Cosmic's MarketPlace Wrap - 3/1/10

[cosmic]

Beware the Ides of March? Interesting beginning of the month. Did funds buy in today in anticipation of Q1 ending? Hmmm.

VSTNQ seems to have been a great play today and I think a few exalts to Mr. C. Head would be well received. I slept through the best part so I didn't get to play

Bought back my calls and sold my URE for a 15% profit on the entire transaction. Took a few weeks.

Added small positions in TSEM, as well as an opener in SQNM. I've sold calls against the SQNM position. Added a little UNG.

Market had some strong action today but not so much in the Fins, which did ok, but there were other performers. I still have my short FAZ position with short FAZ puts, and saw very little movement on the position. Will post the RIFIN and bond charts tonight in the Bull/Bear Poll.


Hope everyone made some money today and will do so tomorrow. Regulars, please post your results with a minimum of 3 smileys per post.

[brosin]

VSTNQ took up almost my entire work day just staring at the screen. Turned out to be a profitable fixation.

Had a successful swap from 40% of my APWR shares into a VSTNQ position/day trade. Made $750 (29%) on it and only lost 40$ on the APWR shares to get out at $13.46 and back in $13.56. The APWR did have a strong albeit a weird finish as well.

I will count that as a successful day.

For my 3 smiley's, I will go with how I felt like today was going (in order of when I felt them starting with the earliest).

(seeing VSTNQ go to .95 without taking a breath)
(my feeling when I bought it - was fairly certain I was going to get clobbered)
;D (my feeling after everything worked out even better than I hoped)

[tajmahal9898]

Not so interesting day due to other commitments in the early morning...

Missed on MU upward movement.. shorted it at 9.75 and got stopped at 9.74..

FAS short puts are slightly up..

overall very little movement in the portfolio..

[mihai]

I've gotten in MU with half my money on 8.97 last week, should've jumped in today at ~9.45 but ended up panicking and getting in at 9.64.

I'm betting the market is up tomorrow too so I can cut down half my shares to play it safer in case I can retake the buy-in spot (~9-9.50) before 3/29 earnings.

I have full faith MU could rocket past to at least low 10's very soon, barring big market pullbacks.

[Dualism]

A very solid day for the bulls. But we may be getting technically short term overbought.

The collective market breadth was absolutely stellar at 5459 : 1807 in favor of the advancers.

The VIX traded a bit choppy early in the session, but it mellowed out ½ hour before lunch to close down 1.2%. T-bond futures had a quiet session.

Opened SQNM Apr 7 and 6 puts. Also, added to Mar 6 puts.
Traded FAS Mar 70 calls for 30cent gain.
Closed out URE Mar 6 puts for 0.05.

My account forged ahead 0.8% on the day.

17.33 is the next target for bulls on the VIX . I’d think that is going to be a tough target to hit, so bulls should be cautious and employ strategies to protect their gains. A run above 19.59 on the VIX is signal for bulls to lock in profits.

[ask2lern]

I sold my FSLR calls for a 48% gain........ .......Sold my SPY 110 Calls for a 29% gain ;D ................................added to my PALM position so now 5K @ 6.16...... ...........built up a SPY 110 PUT position 175 @ 1.18 avg.......... ...............shared some karma................Exalts for Cos..................Live to trade another day............................ .........GLTA

[drtracyb]

Had my first great day of the year in VSTNQ -- thanks to Chickenhead, Maxi and Brosin for all the advice. I'm now more than positive for the year, redeeming myself for getting spooked and selling IMGG at its low earlier this year. Did three round trips today so can't play for a while, but I sure do love free money.

[brosin]

Mar 1, 2010 16:36:24 GMT -5 drtracyb said:

Had my first great day of the year in VSTNQ -- thanks to Chickenhead, Maxi and Brosin for all the advice. I'm now more than positive for the year, redeeming myself for getting spooked and selling IMGG at its low earlier this year. Did three round trips today so can't play for a while, but I sure do love free money.

Congrats Tracy! Knew you would hit a Home Run on one of your plays soon. You were due!

