Breakdown Wonderland

Mark(et) has left me speechless for the past couple of days. Sorry for the irregular posting. 

Today was just terrible! Last night, the Dow closed -85 points from as much as -133 points. We reacted by taking a nosedive at the open. When the information has been discounted by the market, we consolidated for a while, formed what seemed like a bullish inverse head and shoulder pattern (intraday - weak reliability), which failed, thus continuing the downtrend, slowly but surely. I wonder, if the Dow fell by 200 points, would we have gapped down but still be able to bounce intraday? But because the Dow didn't fall triple digits, what happened instead was an open near yesterday's close, then it's all downhill from there. In effect, the decline was more healthy, so to speak, unlike a massive gap down, which usually attracts bargain hunters that drive the market higher, intraday, at least. 

In the office, most of us are short-term traders. When a stock shows promise of upward momentum, one trader usually shouts that it's the last chance to buy. Today, someone said instead, "Last chance to die." I think Mark has been cuh-razy! I was listening to Adam Lambert's "Whataya Want From Me" and I couldn't help ask Mark the same question. Alam mo un? You're doing everything you can but for some reason, it's just not working out. As in the song, "I need a second to breathe." 

Oh, another one. Tell me if I'm the only one who can relate. :))

"Bum bum be-dum bum bum be-dum bum. What's wrong with me? Why do I feel like this? I'm going crazy now...It's a thief in the night to come and grab you. It can creep up inside you and consume you, a disease of the mind, it can control you. Your mind's in disturbia. Release me from this curse I'm in." 

AEV

Nothing much has been happening with my portfolio this month. So far, I have only made 8 transactions, mostly selling non-moving positions (CMT, JGS, CYBR and PIP). I have also failed to ride the mining+lopez rally coz I'm trying to limit the number of stocks that I hold. Good thing though that I was able to ride DMC and ICT trains. Today I was actually focusing on SECB but it failed to close above 100 so it got me turned off. Anyway, I noticed something different with AEV! Talk about forced closings. It got my attention plus my system had a buy signal so I got in at the close with a probe position - only 4% of my total port. If the move is wrong I'll simply cut it. Who knows, this baby may hit a new high soon.

War! at the Pre-close

There are days when I consider the pre-close period just a period of idle time. Every so often though, the pre-close phase regales the attentive viewer a good tale about the classic conflict between the bulls and the bears. In those moments that count, I enjoy watching these two animals fight to determine the day's closing price. 

Today was one of such moments. 

The market fell 25 points. You can say that the bears dominated. We were up around 5 points at the start but around 10 am, the market just fell and consolidated at the lows for the rest of the day. Having fell so much, the only window the bulls had to strike was during the pre-close period where the bulls struggled to raise closing prices. I was watching two issues then. EDC last traded (11:56 am) at 6.63 but a 7M buying at 7.30 was able to close it at 6.69. DMC last traded at 47. It had a 241K selling to close it at 46.90 and a mean 544K sell posting at 47 and 150K at 47.05. The bulls answered with an 870K buying posting at 47. Booyah! 

Experimentation LC failed today. The breakout yesterday was counteracted by the very bearish engulfing pattern it did today. I got out of that one alive... So, next! I experimented with ALCO this time. But because of the very small postings for this one, exposing 5% of the total portfolio would be suicide! I bought less than 1% from the total portfolio. =)) 

Regroup

Ahh.. Breakout! The market closed 56 points higher with the Lopez group, banking and property sector leading the way. Retest of the all-time high of 4413, coming? For some reason, I'm not as ecstatic as I thought I'd be. I feel like such a sore loser but it's my fault, anyway, since I adamantly refused to sell my "FUN FUN Stocks", as genkumag would call it. My Fun Fun Stocks are GERI and CMT. Out of impatience, I sold some of my CMT at a loss. I've been waiting for it to trend up but it has done nothing but threaten my cost. I'm giving it until tomorrow. If it still doesn't go up tomorrow, I'm selling it all. I still can't shake the feeling that CMT will spike up after I sell. This reminds me so much of GERI and how I ended up buying back higher. Thing is, the play just isn't in the third liners yet. I feel agitated when my positions are underperforming. I missed some rallies because I was locked in these issues. GERI and CMT comprise 25% of my total portfolio each. I sold the 10% allocation for CMT so it now only comprises 15% of my total portfolio. Why settle for sideways when there are issues that are trending, right? So, I'm fixing my portfolio. More blues and seconds! I'm particularly pleased with MBT but volume is still a bit of a concern.  I'm on the lookout for DMC, ICT, and some mining issues. 

Speaking of mining issues, I found something interesting today so I decided to experiment. I know mining issues (PX, MA/B, LC/B) found short-term peaks but LCB was still able to take on a new high today. As for momentum trades, the scarier, the better! And LC is definitely scares the pants off me. :P  I bought a 5% position at 0.75. The upside I'm looking at is actually only 0.79 and 0.80 but I had to satisfy a curiosity so I only bought at small position to offset my uncertainty. I'm on the lookout for a flag formation for PX and MA. Stick to the strongest stocks, right? 

