Tuesday, July 31, 2007

What Correction?

Plenty of hurt goin' around. But there are some stocks out there that aren't even aware of the sell-off going on around them. Case in point - Ceragon Networks Ltd. (CRNT). Since it broke out of it's base (April 30th) the stock has appreciated 83% and corrected no more than 9% (June 6 -13 8.8% correction). Currently CRNT has a 1.9% short interest.





































inserts from investors.com & StockScouter




Ouch!

Another late afternoon sell-off puttin' some hurt on. Not sure how many people were really too surprised by the selling though, it kind of felt like traders were on guard and ready to take short positions. There were plenty of good short set-ups around if you could get the fill on 'em. Apple gettin' a beat-down before closing down over $9, ouch! DJIA down over 1%, the DJ Utilities, however, up 0.2%. Nasdaq down over 1.4%, and the S&P500 down over 1.2%. Ouch.

AAPL & FWLT shorts



Monday, July 30, 2007

Bounce, or Head-Fake?

Some stocks that met with (or rebounded off of) their 50-day EMA's post-correction:
FDRY
CDWC
MHS
ABB
ABN
HPQ
GLDN
ALTR
COP

Some stocks that met with (or rebounded off of) their 100-day EMA's post-correction:
TXN
VRSN
CMTL
BK
HOC
ICE
EMR

Some stocks that met with (or rebounded off of) their 200-day EMA's post-correction:
MICC
GLW
NTRS
CTSH
AXP
TSO
HBC
BMY
BAX
VLO
MM

Sunday, July 29, 2007

To Buy or Not to Buy

After the end-of-week sell off we're all left with a tough decision as to whether or not we're going to buy into some dips, find strong performers, or start selling whatever we can. I'm including some charts of companies that have either fared well in the sell off, or have sold off so much they could present good buying opportunities.
FSLR
CROX - Who'd-a thunk it?AA - looking for support from it's 200EMA.
However, on a longer time frame we could see a continued downside:
GS- Goldman Sachs couldn't get no lovin'. $189 looks like a good area of support.

GS on the weekly time frame:
AKS has fared well:

Saturday, July 28, 2007

Weekends with Wine


It's been a while since I've posted anything about the wine I'm drinking (my last post featuring the Prisoner wine). So, this weekends feature is the Monticelli Brothers and their 2005 Mario Sangiovese from the Russian River Valley. It should go without saying that if I'm posting about it then I love drinking it. If you're not familiar with a Sangiovese varietal, take this bottle with you to your favorite Italian restaurant and thank me later. Sangiovese has its roots in Tuscany and is the backbone of most Chianti wines (which are upwards of 90% Sangiovese, and rounded off with lesser known blending vareitals). It's not clear from the label what the percentage is of Sangiovese fruit, but next time I run into the winemakers I'll find out and update this posting. The first thing that jumps out at you is the distinctly California fruit bouquet (think spicy strawberry), that's cut with a fair edge of vanilla oak. It has a light and crisp body with a little bit of acidity that makes it work so well with pasta dishes, tomato sauces, pizzas. It's not as earthy as a lot of Chianti's can be, which I typically prefer, and the oak seems to lend a sweetness to the wine rather than a tar element. The best part of the experience is this bottle retails for $28. One footnote here; I drank my wine in crystal wine glasses, which can completely transform a wine. Don't believe me? Try it out for yourself. *salut!*

Friday, July 27, 2007

macAddict

For all of the macAddicts out there, here's a leaked prototype of a new keyboard from apple. We'll probably see it in time for next year's Macworld expo. They are the leaders in stylish tech.

Thursday, July 26, 2007

When the Sh*t Goes Down...

...ya better start shortin'. We're lookin' for a bounce up tomorrow after today's selling frenzy/capitulation. The Dow was in the toilet, losing over 300 points today and the talking heads are in full spin mode to figure out why.









The Russell2000 is hurtin'.

Joining the Train...

