Record Advance in S&P 500 Futures Shows Confidence in Economy:

Record Advance in S&P 500 Futures Shows Confidence in Economy:

By Lynn Thomasson and Rita Nazareth

March 13 (Bloomberg) -- The longest-ever gain in futures linked to the Standard & Poor’s 500 Index shows growing investor confidence in the U.S. economy.

“It’s a bullish indication,” said Stephen Lieber, chief investment officer of Alpine Woods Capital Investors LLC, which manages more than $7 billion in Purchase, New York. “There’s greater confidence in the equity market. Earnings have been relatively positive.”

Contracts to buy the S&P 500 in June 2010 have climbed for 11 days since Feb. 25, rallying 4.5 percent to 1,146.6. While futures on the U.S. equity benchmark usually track the index, they don’t move in lockstep as the S&P 500 retreated less than 0.1 percent yesterday following a drop in consumer confidence. Caterpillar Inc. helped lead the Dow Jones Industrial Average higher on signs of growing demand for machinery in China.

The S&P 500, which is near its highest level in 17 months, has risen 9 of the past 11 days. The index increased 1 percent this week as economic reports showed a rebound in consumer demand after retail sales unexpectedly rose last month and wholesale inventories fell in January.

Forecasts for the biggest two-year rebound in profits since 1994 also fueled the advance. Analysts’ estimates show income for S&P 500 companies may climb 26 percent this year and 20 percent in the next. More than 72 percent of firms in the equity index beat earnings projections for the fourth quarter, the second-highest percentage on record, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.

“People are looking to buy stocks,” said Mark Bronzo, an Irvington, New York-based money manager at Security Global Investors, which oversees $21 billion. “Risk appetite seems to be growing as people become more comfortable with the sustainability of the economic recovery.”

The 11-day gain in S&P 500 futures exceeds a 10-day advance in January 1987. During that period, the stock benchmark jumped 9.6 percent and rose 5.4 percent the following month. The futures contracts were created in 1982 and trade on CME Group Inc.’s Chicago Mercantile Exchange.

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=aJrxozH8Bx6s&pos=3

Here is the daily and the weekly charts for the $SPX:

Daily:



Weekly:

Senate Finance Bill Includes Agency to Track Financial Risk:

Senate Finance Bill Includes Agency to Track Financial Risk:

By Edward Wyatt and Sewell Chan
March 10, 2010

WASHINGTON — Senate Banking Committee members from both parties said on Wednesday that they had agreed to include in their regulatory overhaul bill a new Office of Research and Analysis that would provide early warnings of possible systemic collapses.

The proposed agency, which has sometimes been referred to as the National Institute of Finance, is intended to give federal regulators daily updates on the stability of individual firms as well as that of their trading partners, including hedge funds.

By standardizing financial instruments and reporting mechanisms, the agency would give regulators a broader view of the health of participants in the financial markets and the potential for problems to spread. The idea’s supporters say that kind of information was lacking in recent years as the housing bubble burst and troubles spread from firm to firm.

“One of the problems we observed in the recent crisis is that nobody knew who had what,” said Senator Jack Reed, a Rhode Island Democrat who last month introduced a stand-alone bill to establish a National Institute of Finance. “The result was a cascading effect of uncertainty and doubt.”

The new agency, which was also endorsed Wednesday by Senator Bob Corker, Republican of Tennessee, would have no policy responsibilities but would instead collect and analyze data, building models to assess relative risks and predict how one firm’s problems might affect others.

As proposed, the new agency would be housed in the Treasury Department with a director, appointed by the president and confirmed by the Senate, who would be an ex-officio member of a systemic risk council that would be created by the bill. The agency would draw its budget from assessments on the largest financial firms, according to people who are close to the negotiations but who were not authorized to speak publicly.

The agency would gather data from the largest firms and from a broad set of market participants, including all United States-based financial institutions, which would be required to report all their financial transactions, regardless of whether the counterparty was based here or abroad. The agency would take steps to safeguard proprietary trading information, while also shining a light onto the so-called shadow banking system of mortgage brokers, subprime lenders and unregulated hedge funds that contributed to the financial crisis.

