Friday's Charts...

Well I have a bit of time and I'm up early on a Saturday so thought I'd post some charts and comment on the trades I took for Friday.. Each evening I do some market scans and come up with a list of stocks to start with the next day. I am looking for stocks that have been beaten up (3 or 4 down days in a row) and are approaching either previous price support areas or significant moving averages (the daily 100 or 200 day avg). I will add to this list any stocks in the news the next morning (earnings, interesting news items etc.) as these will probably give good movement once the market opens. Trade #1: esrx made my list the nite before as a possible bounce play, it had been down a number of days in a row and the day before had started turning indicating a possible retracement..once the market opened it moved up quite quickly so I waited for a pullback (very similar to my futures trading style). On a 5min chart it pulled back and gave a narrow 5 minute bar rite at the 8ema, so my entry is simply a break of the 5minute high. From the first chart, you can see the entry was around 51.31 as the current 5min candle had a high of 51.30. The next chart shows how the trade played out, and as shown it went in my favour, continuing the move higher..I was a seller into the pushes up, unloading my shares on the way. I normally sell in thirds, my first target being around 15cents my next around 30-40cents and my final over 75cents if it gets there. The stop on this trade was a break of the previous 5minute candle low which would have been 51.18 on this trade so I risked 13cents. I also added 500 shares on a break of the day's high as this usually gives a nice pop (which it did).

Trade #2: During the day I have intraday scanners running, looking at different things, one of them being significant volume spikes. Many times, news is released during the day that causes large amounts of buying or selling in a stock and sometimes if I catch the volume early I can hop in and grab a quick ride of 10-20cents or more. dhi was also on my bounce list as it had been beaten up previously so was due for a bounce. Once I saw the volume coming in (pink arrow on chart) I hopped in (was able to slide in at 18.60). Another nice thing about this trade was that the high of day was just above my entry so I knew if we could get through the high of day more buyers may hop on board (the high of day break is usually a good catalyst for a push higher on a strong stock). Second chart shows the outcome of the trade, we continued the push higher over the next 10-15mins and I was offering as it went up and then got rid of my last shares as it turned just in case it fell back down.

Trade #3 and #4: Both losers and both stocks I had on bounce. The thinking was on jcp it had formed a bit of a base and i figured a break of the base higher it may get going up. It triggered only to fade back down and continue lower. I closed on a break of the base to the downside limiting the loss. ip was also on bounce watch, and it was moving lower touching it's 200 day moving average. The mistake I made here was that I didnt wait for some volume and shape to take the setup (the volume and push down came later around the whole number $33). Again, closed the trade on a break lower thus limiting the loss and looking for the next trade.

Trade #5: This was the correct setup I was looking for in the IP trade, as you can see here on fwlt we got the push down giving the waterfall shape along with the pop in volume. You may notice that this mirrors my Euro scalping style where I would look for a stretch and hop in the opposite way, knowing that price moved a bit like an elastic and would always bounce back. I took the previous 5 minute candle break and this one pushed up where I began offering as it gave 10 cents profit and up.