Daily Commentary

With Microsoft (MSFT) and Yahoo! (YHOO) in the news lately regarding take-over bids and deadlines, let’s allow cooler heads to prevail by looking at the charts of these two stocks. It’s clear that Yahoo has been the beneficiary of the latest news, which is the cast most often for potential take-over stocks. From a low…

While some people may hate overnight gaps, others love them for their simplicity and potential profitability. Today, almost like clock-work, the US Stock Market opened with a down-gap and filled it by Noon EST. Keep in mind that yesterday’s trading opened with a gap-up that was filled also. Here is today’s Gap-Fade trade, with two…

Let’s take a quick annotation of today’s DIA action on the 5-minute chart, scanning for ideal trades of the day. First, the market gapped near over 60 Dow Points, setting up the classic “Fade the Gap” trade. Today’s gap fell about 10 cents (points) short of a full gap fade, but the initial action is…

Apple Inc (AAPL) continued its remarkable, almost vertical steady rise today, gaining almost 4% intraday before noon! Since the middle of March, Apple has been traveling upwards at neck-breaking speeds, ascending in a near 70 degree angle. The angular momentum of the stock is changing, meaning the rapid ascension may be unsustainable in the short…

With the exception of Tuesday’s “April Fool’s” 3% stock market move, the rest of the week experienced tame trading. Let’s take a quick look at some of the index charts to see where last week’s action left us: For the S&P 500, price crested and closed 4 days in a row above the key 20…

Potash Corp (POT) is a stock I have been watching for over a year now, and it has been an amazing ride up to new life-time highs hit today. Potash is a large fertilizer company that has been increasing in market share and share price over the last few years, and now traders are becoming…

Apple Inc (AAPL) has completed a mighty technical feat recently – it has stopped its downtrend and now is showing signs of vibrant life. Notice the “U-Turn” or the “Saucer or Rounded” bottom the stock has formed. After falling from $200 to $115 two months later, AAPL has recovered up to an intraday high near…

The US Indexes opened this morning slightly lower via an overnight gap, yet as of 11:00 EST, all had virtually filled this gap, creating a profit opportunity for nimble traders. Let’s look at two different chart views to see the difference: StockCharts.com reports yesterday’s close as a hash-mark around $126.20 (in the DIA) but it…

The US Dollar Index ($USD) showed signs of life recently, forming a potential short-term reversal pattern. Let’s look: The Index formed an all-time low just beneath 71 on March 17th before reversing upwards to form a semi-hammer (or long-legged doji) pattern which can mark reversal points in a market. Following the doji reversal, price rallied…

The Financials Sector (XLF) has received considerable attention as of late, but let’s look at the chart for a few more insights: The small horizontal hash-marks represent the series of lower lows and lower highs which have defined the prominent downtrend, and this structure has not been broken yet. Price recently formed a higher low,…