The financial reform bill approved last year by the House would create a systemic risk council that would collect similar data without establishing an independent agency, a difference that will have to be resolved before a bill is sent to the president.

A group called the Committee to Establish the National Institute of Finance — made up of current and former financial executives, statisticians and economists, including six Nobel laureates in economics — has been lobbying for such an agency for much of the last year.

Allan I. Mendelowitz, a former director of the Federal Housing Finance Board who was a founder of the group, said in an interview that regulators were unable to assess expanding risk in the recent crisis in part because they relied on independent contractors, like the credit rating agencies, for data.

If a security was rated triple-A by the ratings agencies, for example, as were many mortgage-backed securities, regulators wrongly assumed that it posed little systemic risk, Mr. Mendelowitz said.

The agency would require a vast array of computing capacity, supporters said, and it would probably take a couple of years to establish data standards and build analytical models. But it could immediately begin to assess counterparty risk based on existing data.

Senate negotiators also tentatively agreed to establish a $50 billion fund to finance the dissolution of failing firms that could not be rescued through bankruptcy proceedings. The fund is intended to support companies that are forced to wind down their operations, without having to resort to taxpayer bailouts.

People who have been briefed on the negotiations said two proposals were under consideration. One would require financial companies to pay into a fund upfront and the other would have them buy interest-bearing shares in a trust that would allow the firms to keep the assets on their balance sheet.

Also on Wednesday, five Senate Democrats, including two members of the Senate Banking Committee, Jeff Merkley of Oregon and Sherrod Brown of Ohio, introduced a bill that would ban deposit-taking banks from owning or investing in hedge funds or private equity funds and from making market bets for the company’s own benefit.

President Obama put forward the idea in January and called it the Volcker Rule, in recognition of its champion, Paul A. Volcker, the former Federal Reserve chairman.

The bill has been endorsed by John S. Reed, a former Citigroup chairman; the economist Joseph E. Stiglitz; and Robert B. Reich, a former labor secretary, among others. But it faces significant resistance in Congress and is unlikely to be part of the revised bill that is expected to be introduced this month by Senator Christopher J. Dodd, chairman of the Banking Committee.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/03/11/business/11regulate.html?partner=rss&emc=rss

Unemployment Rises in 30 States in January:

Unemployment rate rises in 30 states in January as joblessness remains widespread:

Christopher S. Rugaber, AP Economics Writer, On Wednesday March 10, 2010, 12:54 pm EST

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Unemployment rose in 30 states in January, the Labor Department said Wednesday, evidence that jobs remain scarce in most regions of the country.

The data is somewhat better than December, when 43 states reported higher unemployment rates, but worse than November, when rates fell in most states.

Still, five states reported record-high joblessness in January: California, at 12.5 percent; South Carolina, 12.6 percent; Florida, 11.9 percent; North Carolina, 11.1 percent; and Georgia, 10.4 percent.

Michigan's unemployment rate is still the nation's highest, at 14.3 percent, followed by Nevada, with 13 percent and Rhode Island at 12.7 percent. South Carolina and California round out the top five.

There were some signs of job creation. Thirty-one states added jobs in January, up from only 11 in the previous month. But the job gains weren't enough, in many cases, to lower the unemployment rate.

For example, California reported the largest job gains, of 32,500, though its unemployment rate also rose. Illinois, New York, Washington state and Minnesota reported the next highest totals of new jobs.

The lowest unemployment rates are still found in upper Plains states, with North Dakota's jobless rate of 4.2 percent the lowest in the nation. Nebraska and South Dakota had the next lowest rates, at 4.6 percent and 4.8 percent, respectively.

In January, the national unemployment rate fell to 9.7 percent from 10 percent the previous month. Last week, the Labor Department said the national rate was unchanged in February at 9.7 percent, a better reading than most analysts expected.

