Calm before the (earning)storm..

Undoubtedly, the next couple of days will be very quiet as we imagine most of the market participants will be away with their family.    This is not to say that opportunities will not be present during next couple of days.   On the contrary, we think there will be plenty of opportunities and the main concern for us will be the liquidity.    The lack of liquidity means that some already volatile stocks will be push to either direction with less volume.   This may create some "false" move but as long as we are aware of what's going on, we can take advantage of it.     What we are going to do is to keep our eyes on those that have been active during the first two days of the week.   Stocks such as TNH FSLR JASO... and even the ones that have been hot past few days BTJ PENX SNHY etc. will also be on our menu.    Just make sure that you are aware this is just holiday trading and take advantage of it but not over extrapolate things too much.

oh yeah, Happy Holiday!

DJIM #29 2007

The easiest thing to do would be to speak of the big market move last week, but we won't do that and instead look forward to the week ahead. Hopefully, we steered you in the right direction in our Journals the past while and you have stayed invested heavily in the market and our plays as they were the beneficiaries as much as anything else last week. Just looking at the list from DIM #28...DRYS TBSI LPHI AZZ FWLT PENX DDUP SCOR FSLR TSL LDK JASO and you see who played with enthusiasm.  If you need still need to grasp the significance of last weeks action, just look at the weekend charts/comments.  Funniest quote so far heard though, is ..."meanwhile while the media is enjoying their victory lap, many investors are less than enthusiastic about the moves in their accounts at the end of the week....they didn't see the same huge gains in their accounts".  Name the the tout and win a free month at DJIMstocks...NAH, that wouldn't work as too many of you are quite familiar with this singer.  Sounds like sour grapes for some reason, if you ask us!.   At this point in the game, we have to look for some potential stalled action, fortunately we have earnings as the base of this DJIMstocks and it should not stop us from going forward as earnings will pick up this week and new picks will start to show their colors.  We already had some nice reports from CCF, GBX, SCHN  indicating a diverse crop of good reports possibly to follow. Use our Earnings Dates link to see some notables reporting.  Again, we ask for members to post within that link any earning dates for DJIM stocks past and present plays you might come across and we will edit them into a list for all to keep track of this Q.  Going forward, we're basically keeping to the same list as last weekend of stocks we are concentrating on, plus a few new ones that appear all over DJIM last week.  Take into consideration some stalling action in the market realistically should come to some of our names as well.  When that happens we wait and see if the stock sets up again for us to enter a buy in. Examples of this are PENX and DDUP late Friday. LPHI was another were patience is rewarded as it put in a 5pt move after we moved in again.  There is not much to add to individual stocks that was not already said last week, nothing has changed really in our thinking towards those plays  A few other breakouts of past DJIM stocks that we have not signalled out but have been mentioned in our forum such as CMED, SPEC should also be included in any watchlist. The most important thing right now is probably to start freeing up some cash if you are heavily invested to use on new plays that will emerge.  It is quite hard now as everything seems to be running and gunning out there, but it is something you might start doing this week.

Dealing with the inevitables...

So everybody knew it's just going to be a matter of time, sooner or later...this market is going to rebound from that horrid 500 pt drop last week.   How could it not, right?   Of course, we just don't know when it'll happen and how it's going to happen.    Well, the day did not start with any conviction that we are going to have that rebound day.   You can just feel the jitters with fvery tick of the indexes, up and down.   Actually, there's always that fear looming over some people's head that "what if that 500 pt drop turns into a 1000 pt drop?"   Of course, it's just highly unlikely that market drops 1000 points without any kind of rebound.    We may very well drop a total of 1000 points over the next few months or years, but it probably won't take just 3 days to do that.   A little logic,  street sense, you may call it always plays a role in our thinking day to day.

