Swing Trading: Larry Connors on Trading and The Business of Decision-Making

What do you do as a trader when the market falls by 200 points? What do you do when it rallies by more than 400?

As Larry Connors wrote in Short Term Trading Strategies That Work: A Quantified Guide To Trading Stocks and ETFs:

You may think you are in the business of trading. But in reality, you are in the business of decision-making! And the better you can make these decision ahead of time, the better your results will be – period.

Emphasis in the original. You can read “the original” in Chapter 14 of Short Term Trading Strategies That Work. If you don’t already own a copy, you can get one for free at the link below. Both digital download (pdf) and paperback versions of Short Term Trading Strategies That Work are available.

Short Term Trading Strategies That Work: A Quantified Guide to Trading Stocks and ETFs – by Larry Connors, founder and CEO of TradingMarkets and Connors Research

Here are 7 Stocks You Need to Know for Friday

Up nearly 16% and closing above its 5-day moving average for the first time since late July were shares of ^CSCO^ ahead of trading on Friday.

Leading the S&P 500 higher on Thursday, shares of ^NWSA^ rallied back above their 200-day moving average. NWSA finished up more than 18%.

Many of the biggest gains by sector were in the financials, with stocks like  ^MS^ up more than 10% and ^BAC^, which closed higher by more than 6%.

Note that both stocks are trading below their 200-day moving averages, but are not yet back in overbought territory despite sizable gains on Thursday.

By comparison, credit card companies like ^MA^ and ^V^ gained more than 7% and 6% respectively to finish above their 5-day moving averages ahead of Friday’s session. Of the two, Visa had become more oversold during the recent sell-off. But both stocks remained above their 200-day moving averages.

Scheduled to announce quarterly earnings on Friday, shares of ^JCP^ rallied by nearly 6% in Thursday’s session. The retailer has been trading below its 200-day moving average consistently since early July.

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David Penn is Editor in Chief of TradingMarkets.com