Today was a total freak show in the markets.
The day started with the news that Freddie Mac's CFO killed himself in the midst of an SEC probe of accounting violations. This kind of thing is really saddening – – he was a family man – – but as I said about a year ago, I think this kind of violence (on others and on one's own person) is going to be the way of the world for a number of years. I enjoy making money in bear markets, but I derive zero pleasure from violence of any kind. I can only say that when the Dow is in the 4,000s, this kind of thing is going to be rampant (not so much suicide, but corporate killings).
Those reading my posts throughout the day probably caught on to what a rough ride is was for me. I'd say about 30 individual positions were blown out by stops. What was most troubling for me is that the Dow itself wasn't up that much. If I'm having a bad day with, say, the Dow up 300 points, I can understand that. But if I'm having a bad day and the Dow is up 60, I'm really worried.
Whatever the opposite of the PPT is showed up at the appointed hour and sold the market off hard, and by the closing bell I was actually looking at green on my bottom line. Taking into account the losses from the prior blown positions, the day was still down, but only by a little bit, and certainly not to the degree it was earlier.
Looking at the wackiest of the wacky – our dear friend FAZ – I am finding it very, very hard to believe that this isn't ready to explode higher. I have been burned, assaulted, mutilated, pummeled, and raped so badly by this thing that my conviction that it's heading higher doesn't compel me to actually buy any of it, but from a safe distance, it looks amazing.
When FAZ came onto the market last November, its volume for the day was 14,000 shares. The last two days, the volume was about one-third of a billion shares.
I'm pretty busy the rest of the day, so any post will probably not come until this evening. Ta-ta!
