The Student Loan Ranger

Stats from yesterday:

Tuesday stats

There were a lot of stocks making new “10 month” highs yesterday, which for me really isn’t that encouraging.  I would much rather see 12 month highs and good strength.  The numbers show some strength, but underneath the stats above I am seeing a bit of weakness and indecision particularly in techs and financials which have been fuelling the fire lately.  Services and consumer were strong yesterday on the back of consumer spending.

As the market grinds to new highs it is interesting to note that yesterdays participation was significantly weaker than the up days on the 19th and 21st.  The ranges in a list of 10 stocks I keep advanced stats on were insightful: higher on materials on the drop (all with increased dollar volume too), narrower in financials (also with shorter DV) and much lower in techs.

Interesting DV action in these stocks at the moment:

Dollar Volume changes of note

WAG, EXC, HD, ITW, EMR, ITUB, OI and NKE looking interesting going into today, but I will continue to monitor my core list of swing stocks from this weeks Crystal Balling post.  Market about to open up with futures up 1.75 points at the moment.  Charts will actually follow today (got sidetracked yesterday with physio and football).

Update 10:45 US

This market is a total chop fest this morning.  Very weak looking opening before home sales and oil numbers causing a big hard bounce on small volume for most stocks before the market started to stall.  Same thing happened today with these numbers as the consumer confidence numbers yesterday.  At the moment there seems to be no bad news, and when all the news is good and the market either edges up slightly or sells a little; imagine what will happen when some bad news hits the screens?

Statistically, yesterday was pretty poor and that showed in the opening.  Breadth was bad until the numbers came out.  Good job I don’t trade oil at all as I would have been chopped up.

Airlines have been performing well the past few sessions, but I spied this on JBLU:

Bearish wedge on JBLU

My RTN and ERTS trades cancelled each other out yesterday.  Covered ERTS by accident on a planned “make it and take it lower” limit order.  I stopped out on RTN for a small hit after the sector showed relative weakness.  Good exit on RTN as it has been dumping since.  Bit peeved on ERTS but c’est la vie.

I’m short ITUB, was up nicely this morning and was all going to plan until the spike in the markets.  I was stopped out flat for a half and continue to hold a half position short at $18.82.  The setup was from this:

ITUB short

I was actually planning to short this yesterday at $19.30 yesterday, but I had to leave for a physio appointment at 1700BST.  Double top forming with negative divergence with little buying demand.  Secondary pattern of ascending wedge was broken this morning at the open where I shorted.  Realistically looking for someting around $17.50.

$18.60 is a short term support level as shown by the candlestick formation and former flag breakout last week.

I like this bounce on declining volume, and the divergence continues to be negative.  Let’s see if this starts to show some weakness.

Industrials are the weakest sector by quite a bit today.

Update 19:20 US

This JBLU trade was so implied it wasn’t even funny.  Ultra high probability trade.  Time to cover half.

Trades do not get easier than this

NYSE breadth today

NYSE breadth has been weakening since the “oh wow it’s summer and people buy houses in summer so new home sales are up wow what a shock” news earlier in the day.