Spurred on by the WallStreetFighter, and being that I'm in need of some link lovin', I'm keeping the train movin':

———-START COPYING HERE ———-

Geek Train - All aboard!

1 - Write a short paragraph at the beginning of your post and linkback to the blog(s) that put you on the list in the paragraph. You MUST do this. No-one plans on getting slapped for duplicate content any time soon, do they?

2 - Next, copy the list of originals below COMPLETELY and add it to your own blog. If you’d like a different keyword for your blog then change it, when you do your post, and it should pass to most blogs with that keyword, provided the train keeps on spreading.

3 - Take the adds from the blog that added you and place them in the “Originals” list.

4 - Add at least three new favourite blogs of yours to keep the train going, e-mail the blog owners (or comment on one of their posts) and insist that they post. The Originals:

(The satirical saint) Craig Kohler
(The kick-ass) Nate Whitehill
(The original) WallStreetFighter
(The crafty two at) TechRave
(The AdSense ‘dude’) Michael Cheney
(The overclocker) Shawn Knight
(The incredible) Chris Hooley
(The rhetorical) Michael Kwan
(The talented) Leo Chiang
(The root of all evil) John Chow
(The business dude) Josh Mullineaux
(The absurdly loud) Ed Lau
(The mastermind) Jon Waraas
(The yaketty) Stephen Fung
(The wickedly cool) Everton Blair
(The uber blogger) Ms Danielle
(The enterprising) Matt Coddington
(The career minded) Jane May
(The legendary) Gary Lee
(The nifty) Dosh Dosh
(The ambitious) Jeff Kee
(The Down Low) Shawn Low
(The reviewer) Thomas De Maesschalk
(The Post Whore) Derrich
(The Bitchy Mogul) Bob Buskirk
(The Anti-Social) Matt Propst
(The Hawk) Gregg Hawkins
(The Carpenter) HMTKSteve
(The Artist) Web Urbanist
(The Popularity Booster) Romlet
(The Funny Money Linkster) WallStreetFighter
(The Oldschool Blogger) Disassociated
(The life Coach) Agent Sully
(The Thinker) Ilker Yoldas
(Baby steps to big money)Fufunik
(The Sexy Swing Trader) Trading Goddess
(The Rajun Cajun) MadStocks

My adds:
(The Forex Trader) Grace Cheng
(The Short Squeezer) Squeeze Shorts
(The Prehistoric Trader) Dinosaur Trader
(The Glass Artist) Calyxann
If I missed anyone leave a comment and I'll add you. Thanks all!

Wednesday, July 25, 2007

BIDU

Baidu.com (BIDU) had a buying frenzy later in the afternoon today, closing up over $8. Going into after-hours and reporting earnings it's up a whopping $34+, or 19%.
"Net income rose to 141.9 million yuan ($18.8 million)...from 58.5 million yuan, or 1.69 yuan, a year earlier, the company said today in a statement. Sales more than doubled to 401.3 million yuan, beating analysts' estimates. Baidu expanded its market share in China, where it leads closest rival Google Inc. by more than 2 to 1."
"
China was home to 162 million Web users at the end of June, second only to the U.S., according to data from the China Network Information Center." --That's only 1% of the population!!! Compared to nearly 70% of the population in the United States (232+million) are internet users. Lot's of potential for Baidu as the internet using population grows in China. If 70% of the population in China were using the internet that would be over 1 billion users!!


