R.C. Market Report 12.31

• Today: Ho Ho Ho. Santa Claus rally has now come and gone. We had continuation of rally today as the Dow went up nearly 500 pts in just over two days. This is a rather optimistic way to end the second worst year in history.

• Friday: Starting with Friday, I think the market will be tested by the return of sellers. If we can hold up relatively well Friday and early part of next week, we can rally nicely into Obama's inauguration. I expect volatility to slowly return to the market in January, making trading more profitable than it was in December.

12/30 - Market Analysis

SPX - side


XLF - side


VIX - SPX bullish


A/D - fairly bullish


ETFs - XLF leads....good rally


Analysis: i am too tired to analyze...after spending the past 6 hours making broth for pho (which is still not finished), i am as tired as ever...anyway...i did a quick chart scan and overall, things are going as planned...which is that we will stay in the sideways channel for the upcoming trading sessions....dunno when we will break out of this boring range, but i am almost certain it won't happen until next week at the earliest...tomorrow i think i will just sleep in....staycation is what they call it...

R.C. Market Report 12.30

• Today: We had a rather impressive rally today considering we are still in the midst of holiday trading. Major indices were up over 2% and financials & homebuilders were up over 3%.

• Tomorrow: The last trading day of 2008. The rally at the end of day today seemed to me like the closing bell for 2008, even though tomorrow is a full day of trading. I don't expect any tradable opportunities to present itself tomorrow. It'll probably be like the last friday of quarter before summer break, where the campus is deserted but few remain to finish off final exams.

12/29 - Market Analysis

SPX - neutral


SPY - neutral (but under 5day ema)


XLF - neutral


USO - lil bullish


UUP - dollar bearish


VIX - neutral


A/D


ETFs - energy leader of the day


Analysis: sideways trending continues...big move down then followed by a nice size move up to recover most of the losses...overall, things were weak except for gold / silver and oil (EOD rally)...these are the sectors i am looking into for possible longs if SPX can stay within this range and not breakdown...as a fun prediction, i would like to see a nice rally now til end of febuary before a huge fall in febuary that will finally mark the bottom

R.C. Market Report 12.29

• Today: Continuation of frustrating price action + light volume trading.

• Tomorrow: Note for the future - the last week of August and the last two weeks of the year are the prime times for a vacation. All the traders that are on break aren't missing a thing.

George Carlin - Religion is Bullshit

R.C. Market Report 12.26

• Today: I thought the market would start slipping down again. But apparently, sellers were away for the holidays as well. We had extremely low volume for a full trading day.

• Monday: Three trading days left of 2008, one of the worst years in the history of the stock market. I don't see any meaningful move happening within this week. Maybe after new years day, we rally into Obama's inauguration on the 20th.

12/26 - Market Analysis

SPX - neutral


SPY - neutral


XLF - neutral


VIX - SPX slight bullish


A/D - side



ETFs


Analysis: no opinion...basically sideways looks possible until the new year...slight bullishness as i think we will go towards resistance since we are setup to bounce from support now

12/24 - Market Analysis

SPX - neutral


SPY - neutral


XLF - neutral


USO - bearish


UUP - bearish


VIX - bearish, SPX bullish


A/D


ETFs - boring month...financials strong, energy weak


Analysis: Many will look back at this year and call it the lost year...some are already thinking this will be the lost decade...when zooming in on the current stock market environment, i can't help but declare that this December is the lost month...just when i thought that my new and improved trading system was gonna be great, we go and have the longest sidetrend in years...its been totally horrible...i can't see anybody able to feel confident about placing many trades during this time. january will be crazy...but the rest of this month will just remain dead... vacation time for the rich and boredom for the slaves of the market...where the hell did the year go? too fast and too painful for too many...

R.C. Market Report 12.24

• Friday's Forecast: Down Slightly

• Today: Market took a break today and ended up for the first time in over a week.

• Friday: I don't expect the market to be particularly active on Friday. Unlike today, however, I think the market will resume trading to the downside.

12/23 - Market Analysis

SPX - neutral


SPY - neutral bearish


XLF - neutral


VIX - neutral


A/D


ETFs - now all sectors negative...financials worst...