State unemployment data for February won't be released until later this month.

http://finance.yahoo.com/news/Unemployment-rises-in-30-apf-1676881351.html?x=0&sec=topStories&pos=8&asset=&ccode=

Diviners Divided: Economists Clash, Sow Confusion:

Diviners Divided: Economists Clash, Sow Confusion:

Bernard Condon, AP Business Writer, On Sunday March 7, 2010, 3:07 pm EST

http://finance.yahoo.com/news/Diviners-Divided-Economists-apf-2346209182.html?x=0&sec=topStories&pos=8&asset=&ccode=

NEW YORK (AP) -- If you're confused about the outlook for the economy and stocks one year after the market hit bottom, then you've got good company -- the Wall Street economists and strategists who are supposed to have this all figured out.

Rarely have the experts seemed so divided about the future.

We're either beginning the type of robust recovery that typically follows a deep recession, or we're on the cusp of another contraction, the dreaded double dip. Prices could climb fast as they did in the U.S. during the 1970s, or fall to devastating effect as they did in Japan during the 1990s.

Stocks? We're on the verge of a long bull market a la the 1980s. Then again, maybe not. To hear some tell it, the present is more like the 1930s, when stocks were viewed less as vehicles to riches and more as a boring source of dividends.

The collapse we feared last March 9 when the major stock indices fell to their lowest levels since 1997 never did come to pass. But what replaced it is still unnerving -- bewilderment.

The Dow Jones industrial average returned 61 percent during the past year, up 4,019 points to 10,566.20. The Standard & Poor's 500 returned 68 percent. The Nasdaq Stock Market did even better, surging 81 percent. Those gains were largely a payoff on a correct bet that corporate profits would surge from their recession lows.

This year the Dow and S&P 500 have lost momentum, rising 1 percent or less. And the Dow is still 25 percent off its all time high of 14,164.53 set in October 2007.

Part of the problem in predicting the future lately is that the economic signals that drive the market have been so mixed.

The nation's gross domestic product grew at a 5.9 percent annual rate in last year's final quarter, its best showing in six years. But it's expected to expand at a slower rate this year.

Consumer confidence plunged unexpectedly in February. But last Thursday retailers posted their biggest sales increase in more than two years. The so-called fear index, the VIX, which measures expectations of future stock market volatility, is hovering at a 1 1/2-year low, suggesting calm seas ahead. But new home sales have fallen to their lowest level in nearly five decades.

The experts can't even agree on what to make of a single number. Pessimists see bad news in good news and optimists vice versa.

Encouraged by the Commerce Department report on March 1st showing a surprising surge in consumer spending in January? Not so fast, says David Rosenberg, chief economist at money manager Gluskin Sheff in Toronto.

He notes in a report that some items bought in great quantities -- books, up 2.1 percent and sewing items, up 1.6 percent -- suggest a "frugal stay-at-home" or "do-it-yourself" mood among Americans.

The end is nigh.

Or you can listen to James Paulsen, the chief strategist at Wells Capital Management in Minneapolis.

Not even high unemployment can get this man down. His interpretation of the near double-digit unemployment rate: All the more reason to buy shares.

In a report looking back over the past half century he notes that periods of high unemployment rates -- greater than 6.6 percent -- have been great for stocks, which have generated average annual returns of 20 percent. One reason, he says, is that high unemployment often presages big recoveries, and investors drive the market up in anticipation of the recovery.

Of course, you can find Wall Street soothsayers staking out extreme positions in any era. But the hunt is perhaps never so easy as in the aftermath of a deep recession.

One reason is the shock of the downturn feeds fears that the natural corrective forces of the economy won't kick in. Barclays Capital economist Dean Maki calls it the "This Time Is Different" school of thought. He says such worries were rife after the two recessions of the early 1980s. Indeed, oldtimers may recall some investors expected a "triple dip," sidelining them during the start of one of the greatest bull markets in history.

Maki is not mincing words about his view on the recovery today. The title of one of his reports: "This Time Is Not Different." He predicts the U.S. economy will grow by 3.6 percent this year, a percentage point higher than the average estimate.