There was a battle going on earlier in the day between those that looking to sell into any strength (the 1000 pt fearer) and dip buyers.    Finally, when it's apparent that market isn't going to drop today, the reverse happens and people just rushed in to buy up some of their favourite targets.  Hence, we had the inevitable rebound.    At this point, it's going to be hard to convince people that this is nothing but a short lived rebound attempt and the overall technical picture is pretty gloomy.   Well, at least this is probably the majority of the "smart" traders think anyway.    To us, we'll try not to out think the thinkers and outplay the markets.    The strategy is to go with the flow with some contained exposure.    We would bear in mind the potential risk of selling off again but still trade those with the best momentum and setup.    The point here, is that we have to stick with our game and plan.   If we took some loss from last week,  we'd grind it back, slowly but surely.   Having confidence in our ability to trade well in an up moving market is the key to long term success in this business. Some..most..can't do this...so stay put!....Right now, we just have to be super disciplined and be ready to go cash on a moment's notice.    Other than that, it's really business usual and last week's drop does not change our personality or strategy or discipline level whatsoever.    The only thing that may have changed since last week is perhaps our portfolio value ...   Frankly, that is the easier part to deal with given the number of similar scenarios we've gone through before.

Now a couple of earning plays and story stocks that should be kept a close eye on......

ARTC. this is a play that weathered a 300 point Dow drop by announcing its earning last Friday.    When market turned positive today, it's almost inconceivable that this one would do anything other than being up.   After another above average volume day, this one tacked on two points and a new closing high.    Again, we like this one's business and we don't think any "sub prime or prime concern" would have any adverse effect on this one.  It is at the most recent price targets set by a few recently.

AXYS, this one actually had a buy reiteration today, so some of the move maybe attributed to that.   In either case, any stock that gets a new closing high in this gloomy environment deserves a trade from you..

LDSH, this one actually had a downgrade the day after it ran up off earning.   We are just wondering if it wasn't for the downgrade, would this one already be well over $50s?   Of course, it's useless thinking about questions like that.   We just simply have to deal with what's already taken place.   It's going to get a good test to see if it can zoom past $50 and beyond.    We think a lot depends on the overall health of the market.   However, if this market rebound does carry some leg, there's no doubt that this one can be one of the leaders leading the gainer list.

FSLR,  if you happen to catch some intraday swing, it's pretty sweet.   Earning is tomorrow and this one is something we'd definitely keep an eye on as this can set the tone for the rest of the solar sector for next little while.  We said watch for pre-earnings moves in our listed stocks reporting, this one  definitely got one today.

GHM, for a small company with a small float, its earning looks pretty good.   Valuation is still very reasonable.    We would be trading some with the flow

PWRD, this is a new play we've added to our watch list last since Friday.    This can trade wildly but it can be rewarding if you are on the right side of the trade.    There's some good amount interest in this play, so we'd trade it until the characteristic changes. Not for all!. 

There are many bouncing as expected...CCF.....some of these are so thin it is easy to walk up as it was to walk down last week.

BOMB- ay...the Turks are coming

Can't we just live in peace and drink up the US tech reports from last night!.  We've been beating our drum set in our gorilla suits anticipating the tech/internet earnings and now we get this stuff tossed around our heads!.   Geez.  Give us a break wasn't the subprime debacle enough!...Ah, the beauty of it all.    As far as the Turks and oil rocketing...doesn't anyone realize that the bulk of the oil is in the South and the pipelines in the North account for as much pipe as there is running from our toilets.    No doubt we will now get many attempting to get on the subject of the "Trick or Treat" due end of October by the FED as well.    Anything to turn our attention will be spinned to make the relevance of the earnings last night seem unimportant. lol.    We'll just reiterate what we said yesterday and that is to deal with what is front of us and pay no immeidiate attention to what geo-political, rate cuts etc. stuff we can't do anything about.    So..let's get on with the show and deal with what is front of us.   At this time...it is an up futures market here and we should all use it to our advantage in the morning...