AAPL

After being up over $2 in the regular session today Apple (AAPL) shares are up over 9%, or $12+, after reporting earnings.
"Apple Inc.'s fiscal third-quarter profit soared more than 73 percent, fueled by demand for its Macintosh computers, the strength of its iPod media players and the sales of 270,000 iPhones in the first two days on the market...For the quarter ended June 30, Apple's profit rose to $818 million, or 92 cents per share, up from $472 million, or 54 cents a share in the year-ago quarter. Sales grew to $5.41 billion from $4.37 billion last year. Analysts polled by Thomson Financial expected Apple to report earnings of 72 cents per share on sales of $5.28 billion while Apple itself had projected earnings of 66 cents per share on quarterly sales of $5.1 billion."
After reading this post today at TickerSense I wasn't suspecting such a drastic leap in price (maybe that's just the reason I should have gone long overnight). Even though the information posted is certainly worth considering in making a play on Apple overnight through an earnings report, the stock/company is not the same it was from a year or two ago. They are making the products everyone loves and wants (how many people do you know own a Zune?). From my own experience, if I were to get another computer I would definitely get another macbook pro like the one I have now. I mean come on, two operating systems on one laptop, you just can't beat it. And I think people are finally coming around to realizing that. We won't even go into the iPod/iPhone/iTV products. Apple is large and in charge, demanding the respect it's had coming.

INTC

Intel Corp. (INTC) continues to evolve technological development. "The company said it has fabricated the first modulator made from silicon that can encode data onto a beam of light at a rate of 40 billion bits per second, or gigabits. Modulators are key components in using lasers to send data down fiber-optic cable...Such speeds -- roughly 40 times faster than the most sophisticated corporate data networks -- now require expensive materials, a factor that helps push the cost of existing 40-gigabit modulators into the thousands of dollars. Intel, which boasts the biggest revenue among companies that make silicon chips, wants to use that material to create much less-expensive communication components, an effort it calls "silicon photonics."
The Singularity is Near!

Tuesday, July 24, 2007

NTRI

After hours today was good news for NTRI. They reported Q2 earnings above expectations at 96 cents/share vs. analysts forecasting 85 cents/share, resulting in a nearly 3% increase in their stock price. THEN, before you know it, they're down nearly 15% with the company stating "it expects to make 77 cents to 82 cents a share for the third quarter on revenue of $200 million to $208 million. Analysts were looking for an 89-cent profit on sales of $209 million." It hurts to hold that one overnight.
NTRI's customer base is (literally) growing. FYI...66% of Americans are overweight. That's nearly 200 million people!! Not only that, but it's projected that by 2015 (a mere 7.5 years) a full 75% will be overweight. That's insane!!

More Selling

Couldn't catch a break today. Felt like a lot of selling pressure on the breaks I was watching. Time to double my dosage of St. John's Wort so as not to slip into a depression for my failed trades.
Big time hurt-down put on the Energy sector. Big time sell-off in the DJIA end-of-day on high volume, but it found relative support at the 20EMA.The Russell2000 was fed a plate of whoop-ass today; falling through its trendline and not quite down to the 200EMA.
S&P500 dipped just below its trendline. Looking for a bounce back above the 50EMA tomorrow, or else...b-bye.As for the Nasdaq; more selling, bringing the index down to the lower range of it's channel still above it's 50EMA. The selling could have been a lot worse for sure.

Monday, July 23, 2007

For a positive outcome for the indexes, end-of-day today was a difficult time for me to find set-ups. Those I was watching turned into nothing. I'd be more discouraged if not for reading the blogosphere and hearing similar impressions.

TNH

TNH has been having some more controlled moves lately. The increased volume on the breaks of the formed bases provided a good shorting opportunity.

Sunday, July 22, 2007

Gold Stocks

To follow up the previous post, I'm reading an interesting article about the "Secular Gold Bull Market."
An excerpt of interest from the post being: "While the spot price of gold has yet to reach the swing high in April 2007, the Philadelphia Gold BUGS Index (HUI) has just surpassed it. If this sort of disconnect continues, either the price of gold has to run up to catch up, or the gold stocks will fall to realign with the commodity."

Gold Stocks: MDG, NEM, CDE, GG, GSC, GSS, RGLD

Loonie

Go Loonie!!

Saturday, July 21, 2007

Friday, July 20, 2007

Not THAT Bad

Today's sell-off doesn't look nearly as bad on a chart as the pundits would lead you to think is was. Sure there were a lot of companies (CAT, GOOG, GS, WHR, DE, i could go on, and on) that got their hats handed to 'em, but look on the brighter side, It's still a bull market. As I was saying, the charts don't really give too much indication of extreme worry at this point. The worst looking of the bunch being the Russell2000.