Finger Lickin' Good at PSE

I was expecting this week to be selective, at best. It is the Holy Week, afterall. Many stock market participants are off gallivanting at some exotic hot spot for a vacation. However, instead of the the Holy Week lull, we got excitement! I'm so pumped up, I can't keep still. This is one of those days when "I hate the weekend because there is no stock market" (Rene Rivkin). From the chart of the PHISIX, I thought the correction would start yesterday. I wasn't looking at a deep correction or anything but I also wasn't expecting that it would be this shallow. I'm loving the pleasant surprise, Mark! ;) The index looks like it's bullishly consolidating at the highs. A convincing breakout above today's high of 4,283 should confirm the continuation of the uptrend. In the short-term, this breakout should bring the market to at least 4,370. The next resistance is already the all-time high of 4,413. If we look at the (green) channel, the recent upswing could potentially lead us to a new high of 4,550. *fingers crossed*

The flavor of the week was mining stocks. LC, MA, PX were the noticeably strong stocks. I wasn't able to take part in the mining run because I was busy elsewhere, namely, DMC and BEL. Of the movers last Wednesday, BEL, FGEN, LPZ, and FPH caught my attention. Time to fly!

D.I.P. it baby!

Wasn't able to ride D and I today that's why I decided to go with P.

D - DMC left me Dumbfounded

I - ICT was Interesting

P - PX was Perfect!! I bought PX when it broke out of its resistance of 16. Sana hindi sya maging Paasa :))

Whipsaw

The Dow was down by 117 points yesterday yet I was still able to end the trading day with a smile. In fact, the PHISIX was able to close the day on the green with four points. Today, the Dow was up by a mere seven points; we were up 31 points but I ended the trading day with a heavy heart. Today was a whipsaw day for me. I bought ICT at 51, closed 49.50; LR at 11.60 and 11.70; closed at 11.44; AP at 32.50, closed at 32. I felt like the market didn't have that upward momentum to keep prices afloat. Well, we can't have it everyday. I guess the market is running out of steroids. Haha! I think 31 points was a product of teamwork. Issues like DMC, ALI and EDC, all closed higher today. As usual, the index doesn't tell the whole story. At the end of the day, I asked myself if I was bullish. I am. So, HOLD! Let's see tomorrow. 

BTW, did you see what happened to PSE?? Sheeeesh! It went up by more than 100 points! Amazing! When I heard it was doing a 100% stock dividend, I was like, "Joke ba yan?" Apparently, it was disclosed yesterday. HAHA! Huli sa balita. :)) 

Another L Affair...

For the past 4 weeks, I've been "playing" with the first L of my life...

LR 

I was able to get it at 7.36 then I sold it at 12. But after that, things started to become shaky between us... And after so many whipsaws (I repeat WHIPSAWS - ALL CAPS), I decided to leave LR (for now but hey I'm still bullish on this issue) and move on to a perfect stranger...

There he was... I didn't notice LPZ at first, he was quiet and reserved (consolidating in other words). In my whole trading experience (I started playing last December 2009), this was the first time I decided to play with this stock. The chart looked promising to me (it has been consolidating for quite some time already, the bollinger bands were starting to narrow, the stochastics was turning upward already and most of all there was volume today), so I decided to buy at 5.50

It just broke out of its resistance of 5.60 now let's see if this L affair would last for a couple of days. Although I have a feeling that it will retest its previous high of 5.75 tomorrow....

What do you think?

Beautiful Monster

I missed the PNB train! The last time it went up (49 to 61), I was singing along to Ne-yo's "Beautiful Monster". PNB got me singing again today. Yes, he's a monster, beautiful monster. ;) PNB wasn't in my radar yesterday so I don't regret not buying into it yesterday after seeing that it was able to surge back to its highs. Today, it also wasn't on my radar until I saw it surge to 64. Thing is, I thought PNB was a buy at the open. I assumed that the previous high of 62.10 could easily break because the tougher resistance was at the 61.10 to 61.40 levels. It still wasn't on my radar during the early hours of trading because I was currently occupied with LR. I even averaged up at 11.62 to 11.64! I ended up selling everything I bought yesterday and today at 11.4 and 11.42. See, I averaged up right? I noticed, whenever I buy up and no one follows, that usually indicates I was wrong. My only mistake was not selling as soon as I realized that. It took 20 cents for me to accept the fact that I was wrong. Anyway, at least I was entertained. You know why? I used the iceberg order. People kept on buying it up, they even thought of eating it up until the next fluctuation but for some reason, the selling orders at those levels just kept on coming back. Hihihi! Fun times. 

Anyway, back to PNB. PNB gapped up at the open and traded to as high at 62.20 before correcting slightly. The break above 61.85 got my attention as it spiked to as high as 64. Notice the first minor resistance line I drew. PNB rested for a while after this. I had my buying order ready but I didn't want to be the one to make it breakout (In hindsight, dapat pinabreakout ko na nga!). So, I was waiting. It took quite a while that I even talked to Amorito Girl for a short while. When I brought my attention back to PNB, it was like on cue as PNB broke out right before my eyes and even before I was able to hit 'send'. I tried buying at 64.30. I was able to get some at this level but the number is so insignificant. I'll cheer nonetheless. There was another buying window intraday. Notice the line I drew near 66. I decided not to chase prices anymore since it is the second day up already. My threshold was only until 64. Congrats, to all those who have this beautiful monster! 'Wag kang magpatalo, MBT!! :)) I have renewed faith in you.. Translation: Bumili ako kanina. :))

Dilemma

I need your opinion. Which chart looks better?