Analysis: Another lackluster day tomorrow? probably will get an up day to close us back into the range with a higher low to go with the lower high we made today...damn i hate this...dunno how to make money when the market can't stay committed to a direction on volume...

R.C. Market Report 12.23

• Tomorrow's Forecast: Christmas Eve Rally

• Today: Another low volume down day. Market seems to favor sliding down during these low volume days. Today's close puts us below the support line. Confirmation is needed.

• Tomorrow: We can easily reproduce another low volume down day tomorrow. Looks to me like that's how it's going to be until Jan 1. However, we have gone down 5 consecutive days now on declining volume. And psychologically, people may want to go home for christmas on a good note, even if it's only a small gain. So I think we'll finish positive tomorrow. It won't mean much going forward but we can use a little break from all the negativities.

12/22 - Market Analysis

SPX - neutral


SPY - bearish


XLF - bearish


VIX - SPX bullish


A/D - bearish


ETFs - XLF weak today but strong last 5 days...


Analysis: honestly, today didn't do much..felt much more boring and insignificant than the tape suggested...psychology and my boredom aside, today made my charts slightly more bearish...especially the 30" chart of SPY...might still just be a very short pullback before a big rally up...but for now, things are no longer as bullish as before...i am very close to neutral without any bias at the moment...its the frustrating time where patient trader do nothing and wreckless ones gamble and blow their accounts...i'll do my best to stay focused but it damn tough when everyone's on vacation and volume is superlight.

R.C. Market Report 12.22

• Tomorrow: Still Waiting for Direction

• Today: We broke through the support and remained negative for the entire day. However, final half hour rally brought it back to the level of support.

• Tomorrow: I was hoping that we start moving down because for the next couple of weeks, we'll be trading on light volume. I don't know if the rally at the end means we hold support and move higher, or we wipe it out tomorrow and continue lower. Either way, as of today's close, I'm not convinced that we are going down yet.

12/19 - Market Analysis

SPX - still bullish


SPY - bullish

XLF - neutral


USO - bearish


UUP - bearish


VIX - SPX bullish


A/d - neutral


ETFs - security in the boring safety stocks seems to be the last 5 day trend


Analysis: not much has changed...other than the market being very boring lately, nothing has happened...all major trendlines are still in place...and until we get a breakout or breakdown, the best we can do is hold the bullish stance we are currently in...with light volume next week again, we might just go sideways til the new years....good luck!

R.C. Market Report 12.19

• Monday's Forecast: Setting up for start of next trend

• Today: Other than the pop from the auto bailout news in the morning, it was another pause day for the market.

• Monday: The market is getting squeezed between the 50 and 20 day moving averages. The strength and the speed of the ascent worries me enough to believe that we can break the support and go lower. However, VIX keeps going down and oil looks to be very close to reaching a bottom as its volume picked up in the past week. Also, market has been holding up on bad news, so there are reasons for me to think that we break the resistance to the top and go higher too. I don't know which way we'll go. But I do believe that we've been squeezed into a range that's as tight as it can get, and we'll break out of it one way or another. Monday may be the start of that new trend.

R.C. Market Report 12.18

• Tomorrow's Forecast: Rally a Must for Bulls

• Today: We had a steeper selloff on increasing volume from yesterday. And this economic crisis is helping to expose more fraudulant activities of the past.

• Tomorrow: If the market breaks the support formed on the most recent higher low, look out below. To preserve this uptrend, we need to have a rally tomorrow. It's make or break time for the market.

12/18 - Market Analysis

SPX - bullish


SPY - bullish


XLF - neutral


USO - bearish


UUP - neutral


VIX - SPX neutral


A/D - not as bearish as i expected


ETFs - oil very weak, xlf relatively strong


Analysis: many charts, despite pulling back for the 2nd day in a row, still are bullish...support is held and until they are broken, the trend is still up...today got close to breaking many of them, but failed to do so...and as volume has been low, its kind of hard to say how strong the selling really was...the next big volume day will probably is a good indicator of the future...right now, i remain on holding status thinking the uptrend is still in place.