I too made up most of my IMGG losses today. That may allow me to just buy 1000 shares in my long term account (of IMGG) and forget about them. Trading it has not been kind to me - actually this statement is not so true, but all the gains I built up were on small positions, whereas it was the (very) big position that cleaned my clock.

I used up my 3 day trades today as well (3 buys VSTNQ / 1 sell of all the shares), but it was well worth it.

[timber]

just two vsnq trades for decent gains nothing like tracy....wow she hit it just right....bought some sva....earnings is april 5 i think dont miss the run now

[ask2lern]

[/quote]I used up my 3 day trades today as well (3 buys VSTNQ / 1 sell of all the shares), but it was well worth it. [/quote]



..........um correct me bronsin because I know you are really good with numbers.............. but wouldn't that be 4 trades...............LOL

[brosin]

Mar 1, 2010 16:43:27 GMT -5 timber said:

just two vsnq trades for decent gains nothing like tracy....wow she hit it just right....bought some sva....earnings is april 5 i think dont miss the run now

Yeah timber what was with that big drop here EOD in SVA?

Looks (very) attractive to me again from a valuation standpoint, but the chart looks like doom (tm).

[brosin]

Mar 1, 2010 16:53:08 GMT -5 ask2lern said:

..........um correct me bronsin because I know you are really good with numbers.............. but wouldn't that be 4 trades...............LOL

LOL Ask. Sure it would be 4 trades, plus the 3 trades that I used to exit and then re-enter my APWR, but I was referring to "day trades," of which I only have 3 in a 5 day span and defined as 'opening and then closing the same position in the same day.' I used 3 of these today (opening and then closing 3 VSTNQ positions).

[trading4dough]

Bought and sold tza for $.03 and sold faz lost $.04

Account was up 2.45% for the day

[tajmahal9898]

slight update since my last post - I was not done closing the books for the day..

My ticket to short MU at 9.77 was not filled during market hours. Apparently, the ticket was with the human broker, and the order got filled at a later time.. My cover ticket was accepted at 9.67 in AH... Somebody sold 25K shares at 9.67 in two blocks 24K and 1K..

[kryptos2009]

Spent most of the day with work....

Bought 20 FPM Mar 20 2010 80.0 Calls @ 1.95

[exabi]

Account up day, even with the RICK whipsaw, missed the big PCX up day...not trades otherwise.

[Rich]

No trades. In and out today, but I did check out the market along the way.

Thought about going short at 1115, but then didn't.

It would be just like them sum-guns to blast right thru it in the morning, although I think the odds are against it.

[ccash04]

Didn't do much wish I woulda held on to the VSTNQ from friday.

Bought 100 RIG $85 calls; kinda wished I hadn't now RIG's been beaten up even though their earnings was bad it wasn't really that bad.

Thinking about pulling the trigger on some FAZ.

[commodityypro]

Kudos to Ask2learn, nice gains!

Only action was I covered my FAZ short for a nice gain. I thought market would pullback from 1115 S&P, which it did for a bit but rallied back at the close. Still holding short FAS, avg. $68. Have a FAZ short order in now at $17.40. Still holding BAC but may sell it depending on how these warrants shake out.

[torrentio1]

I saw a bullish market up portfolio up session...

Hope all did very well!

;D

[benvestor]

Still holding all Prev positions, APWR, MVIS, DDSS, ZLC, NETL, TYH.. all green today woohooo!

Holding 50 vstnq now long term lol..

Heck of a VSTNQ ride, had a limit order at .42 missed that and had to get in at .58, rode that one until 90+ and stopped out mid .80s!! Made a nice profit on that one, big thanks to ChickenHead duder! ;D

Great day overall, now i have to wait until my settlement date to get back in for any day trades.

[benvestor]

Mar 1, 2010 20:56:04 GMT -5 benvestor said:

Still holding all Prev positions, APWR, MVIS, DDSS, ZLC, NETL, TYH.. all green today woohooo!

Holding 50 vstnq now long term lol..

Heck of a VSTNQ ride, had a limit order at .42 missed that and had to get in at .58, rode that one until 90+ and stopped out mid .80s!! Made a nice profit on the trade, big thanks to ChickenHead duder! ;D

Great day overall, now i have to wait until my settlement date to get back in for any day trades.

