It was a great week. Stocks and commodities are moving as expected from my weekend trading report. I like to see the market unfold in a calm and collected manner.
The US dollar has made a nice move in the past couple weeks. Although it has broken out of its down channel I think there is a lot of short covering going on making this bounce more powerful than others. Also it is important to note that it is near resistance which could dampen things around the $77-77.5 level. If the dollar heads back down I expect gold to start making a move back up, which it started to do Wednesday.
Below are my thoughts and charts about what I think is unfolding for both stocks and commodities.
DIA – Dow Jones index fund
The Dow index fund (NYSE: DIA, Stock Forum) has performed just the way I thought it would: push to a new high then sell down. Generally I would expect this move down to test my expected support level or trade near that level, but because we are heading into the holiday season, and volume is light the market has a natural tendency to drift higher. I’m sure this is why it’s still trading near the high.
This new yearly high was enough to suck in breakout traders, and in the short term we will see whether they get follow through, or get shaken out of this trade also. Oh, the joys of buying a breakout in an overbought market condition!
GLD – gold exchange traded fund
Gold (NYSE: GLD, Stock Forum) broke down sharply from its trend channel and has settled into a support zone. Wednesday we saw a nice bounce but the question is, is this a rally or a sucker’s bounce?
I’ve found the best setups and moves occur after an ABC retrace. The black lines on the chart show exactly that type of price action. These retraces shake out most short term traders before starting a new rally. There is a dotted blue line showing a possible resistance trend line which would need to be broken after the ABC retrace pattern has formed if we want a low risk setup with a sizable win/loss ratio.
SLV – silver ETF trading fund
Silver (NYSE: SLV, Stock Forum) is in the same boat as its big sister (yellow gold). We just need to wait for a high probability setup to present itself before putting any of our hard earned money to work.
USO – crude oil fund
The crude oil fund (NYSE: USO, Stock Forum) has provided some great short term gains for anyone who used my analysis from my Sunday night report. The quote and chart below covers my thoughts for USO.
Sunday night report:
“Oil broke down out of its bull flag last week and is currently testing both trend line support and horizontal support levels. We could see a short term bounce here to the $37, 38 or 40 levels. Taking money off the table at each resistance level and raising your stop is an important money management strategy I use for this type of play.”
UNG – natural gas trading fund
Natural gas (NYSE: UNG, Stock Forum) is still very much a speculative play, as everyone thinks they will make huge money from this commodity.
This means two things in my opinion:
It’s still headed lower
After rallies the sellers jump back in.
UNG is trading near resistance and it could provide a great shorting opportunity in the coming days.
ETF trading conclusion:
Although it’s been a quite week in the market, I have really enjoyed it. Not sure if it is related to everything unfolding in a controlled manner or the holiday season nearing, or maybe both?
November and December have been quiet for our ETFs, but I know we are on the verge of either a large move up or down in the coming weeks. Let’s watch the market and funds unfold and see if we can get another trade or two in before year end.
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Chris Vermeulen