET) ~ Back home now and going to wait in for the inmobiliarias to appear at whatever time he deems suitable, but while I am here I’ll keep half an eye on some charts while I sort the garage out.
15:50pm (CET) ~ After a quiet hour this morning in front of the charts, I now find I’m in two trades now – first one is a long position on the S&P500 and the second a short on Gold. Just like London buses……
16:30pm (CET) ~ More developments in the market – I’m in another trade (Brent Oil – long) and I’ve been stopped out of my Gold trade at minus 44 pips. The S&P position is going ok so I’m staying in there.
18:25pm CET (17:25 UK time) ~ And now I’m in a long “Trade With A Day Job” as well. I’ll report back at 10pm (9pm UK time) when the U.S. market closes.
22:05pm (CET) ~ Well that turned out to be a busy evening trading session. I was in 3 trades at the end and have come out all of them at 10 o’clock. My first S&P trade ended at +95 pips, the Brent Oil one came in at +170 pips and my first “Trade With A Day Job” was stopped out at minus 11 pips. I had a second evening system trade and that gave me +12 pips. So all in all I had 5 trades, 3 winners and 2 losses with an overall profit of +222 pips. Time for a swim and a few beers with a couple of friends who turned up a while ago.
Daily Target Reached ? YES (+222 pips) I traded for an hour this morning plus the afternoon/evening session.