Seth Glickenhaus, who worked on Wall Street as a trader in the Great Depression, calls the optimist-pessimist divide now the "big gulf."

For his part, the 95-year-old Glickenhaus, who still oversees $1 billion in assets, is siding with the pessimists. He thinks the Dow Jones industrial average will flatline, trading no higher than 11,000 for at least another 5 years.

One reason he's so glum: The unemployment picture is actually a lot worse than the widely cited headline number suggests because many people have stopped looking for work and aren't counted. On Friday, the Labor Department reported unemployment held at 9.7 percent in February. A broader measure that includes frustrated part-timers and other discouraged workers was 16.8 percent.

Glickenhaus likens Wall Street optimists to the guys he used to beat in bridge games as a student at Harvard in the early 1930s. "They were great scholars but not necessarily bright," he says. His winnings "paid all my tuition, though it wasn't much back then."

The professional bulls today, he says, are "just stupid."

But money manager Richard Bernstein, the former Merrill Lynch strategist who created a stir years ago with bearish reports, says he's turned bullish on stocks now -- though it hasn't been easy.

"People who thought I was so insightful as a bear think I'm an idiot," he says. He adds, wistfully, "Hopefully, I'm still a likable guy."

Bernstein says he's optimistic because much of Obama's $787 billion stimulus plan passed last year has yet to be spent, and that means a big boost to growth is still to come. He also notes a reliable predictor of a strong recovery -- a big gap between yields on short- and long-term bonds -- is at a historical high.

But perhaps the best reason is also the quirkiest.

While at Merrill, he came up with something called the "sell-side indicator." It tells you whether to buy or sell stocks based on changes by Wall Street strategists in their recommended allocations.

The quirky part: Bernstein discovered that strategists were wrong on stocks so often that it paid to do the opposite, that is, buy when they're selling and vice versa.

Right now, he says they're underweight stocks, on average, or telling people to sell. So he thinks you should buy.

Or maybe the real takeaway here is to just ignore the professionals and do what you think is right -- if amid the data you can figure that out.

US Congressional Estimates See Grimmer Deficit Picture Than Obama Administration:

US congressional estimates see grimmer deficit picture than Obama administration:

Fri Mar 5, 5:18 PM
By Andrew Taylor, The Associated Press

http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5ib3KqdpvjY_RfC7wEboQtJRC3YCQD9E8P2180

WASHINGTON - A new congressional report released Friday says the United States' long-term fiscal woes are even worse than predicted by President Barack Obama's grim budget submission last month.

The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office predicts that Obama's budget plans would generate deficits over the upcoming decade that would total $9.8 trillion. That's $1.2 trillion more than predicted by the administration.

The agency says its future-year predictions of tax revenues are more pessimistic than the administration's. That's because the report projects slightly slower economic growth than the White House.

The deficit picture has turned alarmingly worse since the recession that started at the end of 2007, never dipping below 4 per cent of the size of the economy. Economists say that deficits of that size are unsustainable and could put upward pressure on interest rates, crowd out private investment in the economy and ultimately erode the nation's standard of living.

Still, the Feb. 1 White House budget plan was a largely stand-pat document that avoided difficult decisions on curbing the unsustainable growth of federal benefit programs like the health care program for the elderly and the health progam for the poor and disabled.

Instead, Obama has created an 18-member fiscal reform commission that's charged with coming up with a plan to shrink the deficit to 3 per cent of the economy within five years. But the Republicans to be named to the panel by congressional GOP leaders are unlikely to go along with any tax increases that might be proposed, which could ensure election-year gridlock.

The report says that extending tax cuts enacted in 2001 and 2003 under Republican President George W. Bush and continuing to update the alternative minimum tax so that it will noy hit millions of middle-class taxpayers would cost $3 trillion over 2011-2020. The tax cuts expire at the end of this year and Obama wants to extend them - except for individuals making more than $200,000 a year and couples making $250,000.

