Trading Solutions That Can Help

The three indicies lost just over 1% each on Tuesday. The DOW slipped 96.50 points to close at 9241.45, the S&P 500 shed 12.75 dropping below 1000, and the NASDAQ finished the day at 1969.73 after losing 22.51 points. There were some great gains in some stocks even with the down day.
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The financial sector was the worst of the bunch today. I’m glad that I’ve pulled out of that sector a couple of days ago. I’ll wait for a healthy pull-back and jump in again.
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When I sit on the sidelines waiting to jump back in, I sometimes use the time to try some investing programs I’ve come across.
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One that I recently checked out is the free analysis trading software package from Trading Solutions. It can learn patterns from historical data and allows you to create trading systems that suggest when to buy and sell. The software works with stocks, futures, currencies (FOREX) and many other financial instruments.
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Download Trading Solutions and try it for free. Let me know what you think. As I continue playing around with it, I’ll report back on how I like it.

Tags: currencies, dow, financial sector, forex, futures, indicies, NASDAQ, software package, stocks, trading software, trading solutions, TradingSolutions

Posted in Fun With Investments, Stock Market News | Leave A Comment »

The Dow At 9000, Where Do We Go From Here?

Who would have thought that this could have happened so soon? Either way, it was reached. The DOW close above 9000 (9069.29 to be exact). The S&P 500 has been on a tear, closing at 976.29. Lets not forget that the NASDAQ is now at 1973.60. The past two weeks of trading have been great for the markets.
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With that being said, what are we to expect in the coming weeks? If you’ve been listening to the talk on the street, you’ve heard both sides of the possibilities. “It’s only going to get higher” or “the markets are going to correct themselves”. Those are the only two choices.
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After listening to all the opinions that where flying today, I would have to agree that the markets are due for a correction. How can it not? I don’t know about you, but I don’t really see a reason to be all optimistic about the stock market. Add on to the fact that many traders and investors have made a lot of money in the last four months. There will be some profit taking very soon.
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With all the talk about health care and the Cap and Trade bill, if these two bills pass, corporations are going to find it hard to keep making the earnings that the investors want to see. The taxes that will be imposed onto these industries are going to break them as well as the country’s GDP.
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In the last few months I’ve made some great gains in the markets and I’m not willing to give them back anytime soon. At this time I’m sitting more than half my portfolio on the sidelines, while I wait for the other shoe to drop (and it will). Don’t get me wrong, I do believe that there will be some gains to be made in many other sectors and that’s why I’m watching the tech sector. They (tech sector) don’t have the government issues to deal with, like most of the others ones.
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Which ever way you plan on playing the markets in the coming weeks, do your due diligence.

Tags: Economy, Government spending, Investments, NASDAQ, Stock market news, Stock trading

Posted in Getting Started In The Stock Market, Government Involvement, Stock Market News | Leave A Comment »

Research In Motion (NASDAQ:RIMM)

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Yesterday I spoke about building a position in Research In Motion (NASDAQ:RIMM). My first buy-in was at $76.25 when the price dropped. Share price opened this morning at $77.86 and within the first five minutes of trading, it was up to $78.40. Unfortunately that was as high as it would go. Minutes later it fell to $76.13, where it would continue to bounce within that range.
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Research In Motion was scheduled to release their first quarter earnings report after the closing bell today. I was looking for some more upward motion from other traders getting on board in expectation of RIMM beating the street.
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Shortly after the bell, RIMM released their report. RIMM earned $1.12 per share for the first quarter on revenue of $3.42 billion, compared with $482.5 million or 84 cents on revenue of $2.24 billion a year earlier. Included in the results were non-recurring items. $96.4 million relating to certain employee tax liabilities along with a gain of 175.1 million primarily as a result of the enactment of functional currency tax rules. While the analysts were only expecting $0.94 on revenue of $3.43 billion, RIMM earned $0.98 per share.
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What I didn’t expect was after the company beating expectation by $0.04, the stock dropped more than 6% in after market trading. By the time after hour trading was done, the stock moved back up to $76.06, just off by 0.5% from where it closed at 4:00pm today.
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One thing that I wish I was able to do was to buy more shares when it fell to $73 shortly after the release. In April, Rimm beat expectation by 7% and since then the stock price has moved up 55%. Today they beat it by more than 4% and it moved no where today. Many investors and traders were looking for more and the knee-jerk reaction was to sell. The more they were looking for was in RIMM’s second quarter guidance. RIMM”S range for earning in the next quarter is $0.94 to $1.03 per share on revenue of $3.45-$3.70 billion. The mean analyst estimate is for 97 cents on revenue of $3.61 billion. After the conference call, I guess people realized it wasn’t as bad as it originally sounded.
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With the information I have on this company, I believe that RIMM is still fundamentlly sound and will continue to grow. I will continue to buy into RIMM under $80, after that I will sit back and watch the gains from this great company with a fantastic product. The BlackBerry is a great smartphone with many different applications to do the things you want to do. As a matter of fact RIMM just released their latest BlackBerry model, the Tour, earlier this week.
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Jim Cramer doesn’t call this company one of the four horseman of the tech sector for nothing.