And...

...need I even mention that Apple looks like it's just about cleared the atmosphere, and ready for orbit?

newsflash

After posting yesterday about Taser and their newly released C2 product, I can't help but share this article coming out today. A police chase through Stamford, Conn. ended in a bus station with a man pointing a .38, leaving police with the option of shoot or be shot. The officers describe it as a "classic suicide by cop" circumstance in which a suicidal person puts themselves in a situation where police are forced to use deadly force." The situation was instead remedied by one bad-ass electrically charged Taser. Now, instead of giving a man his wish to die the city of Stamford will put him up in the nearest prison and flip the bill for his food, shelter, clothing, and representation in a court hearing. Good for them.
I kid of course.

Thursday, July 19, 2007

MSFT

Microsoft reported record annual revenue, an increase of 13% year-over-year to $13.4 billion beating analyst expectations. Net income rose 7.3% to $3 billion (including the $1.1 billion reserved for repairs to Xbox consoles). Not enough for after hours trading; MSFT is down over 2% around $0.68.

Google Schmoogle

At least that's what the analysts think. In after hours trading Google (GOOG) is down by over 7%, or $39+ (taking Baidu.com BIDU with it; which is down over $5+ or 3+% after hours). Google's 2nd quarter profits are up 28%, but "profit was $3.56/share, missing the average estimate of $3.57 in a Bloomberg survey of analysts." The reasoning behind the lagging profit is said to be due to increased Research & Development expenditures. "We overspent against our own plan on headcount,'' he [CEO Eric Schmidt] said..."We decided it was not a mistake. The kind of people we brought in were so good that we're glad we did this.'' A company spending half a billion dollars on R&D you would think there'd be some more impressive projects in the works. All-in-all a $39/share sell-off for being a penny off analyst expectations seems a bit harsh. Net income = $925.1 million ($721.1 million a year ago). Net sales was $2.72 billion, up 63%.

For that special woman in your life...


...it's the new Taser C2! For less than the cost of an iPhone you can own a piece of personal protection that's purely priceless. With a range of 15 feet, a lithium ion battery good for up to 50!!! uses (in case you just happen to be a scumbag magnet), and available in designer colors it's the latest family protection device brought to you by Taser International Inc. (TASR).
Recently released (and causing stock prices to rally) this newest product line is smaller, sleeker, and sports a "non-gun design" (just so police won't do an Amadou Diallo on your ass). This baby can penetrate up to 2" of clothing and has a 95% effectiveness rate. But wait...the Taser C2 also has a laser-guided aim!! Need I say more? In case you're wondering; "Doesn't this open the door for every maniac and/or sadist in the world to carry around a taser?" You'll be relieved to know, these weapons can only be activated after the purchaser passes a background check.
Screw the iPhone, I know what I'm getting my wife for christmas. Check out the taser in action.

Wednesday, July 18, 2007

b-bye Bidu

Today saw a very orderly short set-up for Bidu, losing over $8 after breaking its base formed just below the opening range low. The volume kept the momentum on downside. Nice chart/trade. There was probably an earlier entry point, but I'm not sure where I could have justified one.

Articles to Read

Here are a couple of interesting (unrelated) articles I read this morning.
The first being an argument for reasons to believe why China might be nearly where it currently is ten years from now. Basically, big population = big beaurocracy = bigger hurdles to overcome.
"A more intractable problem is China's power structure itself. Although Beijing holds a monopoly on politics, local Communist Party officials enjoy wide latitude over social and economic affairs. They also have huge professional and financial incentives to spur GDP growth, which they often do by ignoring regulations or lavishing companies with perks. As a result, China has built a bureaucratic machine that at times seems almost impervious to reform. Even if Beijing has the best intentions of fixing problems such as undrinkable water and unbreathable air, it is often thwarted by hundreds of thousands of party officials with vested interests in the current system."
This next article is another great tome put out by Dr. Brett.
In summary;
"Too many nuances of the TICK exist to cover in a single article. An important one, however, is to observe unusually large thrusts in TICK values...A large jump or drop in the one-minute TICK readings indicates that baskets of stocks are either being purchased or sold. It isn’t small retail traders executing such baskets, but rather, this is a footprint of institutional traders. By tracking whether the big jumps are primarily occurring in the positive or negative direction; by observing whether they are coming early or late in a market move; and especially by noting how the jumps are affecting price, it becomes possible to align your trading with that of the “big players” in the market.
Ultimately, it’s those large traders that move price. When they are repeatedly hitting bids of lifting offers, they’re tipping their hands in the market auction. It pays to be a market shrink and analyze what they’re doing!"

