Stocks
Trades: 163
Shares: 47,600
P/L: -1,804.54
Swing Trades
Closed: 9
Shares: 1,250
P/L: -1,181.09

Stocks
Trades: 8
Shares: 1,600
P/L: +253.61

Swing Trades
Closed:1
Shares: 200
P/L: -58.00

Well……Not really a miracle, but considering the slump I have been in lately, making money FEELS like a miracle. Oddly enough, the market seemed very easy for me to trade. Maybe the fact that I stuck with 100 shares on most every trade made the day easier. I ended up being profitable on three out of four trades, and the one loser was a break even stop out that cost me $4 in commissions.

I had my first winner in TSL shorting at the top for a reversal back to Friday’s close. I liked the setup on the 15min chart seeing the extreme in MFI while we continued to make lower highs over the past three trading days. I got short at 32.45 and set my stop and limit exit. I got my exit after being in the trade about 30mins. All in all, it was a great trade with a good entry and a quick reward. Here are the 15min and 1min charts showing entry and exit.

After booking a quick $80 in TSL I looked to a long in EOG as my next victim. It setup a nice Holy Grail, although it was a bit fast on the move down. I got 200 shares and waited for the move. I I got a somewhat convincing move up so I added another 200 shars with full intentions to go all in with 1k total shares. The move in EOG didn’t play out like I had hoped, and I balked on the last 600 shares to keep my risk low. I was looking to exit at 121.40 but EOG only made it to 121.38 on the first run up. After seeing the light volume and lack of conviction in the move up I set my stop at break even and was taken out. EOG had a high of 121.41 on the next push before breaking down hard. I was up $130 at the most before getting taken out. I was really caught off guard when EOG popped the first time and should have taken my quick profits. Lesson learned…

My final two trades of the day were short commodities by way of MON and MOS. I did something that I normally don’t do. I was watching MON on the 1min charts and saw a good LREP and took 100 shares. This was at 11:24 and I had a lunch date with my wife at 11:30. I decided on a stop level at 110.83 and profit target at 108.50, placed my orders and left. This type of hands off trade isn’t necessarily against my trading rules, but I almost never leave a position open unattended. What made me so sure the trade would work?

Look at the 30min chart of MON below. On the far left we have the gap up that happened on Tuesday of last week. Notice the lack of an extreme high on MFI (circled) with the gap up. This told me that there wasn’t much buying behind the gap. As the days went on MON caught a nice bid on Wednesday moving up $3 to 116.61 but notice how buyers still lacked conviction as MFI still did not make an extreme high. From there we start to see lower highs in price and lower highs in MFI as a confirming signal. MON sets a firm support level at $113 over the course of last week. Soon after the open, MON breaks this support level and falls out of bed. There is a small consolidation between 111.50 and 110.50 and I got short at 110.20 as the consolidation was violated to the downside.

Now for the frustrating part. I get back from lunch and MON hadn’t stopped me out. Haleluiegh! I keep holding onto the trade but I move my stop down taking into account the lower highs that are forming on the 1min chart. MON continues to trade sideways for a bit longer. I notice that MOS and AGU are setting up inverse HGs, so I get short 100 shares of MOS. The whipsaw continues and now I am watching the 1min charts on all the ags. Tradeitup points out that USO is getting killed and I start to think that ags (and other commodities) could see selling pressure also. Anyway, while looking at the 1min charts I am totally oblivious to the fact that MON sets up one of the most beautiful Invers Holy Grails I have seen in a long while.

Both shorts are working out well and I keep tightening my stops to preserve my profits. MON is looking much weaker than all the other ags. We see a bit of a sell off and then MOS catches a bid and hits my stop, taking me out with a $40 profit. I start thinking I should abandon the MON trade as I am up over $100, but I tighten my stop, loosen my profit target and let it ride. I set my exit at 108.63 and an hour and a half after entry my target was hit with a $160 profit. Notice the extreme MFI low at exit. Below you can see the first IHG that I missed, my entry, stop loss, the second IHG that I should have added on, my profit target, and the extra $1 move that I missed. BTW… my profit target of 108.50 (revised to 108.63) was totally arbitrary. Here is the 5min chart.

Ainkurn - $274 on 400 shares
Timmay - $30 on 1,600 shares
Wincity - No Trades
Retardo - No Trades
Denarii - No Trades
OBAT - $147 on 9,800 shares
Sanglucci - $214 on 33,800 shares
Dehtrader - $1,624 on 6,820 shares

Today is my last post as host of the VO. I have had a good run of it, but it is time to pass the torch back to Dinosaur Trader, the originator of the world famous Virtual Office. During my tenure as VO Chairman I put up 24 posts about the VO and received 72 comments on those posts. My site traffic went from 115 average daily visits in February to 260 in March, a 125% increase. Total visits in March (at the time of this post) comes in at 8,381 versus only 3,213 in February.

However, all was not well during my reign. Under my ruling we had one VOer quit, and another has gone AWOL after being attacked by a fellow office member. I was lax on the members turning in their numbers and this caused the VO posts to come a little later than DT normally posted them. In March, the members of the VO went through a staggering 2,650,268 shares with some great results.

I want to tank DT for entrusting me with the VO for a month, and I want to be the first to say that it will be great to have him back in the blogosphere. I am happy to relinquish my duties back to trader that has been a “timeless inspiration” and is the “true force” behind my “quest for success”. DinosaurTrader, you will always be my greatest inspiration in trading.

So, starting tomorrow everyone that wants to know how the VO is doing needs to check with DT. I hope I have earned a few faithful followers over the course of the month. Maybe my traffic won’t drop back down to pre-VO numbers. Again, thanks for stopping by and thanks for all the comments.

Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson is set to speak today at 10:00 EST to discuss further regulation on financial institutions in the wake of the credit crisis. Under the new regulations the Federal Reserve would gain more power to promote “market stability” as a lender of last resort.

The Treasury will recommend that the Fed share authority over banks, securities firms and insurers in monitoring corporate disclosures, writing rules and stepping in to prevent economic crisis, according to the draft, which was distributed to officials last week and obtained by Bloomberg News.

Iceland banks’ risk of default rises amid concerns over ‘unscrupulous’ speculators that are dealing in Credit Default Swaps.

Credit-default swaps on Glitnir Banki hf, Iceland’s third- biggest bank, traded at 1.7 million euros upfront and 500,000 euros a year, according to CMA, up from 1.6 million euros in advance. The cost implies a 60 percent risk of default, according to the JPMorgan model. The contracts have soared from 202,000 euros with no upfront payment at the start of the year.

Word of the Day

xenophobia \ZEN-uh-FOE-bee-beuh\, noun:
Fear or hatred of strangers, people from other countries, or of anything that is strange or foreign.

Pre-Market Gainers: ANST, CALM, RDC, NE, WTS, PM, ASML, SYT, AZN, UBS

Pre-Market Losers: MRK, GKC, IBN, DOD, CME, MOS, FNM, VE, LEH, POT, C