The wild market swings of late are most likely down to hedge funds says Keith Fitz-Gerald. These big money movers are liquidating assets to meet margin calls, causing chaos in the markets. Keith has four tips on how to dodge the worst of the damage.

He says it is essential to guard against today’s downside risks with trailing stops, inverse ETFs, and put options.

And every investor should have a plan to re-engage with the markets when this financial storm passes.

This from Money Morning:

As the worst financial crisis in recorded market history rocks Wall Street, millions of investors on Main Street keep asking a single question.

When will this end?

The market volatility is unprecedented: Where professional traders once ranked a day as “wild” if we witnessed a 300-point swing, in recent months we’ve seen 600- and 700-point swings on a regular basis. On Oct. 9, a Thursday, we rode out a

...

As the worst financial crisis in recorded market history rocks Wall Street, millions of investors on Main Street keep asking a single question. When will this end? The market volatility is unprecedented: Where professional traders once ranked a day as “wild” if we witnessed a 300-point swing, in recent months we’ve seen 600- and 700-point swings on a regular basis. On Oct. 9, a Thursday, we rode out a record-setting swing of 1,000 points. That wild backdrop is bad enough. At the same time, however, the major market indices are heading lower – at times with a speed and ferocity never before seen. But the real killer is that there is seemingly nowhere to hide. This is what Wall Street’s Armani Army doesn’t tell you about traditional diversification: It doesn’t work when everything goes down at once. (The one exception is the specialized inverse investment vehicles ...

Chicago the most populous city of Illinois is also home to the world’s second busiest airport, Chicago O’Hare. But this state’s economy does not depend on any particular city or industry. Read on to find out more:1. Illinois is the top producer of nuclear power in the country.2. The state offers several tax incentive programs for companies relocating to Illinois.3. Almost 12,000 manufacturing firms are headquartered in the state, and together they operate 19,000 plants within the state.4. The most important industries in Illinois are: food, chemicals machinery, and fabricated metals.5. Over 2,000 banks and 1,000 savings institutions are headquartered in Illinois.6. The agricultural industry produces more than $8 billion in income.7. Illinois is the number one producer of soybeans and a top producer of corn.8. More than 6,000 trucking companies call Illinois home.9. ...

Hmm... here I thought we were positioned well for a big up day, having cut back our short exposure and getting quite long Friday. How very wrong. Always interested on days like this when we are trailing the market so badly to see what is winning and what is losing - below are the best and worst performers of the S&P 500 Best - Banks & Homebuilders - and home related (Masco/Lowes/Whirlpool) Symbol Company Name % Price Change Today STI SunTrust Banks Inc 7.8 KBH KB Home 7.7...

Technical analysis video of individual stock trading ideas for Tuesday September 4, 2007 including: Alkermes, Inc. (ALKS), Hansen Natural Corporation (HANS), ISIS Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (ISIS), CME Group Inc. (CME), Overstock.com, Inc. (OSTK), F5 Networks, Inc. (FFIV) and U.S. Global Investors, Inc. (GROW).