Tuesday, July 17, 2007

Yahoo!

Profits down for Yahoo! 2.3%, with sales down and full-year revenue off of expectations. After hours YHOO is down over 3%.

Intel reports...

...profits up, margins down....equals, shares down over 3% after hours. INTC also expecting current quarter sales to drop.

How to...


...ruin a perfectly stable chart. MVIS just can't seem to hold it together.

Monday, July 16, 2007

Lame Day

Consolidation today after last weeks momentum. A lot of failed breakouts today, glad I hesitated on my alert points. Same with the broader indexes, early rallies and plenty of selling in the afternoon. It feels like the DJIA is moving purely for psychological reasons, pushing for the 14k mark. You know it's a lame day when one of the best performers is a pancake house (IHP) that announces it's buying Applebee's (for $1.9 billion). Sounds backwards.

Saturday, July 14, 2007

mvis revisited

I decided to take a technical look at MVIS today, for no other reason than it's been a long touted stock of "the fly" and I typically trust his picks and enjoy reading his blog. So here we go...I broke it down weekly, daily, and on a 15-minute time frame and picked up some pivot points that the stock reacts to. On the weekly time frame the stock is in an upward channel and closed this week just above the 10-period EMA and at the lower end of its channel (a good buy point?). The stock had support at the $5.04 price last year. Now that price is a point of resistance. So, we look for a close above $5.04 on increased volume.

On the daily chart there's resistance at $5.09, with an ascending triangle taking shape.

And finally, on the 15-minute time frame $5.10 is acting as a pivot point.

MVIS also has a pretty high short interest around 10.6%. Would be nice to see it squeezed.

Thursday, July 12, 2007

There ya Have it...

After blogging yesterday about the S&P500 looking like it was setting up a triple top, we can see why it's important to wait for confirmation to take action. After all, this is a bull market isn't it? Well, at least I was right in one of my assumptions yesterday (I never thought I would be quoting myself); "Of course, I could be completely wrong and we could see a huge bullish engulfing candle that bounces off its trendline [though that didn't take place], and takes out the previous three highs, in which case hindsight would have proven my observation incorrect (though that could set things up for a head-n-shoulders pattern)." And there ya have it! A huge bullish engulfing candle that took out it's previous three highs and settled in all-time high range.

Wednesday, July 11, 2007

Triple Top???


Of course nothing with technical analysis is cut-and-dry. One must wait for confirmation (hindsight really) to say for sure if a pattern was what you thought. And it could be that in my technical analysis adolescence I'm missing a key factor that could discredit my observation. At any rate...In question is the S&P500 daily chart and what looks (to me, the not so trained eye) like a Triple Top formation. What has taken shape are 3 peaks that approximate each other in price. There's also lower volume on the 3 peaks with increasing volume at the break-downs. Triple Top confirmation would come with a close below the support level at the two valley points around 1485-87 range (preferably a close under this level on high volume). Of course, I could be completely wrong and we could see a huge bullish engulfing candle that bounces off its trendline, and takes out the previous three highs, in which case hindsight would have proven my observation incorrect (though that could set things up for a head-n-shoulders pattern).
It's all about the Nasdaq at this point anyway, right?

Tuesday, July 10, 2007

Red Day Tuesday

We were all expecting a correction sometime this week, no?