For the current budget year, the report predicts a record $1.5 trillion deficit. That is actually a little better than predicted by the White House, but at 10 per cent of gross domestic product, it's bigger than any deficit in history other than those experienced during World War II.

The new report predicts that debt held by investors, including China, would spike from $7.5 trillion at the end of last year to $20.3 trillion in 2020. That means interest payments would more than quadruple over 2011-2020.

Commercial Real Estate Heading for the Mat:

Commercial Real Estate Heading for the Mat:

From theTrumpet.com
March 3, 2010

Will the one-two punch of residential and commercial real-estate implosions KO the economy for good?

If you thought the housing market bust felt like a haymaker, wait until you experience the punch to the solar plexus that commercial real estate is about to land. With the economy already gasping for air, this next big blow threatens to knock the economy off its feet for long after the 10-count.

Just when popular media suggests that the economy is back off the ropes, the Congressional Oversight Panel, which is charged with monitoring the banking system bailout, is warning that the economy could be headed into round two of the worst downturn since the Great Depression.

“There’s been an enormous bubble in commercial real estate, and it has to come down,” Elizabeth Warren, chairman of the oversight panel, told the Washington Post on February 19. “There will be significant bankruptcies among developers and significant failures among community banks.”

So far this year, America is on track to see well over 100 banks fail—and this despite unprecedented government action to prop up the sector. During 2009, 140 banks failed—most of them related to the residential mortgage market.

But if Warren is right, America is just experiencing the opening jabs and the main event is yet to come.

“Over the next few years, a wave of commercial real-estate loan failures could threaten America’s already weakened financial system,” revealed the Congressional Oversight Panel’s report, titled “Commercial Real-Estate Losses and the Risk to Financial Stability.”

“Between 2010 and 2014, about $1.4 trillion in commercial real-estate loans will reach the end of their terms.”

Unlike residential mortgages, which can be locked in for 30 years, almost all commercial loans come due in periods between three to five years. Typically, when a loan comes due, the commercial property owner will simply roll over the loan—that is, pay back the original loan with a new loan—provided that his property collateral has not depreciated.

That is the problem facing commercial property owners. Commercial loans that were issued during 2005, 2006 and 2007—at the very height of the property bubble—are now up for renewal. But according to Warren, by next year half of all commercial property owners with mortgages will be “underwater” and owe more than their properties are worth. This means that it may be impossible for them to roll over their loans, and their properties will be forced into foreclosure.

This means that property owners are not the only ones in trouble. Foreclosing on real estate when the property market is declining is like asking for a beating. Losses could range between $200 to $300 billion, according to the report.

“There is a strong potential to see a thousand commercial real-estate bank failures in the next couple of years unless Congress acts to bail them out,” predicts economic analyst Mike Shedlock. “Of course no banks should be bailed out. [T]he correct decision is to let failed banks fail. The last thing we need is further bank zombification.”

And when the banks go down you can be sure they will not go down alone.

A second banking crisis would trigger economic damage that could touch the lives of nearly every American. Think empty office complexes, hotels, retail stores. Think job losses. Think families being forced out of their apartments even though they never missed a rent payment. Think social unrest.

And when the losses start hitting the banks as we head into next year, expect further reductions in lending as financial institutions scramble to shore up bottom lines. For a borrow-to-spend debt-based economy, a reduction in credit supply is like slipping a boxer enough tranquilizer to euthanize an elephant.

As the Trumpet has warned in the past, the current stock market and economic rally will eventually come to an end—and probably an abrupt one. If the economy was a prize fighter, you can picture it bouncing off the ropes, with legs wobbling, a loose jaw and a glazed look in the eye—with a freight-train-size fist labeled commercial real estate barreling straight toward it.

http://www.thetrumpet.com/index.php?q=7021.5553.0.0

The 2009 Financial Report Of The U.S. Government Is Out - America's Economic Goose Is Cooked:

The 2009 Financial Report Of The U.S. Government has finally been released, and the news is not good. It basically confirms much of what we already know - that the United States government is a complete financial mess.

