Were you aware that the Bureau of Labor calculates unemployment in various and sundry ways that are not shared with the press? Neither were we -- until we heard about 'U-6," which reckoned U.S. joblessness at 14.8 percent back in February. We would assume it's much higher now, but unfortunately February was the last month given. Incidentally, if 1933's rate of 24.7 […] Read More
Friday, September 4, 2009
The futures pushed slightly above a 16.265 pivot that had served as a short-term, minimum upside objective. The overshoot hints of further upside progress, presumably to the next Hidden Pivot resistance worth noting, ______.
Check out the pre-holiday special in the Diamonds if you trust Mr Market about as far as you could heave a Bosendorfer. The idea of a strong rally today, followed by a devastating collapse immediately after summer's last fling, sounded too sexy to pass up […] Read More
I usually ignore hot tips, but a pen-pal of mine, Phil C., sent me a breathless, totally out-of-the-blue alert predicting that the Dow would rally 100-150 points this morning, forming a top from which it will collapse when traders return after Labor Day. Putting aside the details, this sounds so absolutely right to me that I'm inclined to speculate modestly. Mr Market loves to spring dirty, stinking, vicious surprises whenever possible, and what could be more vicious -- or more surprising -- than a tsunami to greet us as we return from our final summer vacation, tan, rested and anything but ready? To get short, we can use the midpoint resistance at _____ shown in the chart, buying two September _____ puts if and when the Diamonds get there.
All are ducks are in line now that we've successfully legged into the December 12.50-15.00 call spread eight times for a net CREDIT of 0.15 per. The short sale of some December 15 calls for 0.45 yesterday morning clinched it, allowing us to capture premium in this series when the options were fat and juicy. Let's put in a stink bid of 0.20 to cover the December 15s, good through Wednesday. It would be worth our while to get 'em in at that price if we can do so within the next few days. Our goal would then be to re-short them on rally.
We're no fans of head-and-shoulder formations, since they are everywhere the amateur chartist might want to find them. But there is something to be said for the bullish reverse head-and-shoulders pattern that gold futures have been tracing out for the last year-and-a-half. The pattern is shown in the chart below, and it is predicting that […] Read More
The following questions about my option strategies came up in the forum, but I am republishing them here because they may be of interest to a wider audience: What is the advantage of going long one call, and then locking in a given spread via shorting another call, versus “locking-in” the spread by going long […] Read More
The consistent accuracy of Rick Ackerman’s forecasts is well known in the trading world, where his Hidden Pivot Method has achieved cult status. Rick’s proprietary trading/forecasting system is easy to learn, probably because he majored in English, not rocket science. Just one simple but powerful trick -- managing the risk of an ongoing trade with stop-losses based on ‘impulse legs’ – can be grasped in three minutes and put to profitable use immediately. Quite a few of his students will tell you that using ‘impulsive stops’ has paid for the course many times over.
Another secret Rick will share with you, “camouflage trading,” takes more time to master, but once you get the hang of it trading will never be the same. The technique entails identifying ultra-low-risk trade set-ups on, say, the one-minute bar chart, and then initiating trades in places where competition tends to be thin.
Most important of all, Rick will teach you how to develop market instincts (aka “horse sense”) by observing the markets each day from the fixed vantage point that only a rigorously disciplined trading system can provide.
The three-hour Hidden Pivot Course is offered live each month. If it’s more convenient, you can take it in recorded form at your leisure, as many times as you like. The course fee includes “live” trading sessions (as opposed to hypothetical ‘chalk-talk’) every Wednesday morning, access to hundreds of recorded hours of tutorial sessions, and access to an online library that will help you achieve black-belt mastery of Hidden Pivot trading techniques.
The next webinar will be held on Thursday, October 6. Click below to register or get more information.
