Although the monster earnings (AAPL, GOOGL, AMZN, etc.) are next week and the week that follows, we did have one decently worthwhile report after the close Thursday, which was Intel (INTC). As you probably know, Intel has been on a huge tear since August, blasting from about fifteen dollars to more than double that amount. A triple-digit return in a few months is not what one would expect from a tired old has-been like Intel, but there you have it.
All the same, their earnings report came out, and they’re falling hard. Dramatic as it looks, I can tell you that INTC is experiencing prices it has not seen since……………..Tuesday. So, while I appreciate the drop, it’s not that huge a deal.
This tumble is bleeding over to SMH, of course, the semiconductor sector ETF:
Over a longer time horizontal, the /NQ has been quite stuck under resistance (horizontal line). This is the kind of market that can grind an aggressive trader into hamburger. For a swing trader like myself, the market sucks out loud, because once you’re firmly positioned, the market blows the other way and lays waste to much of the profits garnered.
I try not to say this very often, but we seriously NEED the market to fall tomorrow. The structure of the market has broken, and things are perfectly poised for a nice drop on Friday (except for metals, of course, which as I’m typing this are raging higher yet again).
The point I’m trying to make is that if things are perfectly poised for a drop, as with the QQQ below, and the market goes up anyway, well – – that sucks out loud as well. But let’s hold off on the handwringing until we get to Friday’s close, shall we?
In the meantime, the brutality of the TACO Tirade has compelled me to trim my exposure from 160% to 110%, since my juicy Tuesday profits have been set ablaze. My symbol count has also trimmed from 30 to 25. As a side note, of the seven options positions I do have, I have deliberately (as usual) established a very conservative time horizon, purchasing only June puts, so that theta decay is inconsequential.
