Slope of Hope Blog Posts
Slope initially began as a blog, so this is where most of the website’s content resides. Here we have tens of thousands of posts dating back over a decade. These are listed in reverse chronological order. Click on any category icon below to see posts tagged with that particular subject, or click on a word in the category cloud on the right side of the screen for more specific choices.
Range We Can Believe In
Looks like an interesting day ahead, eh, bears? Tomorrow morning's jobs report will have everyone's attention, but even the sneak peeks we're getting at the economy this morning have provided enough ammunition to take the /ES down a full percentage point.
Looking at 2010 so far, we spent the first few weeks trapped in a range, which we broke to the downside on January 20th. We've spent the past few weeks in a new and lower range, and I've mentioned the "threat" of pushing above the high end of our current range and getting back to the lower end of the prior range. It still could happen, but recent action makes it a little less likely.
It would take an unexpected catalyst to knock us below the lowest end of our current range, because at that point, people will start to really freak out. Trading inside these ranges is a bit of a drag, but it's important to be "in position" prior to breakouts, since the movements after a range is "escaped" tend to be relatively instantaneous. We may well spend the day grinding around roughly wherever we open.
Early Rumblings of Slopefest
For many months, there has been chatter about having a real, live get-together amongst Slopers. I thought I'd float a survey to see how much interest there was in actually doing this.
It turns out that the Money Show in Las Vegas runs from May 10-13, and I'll be attending that. It would probably be as good a time as any to have a get-together, particularly since some of you might be going anyway (and it'll give you others things to do on top of just meeting and greeting fellow traders here).
So, if you think you actually would be interested in making a trip out to Las Vegas around that time, fill in your name and email on this survey (those are the only two data points it asks for). Oh, and if you're a troll, please note that IP addresses are recorded with each response, so take your troll-powers somewhere else. Anyway, it'll be interesting to see if more than two people express an interest in attending such a thing. Thanks.
Mid-Day Minute: CSCO (by Mike Paulenoff)
Shorting the EFA
I have built up a large short position in EFA, which is the widely-traded ETF of non-U.S. stocks. The graph below shows the simple moving averages (50, 100, and 200 day) without the price data (which is one of ProphetCharts' spiffier features). Looks like it's rolling over, wouldn't you say?