Tags: Earnings report, Getting Started In The Stock Market, How to make fast money, NASDAQ, Stock market for beginners, Stock market news, Stock trading

Posted in Getting Started In The Stock Market, Investments, Stock Market News | Leave A Comment »

Another Day In The Stock Market

With the economy the way it is right now along with the volatility in the stock market, If you have the ability to trade stocks on a daily basis (day trader) or even holding for a day or so, you can make some money without really trying.
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You will still have to do your homework and research on the companies that you want to invest in, but if you have a list of stocks that you’re very familiar with, playing the volatility is quite profitable.
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Yesterday I spoke about building position in the companies that you want to invest in. When the markets were at their lows, I started to do so. I actually picked up some at good prices, even though I would have like them to come down some more. I told you in the past to buy in increments, not all at once. If the price did continue to fall yesterday, I would have bought more later on.
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I bought Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL) @ $134.75, Joy Global (NASDAQ:JOYG) @ $34, Research In Motion (NASDAQ:RIMM) @ $76.25 and last, but not least, Sirius Satellite Radio (NASDAQ:SIRI) @ $0.325. I expected prices to bounce back up yesterday as well as a little bit more of a gain today. I was right only three of the four trades I did. This morning I waited for the opening to see what I was going to sell. At the opening bell, Sirius was up to $0.43 per share and after the negative news about their downgrade, I expected it to drop down below $0.40. I put in a limit sell order for $0.425 and it sold shortly afterward. A gain of 30% over night. To be honest I was planning to hold on the Sirius for the long term (until their next earnings report ), but when I was up that much, I sold it and will continue on the next dip.
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As for Apple, I was also able to sell my shares at $138, for a gain of 2.5%. I know that isn’t much to boast about, but if you think that you can’t even get that on a basic 12 month CD these days. Take into consideration that I did buy large amounts of share that help offset the fees that were charged to me. Joy Global was the last on I sold this morning. I sold it at $36.50 per share, for another gain of 7.3%.
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As for RIMM, I didn’t get the action I wanted, but that’s OK since I do expect that to run into the $100 range in the coming months. I will continue to hold on to the share and add to my position.
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You need to take advantage of the opportunities when they present themselves, so if you are able to trade on a daily basis, good luck.

Tags: Earnings report, Getting Started In The Stock Market, Help, How to make fast money, Investments, NASDAQ, Stock market for beginners

Posted in Stock Market News | 1 Comment »

The Stock Market Is Getting Ready For Another Run Up

Here we are again going through another correction in the markets. The three indicies have dropped over the past week off their seven month high and I’m not surprised. Over the last three months the markets have been on a tear coming off their lows. I mentioned before about how the markets wouldn’t be able to continue these gains without some sort of correction and profit taking.
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Even though I’ve been waiting for this pull back for some time, I did expect it. I will say that the markets aren’t as weak as I thought. I no longer expect to see the DOW reach 7000 again. As a matter of fact I don’t think it will get below 7800.
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The word on the street is that there is a large amount of money sitting on the sidelines waiting to jump back in, which means that once investors and traders feel that the waters a safe enough to come back in, it will help the markets rebound even more. Yesterday I heard that many of the hedge fund managers are already invested in and that they don’t have much capital not isn’t in the markets. The report stated that they are concerned that they may miss the next surge in the markets and they don’t want to be caught sitting it out.
If that’s the case, it can also be said that if they get skittish and pull their money out to avoid another big loss, we will see the 7800 level on the DOW.
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I don’t think so on the latter issue because the housing market is showing signs of stabilization, as well as the financial sector. Jim Cramer last night even had a segment in regards to the housing bottom. Since last August he has been saying that the housing bottom would be around June 30th of this year. Well, he ripped the board down and said that after yesterday’s housing number were the third straight month that they have improved. Other indicators are looking good too.
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With that in mind, I will start building positions in the stocks that I’ve been watching for sometime. Over the next two weeks, I will be looking at Apple, JP Morgan, Research In Motion and Agnico Eagle Mines. Of course there are others that I do like, but I would want more of a pull back before jumping on board with them.
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If you’re looking to take advantage of some free advice from Jim Cramer (besides his TV show), Check out his Action Alerts program that he’s always mentioning on his show. I’ve been a member for over a year and find some sound information from him, along with some great picks. Follow the link for a two week free trial of his Action Alerts subscription.
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