The U.S. government budget deficit for 2009 was a record-setting 1.417 trillion dollars. The total liabilities of the U.S. government rose from 12.178 trillion dollars at the end of 2008 to 14.123 trillion dollars by the end of 2009.

At their present rates of growth, the interest on the national debt and spending on entitlement programs will gobble up almost every single dollar of federal revenue by the end of the decade.

Throughout the report, the word "unsustainable" is repeatedly used. The authors of the report understand that the U.S. government simply cannot keep spending and borrowing like it has been recently.

But if the U.S. government slows down this reckless spending even a little bit it could literally plunge the U.S. economy into a deflationary depression. In fact, even with all of the "bailouts" and "stimulus packages" there are many who would argue that we are already in a depression. In any event, the authors of the report make it clear that the United States government is facing a financial crisis of unprecedented magnitude.

Read more: http://theeconomiccollapseblog.com/archives/the-2009-financial-report-of-the-u-s-government-is-out-americas-economic-goose-is-cooked

(I would have posted the article in it's entirety, but there are many interesting graphs that are best viewed on the original website)

I made $1750. in only TEN minutes scalping FAS today!...

I made almost $900.00 in just under six minutes on this trade:


I made just over $850.00 in exactly four minutes on this trade:


If you'd like to learn how to do this too, visit my website by clicking on the banner below...

Welcome! to Stock-Market-Lessons.com

Learning how to trade the Stock Market is without a doubt the best thing that's ever happened to me. Not only in terms of making a good living at it (and allowing me to work at home), but also in the way it keeps me tuned into what's going on in the world.

I'm fifty-three years old and I'm not worried about getting Alzheimer's, because trading the Market is the best brain stimulation exercise regimen I've found yet. This is not easy money. It takes a lot of hard work and many hours a day to study what you need to know in order to be successful.

Over the last fifteen years I've taught myself how to read charts using Technical Analysis, and I've found that charts can actually let you know what's about to happen next.

Charts can give very clear Buy and Sell Signals. But even a master chart technician must know what's going on in the world every day by staying on top of the most recent news. That's why I watch the Stock Market news channel CNBC eight hours a day, five days a week. You must also have a solid understanding of the Fundamental Analysis of each company you trade.

To prove to you the kind of money you can make Day Trading, here are a few examples of real Day Trades I have done recently. I put $21,000. to work when I bought 2000 shares of TSO and made $280. in just three minutes!



Here is another example of a ten minute Day Trade that made $300.00



Here is another example of a seventeen minute Day Trade that made $300.00

Here is another example of an eight minute Day Trade that also made $280.00



This Day Trade took thirty five minutes and made $150.00



You don't need a lot of money to begin trading using my strategy. I can show you how to select good stocks that are less expensive, and that way you can buy a lot more shares and still benefit from smaller moves in share price.

In order to be a successful trader of the Stock Market, you must do all of these things:

1) Keep up with the latest news on the financial markets around the world. That includes know when each report on the Economic Calendar comes out, and which one carry more weight in their ability to move the Market.

2) Know exactly what is going on with the stocks you trade by knowing the Fundamental Analysis of each company you follow.

3) Learn to read and understand charts of each company you trade using Technical Analysis. One thing I've learned is Charts Don't Lie. They don't have emotions. Learn what the chart is telling you, and don't let your emotions get in the way of taking the appropriate action the chart is telling you to take.

When I first started trading, I didn't know anything about the Technical Analysis of Stock Market charts. I had spent a few years watching the live streaming charts that came with my Scottrade account that didn't have any Technical Indicators on them. I was getting pretty good at guessing what would happen next just by observing the patterns I saw develop day after day.

My wife had been trading the Market for many years before I met her, and she told me I needed to learn how to read Chart Patterns.

I found a few websites that offered lessons on the subject, and this one became one of my favorites: www.stockcharts.com

From this website, I learned all about Chart Patterns and all of the Technical Indicators I now use on my charts.

