Starting anew and branching out

After an extended absence from this blog (over 2 years), I'm posting one last time here.

Although it was easy to focus on just writing here about just the TSP funds, I have always had much broader investing interests: trading stocks, ETFs, and options. I enjoy reading many trading blogs around the web, and subscribe to several. I decided to take the opportunity to start my own personal investment/trading blog, calling it AbjectAvarice.com .


The name has a couple layers of meaning: the emotions of fear and greed drive the markets, and my style is to trade based on indicators of those (bullish percents, market breadth, and the like). I'm also trying to imply that both the motivations of fear and greed are not healthy for the investor. I'll be writing about how I try to profit from the market's gyrations while trying to overcome my own fallacies.

Please take a look - I'll be posting my current portfolio, as well as documenting my profits and losses.

Thanks for reading.

Put your money where your mouth is

Initiated three short positions this morning. Looking at the big picture, it appears that technology and consumer sectors appear weakest. I looked at scores of charts, starting with the point and figure (P&F) charts to look for sell signals - then transitioning to the yearly charts to identify medium term trends and tops.

This was my list of worthwhile short ideas:

GD, EMN, STX, EBAY, GOOG, RIMM, JNPR, GSPMS, RL, INTC, GLW, VFC, NOK, VOD, PTNR, AAPL, DELL, PMTC, T, AVP, KMB, AMZN, NSIT, COST, LOW.

I then looked at analyst research to identify the weakest fundamentals of the group, and narrowed to STX, JNPR, PMTC, AMZN.

All four looked good, but the bid/ask spread wasn't as attractive for PMTC. I bought at the money June puts on STX, JNPR, and AMZN, with equal position sizing. Stops are based on short term trend reversal, expected holding term is to expiration. I'll definitely sell early if positions fall to former support levels (around a 50% drop!)...

Inflection Point

The recent rally has surprised most investors. The bears were caught off guard - just as everything seemed to be going their way... The retail investors weren't ready - most just finished selling at the bottom and were too stung to jump back in. Many in the finance industry weren't expecting what we've seen - how many "experts" have you seen wringing their hands lately wondering whether it's time to get back in?

My thought is that if you're not already in, it wouldn't hurt to watch and wait. The aggressive, fast move up off the bottom is done and past. Now, we're up against several big technical reasons for the indexes to pause:

• 200 day moving average
• Matching the most recent intermediate top (established in January 09)
• The 38% fib. retracement line from the Aug. 08 rally just before the "big plunge"

Here's my thoughts, graphically:


I'm currently "all in" - so I'll be watching for reasons to sell to protect profits.