[shipoffools]

Fellow Fastopians -

I was posting that this possibility existed on the Nasdaq today (over on the APWR thread). This is not fool proof, but a requirement to move higher.

From IBD (Investors Business Daily) end of day wrap-up:

The Big Picture
Market Follows Through, But With Signs Of Caution
By ALAN R. ELLIOTT, INVESTOR'S BUSINESS DAILY
Posted 07:12 PM ET


Featured Stocks
ABVT * Abovenet Inc AIG American Intl Group CTSH * Cognizant Tech Sol Cl A PCLN * Priceline.Com Inc POWI * Power Integrations Inc PUK Prudential Plc Adr SNDK * Sandisk Corp * Top-Rated Company
1"
2"
3" In a broad advance Monday, the Nasdaq marked a follow-through, shifting the market's outlook to a confirmed, if cautious, uptrend.

The Nasdaq jumped 1.6%. The other major indexes followed at a distance. The S&P 500 rose 1%, the NYSE composite 0.9% and the Dow 0.8%.

A late drop-off in trading on the NYSE left only the Nasdaq with higher volume.


View Enlarged Image
The S&P 500 and Dow punched above their 50-day moving averages. Technology stocks, led by semiconductors, steamrolled. Many leading stocks broke out from bases or made new highs.

Ideally, a follow-through — which confirms a new market uptrend — comes with stronger gains in the major indexes.

But bullish action among the many leading stocks, even before Monday, pointed to institutional investors embracing stocks once again. The Nasdaq and S&P 500 are now up for the year.

There are some encouraging precedents for Monday's follow- through. In 2005, the market posted two follow-throughs that came with index gains of about 1.5% or 1.7%. Those May and October moves produced meaningful market advances.

Another positive note came from the market in Hong Kong, which staged a follow-through of its own Monday. A number of Chinese stocks rallied Monday and are U.S. market leaders.

Although the market has made a bullish signal, questions remain, partly because Monday's index gains weren't so lofty. The NYSE, S&P 500 and Dow still have poor Accumulation/Distribution Ratings.

Market uptrends always begin with a follow-through, but not every follow-through works.

Still, it's smart now to carefully buy stocks with solid fundamentals in well-crafted bases.

Buy stocks as near their buy points as you can. Most important, keep your sell rules front and center. Be prepared to sell if a stock starts acting poorly.

European markets rose following a pledge by the European Union's monetary chief for coordinated fiscal action to support Greece.

Merger and acquisition news also fed gains. Prudential (PUK) said it would pay $35.5 billion to purchase AIG's (AIG) lucrative Asian insurance operation.

Markets cheered the news as a signal that AIG's effort to repay taxpayer funds was under way in earnest.

The day's big boost came from semiconductors, which rallied on January chip sales figures. IBD 100 stock SanDisk (SNDK) jumped 3.48, or 12%, to 32.63.

Other technology plays piled on, with breakouts coming from Power Integrations (POWI), Above-Net (ABVT) and Cognizant Technology Solutions (CTSH), among others.

Online travel heavyweight Priceline (PCLN) also broke out above a high handle on a two-month base.

Ship

[shipoffools]

Added 200 more swing shares of APWR today on a partial fill at 13.35. It hit it a second time after that, but I didn't fill the rest.

Currently almost 18,000 APWR shares total (Core plus Swing).

Since almost two weeks ago, playing the minimal swing range of 12-16.

The above follow-through on the Nasdaq begins the process of searching for for possible higher upside.

Ship

[sloop]

bought 6000 shares of BIG at an average of 34.15

[elle]

Hello folks,

A little busy, so nice to come here and catch up. I covered my short on STBC this am at 7.05 for .65, turned and bought it there. It didn't do much rest of the day.

See you mañana

[takeprofit4]

I'm still long F, BAC, APWR and URE. I'm up 67% on F! I'm likin things right now. BAC I'm down 4.X% (Jumped in without thinking on BAC) the other two up roughly 16%.