Learn These First Hour Strategies
What Wednesday’s Action Tells
You
The SPX
(
$SPX.X |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) closed almost
unchanged
yesterday at 1213.45 with NYSE volume again “holiday light” at 926
million
shares. The volume ratio was 57 and breadth +472. The Dow
(
$INDU |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating)
finished
at 10,829, -0.2%, with the Nasdaq
(
$COMPQ |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) unchanged at 2177 and the
(
QQQQ |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) +0.1% at 40.02.
The green side was led by the
(
SMH |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating),
+1.1%,
which gave traders good trade-through entry above 32.88 as the SOX
re-crossed
the 40-week EMA at 426.46. The 32.88 breakout was out of a
Slim Jim between
32.88 – 32.76 from 11:30 a.m. ET Tuesday until the breakout yesterday
morning.
You were ready for it, so I hope you took the trade. Entry in the SMH was no
later than the 9:35 a.m. bar, and if you kept scrolling the semis for
First-Hour
strategies, you picked up defined trades, like
(
KLAC |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) which broke out
of a
Flip Top (see chart) above 45.98 on the 10:00 a.m. bar and ran to 46.75 on
the
11:20 a.m. bar and finally closed at 46.25.
Traders of the S&P 500 futures had a
no-travel-range day with the daily range just 3 points between 1213.95 –
1210.95. There is no spin there, as the Generals were able to hold
yesterday’s
gains. The Dow was weaker as it traded down 59 points from the previous
close to
a 10,796 intraday low, then traded up into the 10,829 close.
There are two trading days left in 2004 with
the
QQQQ,
(
SPY |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating),
(
DIA |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating),
(
IWM |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) and Nasdaq all trading above rising
10-,
20-, 50- and 200-day EMAs, so no market commentary needed, unless, and
until,
that scenario has some change in direction at the top end.
This is being recorded Wednesday night for
Thursday, but I don’t expect any big red futures in the morning in the
absence
of any overt news, but if so, scroll for retracement long setups.
The next commentary will be in 2005 as I am
heading North in the morning, so I wish you all a safe, prosperous and happy
New
Year.
Have a good trading day,
Kevin Haggerty