Only after I understood Technical Indicators did I begin to understand why a Chart Pattern would fail to yield the expected result at times. It was because the Technical Indicators said that the Price Per Share (PPS) had moved all it could, and it had met a resistance level.

Once I combined Chart Patterns and Technical Analysis into the reading of a chart I began to have much more consistent success in my trading abilities. It has taken many years of study to get to this point. I started by learning one Technical Indicator at a time until I knew it worked well, and then I would move onto the next one.

Let me give you a little hint here. After learning all about Chart Patterns, one of the first Technical Indicators you should learn is Bollinger Bands. It was the very last one I learned, and it is without a doubt one of the most important ones that I know of. I could have saved myself a lot of pain and suffering, not to mention avoid quite a few trades that didn't go well if I had known all about Bollinger Bands in the beginning of my trading career.

Here are a few examples of the different types of charts I use for doing Technical Analysis. I use different styles of charts because they each have a slightly different look and feel to them, even though the information they give is usually very similar.

There are just a few Technical Indicators necessary for my Day Trading strategy to work. The Commodity Channel Index (CCI) gives very clear and accurate Buy and Sell Signals, and I use Stochastics (STO) to confirm them. Bollinger Bands are also very important in my strategy, and Volume is too. The last two Indicators I use are the 5 Simple Moving Average (5-SMA) and the 15 Simple Moving Average (15-SMA) which also give good Buy or Sell Signals.

The chart of TSO below shows how I setup my charts for Day Trading. I also use three extra Technical Indicators known as the Money Indicators. They basically show if there are more Buyers or Sellers. The dark green one at the top is Chaikin Money Flow (CMF), the yellow line is On Balance Volume (OBV), and the light blue one is the Accumulation/Distribution (A/D) line.

In order for my strategy to work, you don't really need to learn these three additional Technical Indicators. It works fine without them, but if you want to learn how to use them that's okay too. That is an advanced lesson I teach after you have mastered the CCI, Stochastics, Bollinger Bands, and the two Moving Averages.



Here is what the charts from stockcharts.com look like. I use this type of chart after the Market has closed for the day. I primarily use this charting service for daily and weekly charts.



This is a chart from my Fidelity Active Trader Pro trading platform. These are the kinds of charts that I use while the Market is open because their information is streaming in real-time. With these charts, I can get one-minute, five-minute, fifteen-minute, thirty-minute, hourly, daily, weekly, and monthly charts. This is how I set up my charts when I Swing Trade. I use many more Technical Indicators when analyzing longer term charts like the hourly, daily, and weekly charts for Swing Trading.



Here is a screenshot of my four monitor trading platform. I combine elements of the Scottrader and the Fidelity Active Trader Pro platforms.



If you are interested in taking lessons on these subjects, I offer private one-on-one mentoring sessions custom designed for each student according to what subjects interest them. If you have any questions about the lessons I offer, don't hesitate to email me at:

info@stock-market-lessons.com

Day Trading is my favorite style of trading. It is a very exiting and lucrative way to trade. If you watch the Video Charts of my Day Trades, you will see exactly how it's done and you will feel the excitement of watching me make hundreds of dollars in less than fifteen minutes.

I also am very proficient at Swing Trading. Most of my Swing Trades only last a few days at most. Each one makes me at least a thousand dollars or more because I always buy at least one thousand shares, and when the PPS goes up one dollar, I've made one thousand dollars.

If the trade doesn't go well, the most important rule in trading the Stock Market is to KEEP YOUR LOSSES TO AN ABSOLUTE MINIMUM! The way I trade is that I know exactly at what price I will exit the trade if it isn't going well. I enter my trades as close to the exit point as possible. My favorite entry is at the second low of a double-bottom chart pattern. That way, if the Price Per Share breaks below the first low, I'm out without a doubt.

The most important rule to trading the Stock Market is CAPITAL PRESERVATION, because without money to trade with, you won't be able to LIVE TO TRADE ANOTHER DAY...

Happy Trading!
Tom