Brian Just finished your book, and all I can say is WOW!!! I was a market maker on the CBOE for several years, and all I can say is I wish I had read a book like that 20 years ago my career would have been a little less frustrating. Thanks again for all your hard work and sharing with others. Richard R Hi Brian, I was very impressed with your book "Technical Analysis Using Multiple Timeframes” and I read it with great enthusiasm. Your book is not overly technical or complicated and the methods taught are extremely sound and brilliant. Your book provided me with the psychology behind the charts and clearly explained ...

Continuing the theme of avoiding the stronger sectors and buying some weaker areas, I had almost bought Canadian Solar (CSIQ) just a few weeks ago in the mid $30s - it ramped to low $50s, and a missed opportunity went by the wayside. [Jun 17: Canadian Solar (CSIQ) Raises Guidance]It has now pulled back 30% from its high of $52 two weeks ago, and this appears to the be the market's current favorite - the only chart I can find in the sector where the stock has not broken the 50 day moving average. This is not my favorite name in the sector fundamentally - a huge amount of their last earnings were nothing more than currency gains - but the market doesn't peek beneath the hood to realize that, so we'll go with the market. And frankly, all that I've gained from buying ...

There is a lovely article in the Daily Telegraph about Barclays being in denial about the size of the losses that it needs to take. One thing that caught my eye was the following: It has even been suggested that Barclays chose not to offload its Alliance Boots debt, when others in the banking syndicate took a 10 per cent valuation cut to get the assets off their books, because Varley and Diamond wanted to protect the minimal writedowns on leverage loans. Well you might say that. I couldn't possibly comment. Anybody looked lately at their consumer lender exposure in Japan? I couldn't possibly comment. How about just the almost total absence of losing trading days in the investment bank. I couldn't possibly comment. Anyone you know carried an 800 billion pound investment bank portfolio and not lost money on at least some days... I couldn't possibly comment. How about the ...

First, I have not done this properly, thank you for the various suggestions left toward the farmland project I have been working on. I have not really thanked you all properly.This is has been a peculiarly busy week, not trading but with every other aspect of my life, so just a few stray items to chew on today.Here is a link to a lengthy speech by Dennis Gartman. Despite how long it is it does read very quickly. One thing he said, which I cannot vouch for but is interesting if correct "In the last 30 centuries, China has been the dominant economy in the world for 28 of them. It’s just a return to the mean as China now becomes the dominant demand-oriented society in the world." I don't doubt the general idea I just don't know about 28 out of 30....

Today was nearly a mirror of yesterday, minus the bigger point losses and the higher volume. But that to me doesn’t matter as what is more important is the fact that for the second day in a row the market appeared as if it was ready to crack WIDE OPEN but instead caught a heavy bid rallying into the close to pair back a lot of the damage. Yes it was a down day but it was a “good” down day. The selling was pretty bad intraday and in fact I did get a bit nervous. However, when I get nervous it is normally a good sign as the market normally doesn’t move well with my emotions. So the fact that I got a bit fearful was a contrarian signal. If I would have come back in the final hour, however, and the market would have been lower the entire tone ...

This move has nothing to do with the fundamentals of gold or silver. Simply put I want to run a concentrated portfolio and my # of holdings is getting too large. With the Federal Reserve backstopping the entire US financial system, the risk of "calamity" is lessened (in return for inflationary pressure and dollar destruction)... but this is more along the lines of, I see no reason to hold gold/silver when I have coal/fertilizer. I already know where the prices of those are a year out - whereas gold is speculative, subject to the whims of the market, and a lot of people believing in a fantasy called "2nd half recovery". So I just don't see the need anymore to hold something that is sort of replicated in other ways in the fund; yet carries more risk. I'd rather simply be more ...

by CondorTrader

What should you do when the underlying moves against an iron condor position you have open? (For example, if you’re a member, you may have noticed that one of our DIA trades for May expiration is looking threatened by the recent price action in the index.) Any time this situation arises, people will always write in to ask about how they can “adjust” or “fix” the trade if the market continues to be uncooperative. It’s an understandable impulse to want to take action when things don’t go your way, but it’s also important to guard against the danger of overtrading.

Our answer here is the same as the answer we always give: there is no magic solution for “fixing” trades that move …

- Lehman traded lower yesterday by 8.9% to $38.71 on rumors that the firm is "short on cash".  Keep in mind this same type of rumor and corresponding sell-off happened with Bear three weeks ago.  I'm not saying the same is going to happen with Lehman but I am saying taking caution in trading this name. The shares have fallen 41% percent this year amid the $200 billion in industry-wide losses.  I wouldn't be surprised to see more weakness in this stock over the next week or so. 

- The number of bearish put options traded on Lehman's stock exceeded call options by 3-to-1 and put volume in the first three hours of the day topped the daily average of the past 20 sessions. This is a very bearish sign with respect to investor sentiment as it applies to LEH.  Puts are generally bought by people who believe

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