Momentum Trader Report: 04/14/08

The Calm Before the Storm?

Today was a quiet day for the indexes, which finished down slightly. Wachovia was the first of the big financials to report this week, and they reported worse news than expected. But since the market didn’t respond much, maybe it was expected after all. With more earnings coming out this week by other financials, and important companies like Google, things could get very wild.

Energy stocks, including the solars, had a nice today. Although I didn’t post a chart of this stock last night, it was in the Watchlist, and I posted the chart last Thursday night.

There were two other stocks that triggered as well. One was FTI, which triggered and then took heat. It finished nicely though, closing at the high of the day and still looking good here.

The other was JRCC, which triggered, and then quickly lost momentum.

Regarding the Recent Smaller Max Gains

In the Past Performance section, you will notice that most of the stocks that trigger from my Watchlist have offered gains of at least 1% before resting or retracting, which has provided a decent profit for day trading, or taking partial profits. The last several stocks that have triggered though have been offering a max gain of less than 1% on the breakout day. One reason for this is that my entries have been very conservative. Instead of buying a stock just as it breaks out, I am padding the entry a bit to ensure a successful breakout. The trade off is, I am giving away some of the profit. This is not planned. It’s a psychological reaction I suppose. The other reason is that the market has been choppy and lacking direction. The stocks are breaking out, and then just sitting there, lacking any real momentum. Some follow through the next day, others do not. This is a very challenging market to trade, and I have been finding that out especially over the last week. With this week expected a wild one, I may take the rest of the week off from trading unless things look too good to pass up.

The following stocks are charts that are looking pretty good, but the market isn’t right now. For that reason, I am not planning on trading these if they trigger unless the market is moving strongly. This is the stock market; anything can happen. So I will keep my options open.

Trade Ideas for 04/15/08:

Good luck and good trading!