YTEC,    this was thrown in recently on the forum amongst all the the China hype.    A big difference to many others that hit the board is this never got screwed by being run-up and then dumped.    Instead,  it has pullbacked slightly in recent days and then moved to its most recent highs yesterday and became a stock worth a try.   The almost quiet period it had, plus the reco by a firm recently gave this stock credibility in our view, something most of the recent gunners never had and therefore are sitting in the pump and dump category way off their highs.    Part of our trading methodology is to buy late in the day after we see if the stock has what it takes to possibly continue in the day(s) to come.  This is something we have repeated endlessly and this is why we were adding substantially into the close.    We don't take big slices of a pie until we are sure and that comes late in the dayl.    We don't mind missing the initial breakout and miss some gains.  We're looking at the bigger picture and have higher prices in mind.     If you're playing in size, it's irrelevant to go in on the initial break.  It's an unnecessary risk for us.  We've all seen failed breakout moves.  A starter maybe could be taken to keep track.    We rather be sure and then cut ourselves a hearty slice!.    This is the way we play on what is especially a stock showing signs of being a momentum play as YTEC did late in the day.      Another thing about yesterday is the China stocks we have traded here with you, such as WX, EJ were not having good days but the JRJC and YTEC were.  Hmmmm....What we got out if it is a preference for anything China bank related and went with it. 

As far as JRJC,...it has spent days seemingly consolidating around the 9ema and yesterday showed signs of moving off those levels and grabbed our attention as noted intraday.  Last nights EPS results gave early indications of spillover as traders looked for beneficiaries such as BIDU, which climbed $6 or so.  As noted AH, we saw JRJC as a one of those that might benefit off BIDU ( lumped in with it recently ) and it had no movement in shares being bought up as it stayed under $39.  Do you want to buy BIDU 6 bucks up or do you want to take a chance on one that hasn't moved and might be taken on as a potential secondary play. We prefer the latter..

VMW, performed well yesterday after possibly a 3 day slide down that might have grabbed the attention of technical traders. After the tech earnings it's a no brainer of what stock could do well from our DJIM playlist. Calculate the trading action intraday into the picture and you might have a good play today.

Despite a poor showing by the market yesterday, WBD, CETV and EDU showed resilience.  Strong stocks doesn't mean only those popping, most of the time this kind of showing is what grabs our attention.   Why?...because if good news strikes as it did last night these types of stocks should still move forward even if they have nothing to do with tech.   If the news was bad, they have a good chance of showing resiliency because they just demonstrated such the day before.     Another name that got our attention late in the day is FSLR and we will look at it closely today even though our hands might be full already.  This being the case, we apologize to those other stocks that might be worthy of more print.

Accumulation...

Despite the overnight surge in the Asian market, the North American market didn't seem to quite match the same kind of intensity as overseas.    Still, market closed pretty well.   We have Fed meeting this coming Wednesday and the consensus is that Fed will lower the rate.    Again, this is not just anticipated,  it's also being expected.   The question now is how big of a rate cut will we be facing?    Is this the real question we should care about?    No, what we really care is how this market reacts to a 25 pt cut or a 50 pt cut?    In the unlikely event, how will the market react to a no rate cut?    Basically, there are two probable scenario and one unlikely one.   At this point, there's really no reason to overwork a strategy to anticipate the reaction, we'll just have to deal with whatever happens.

As we have been saying for a while, we don't think this rate cut will impact the overall market sentiment by much.    Hopefully, this market is still being earnings driven, and not fear driven, which means that the familiar names will carry this market higher.    There's a lot of disbelief of why this market is at the current level and that actually serves as a good point.    You definitely don't want to see everyone being optimistic and basically we need just as many bears calling for downturn, recession etc. in order for this market to go higher.

LFT STV.    Lets talk about these two as we have been getting some emails toward the end of the day concerning the well being of these two plays.    At this point, what we really want to stress is that these two are IPO's and now LONG term plays as yesterdays Journal noted.  These were already short term plays if you're only looking for a fast trade.  Being an IPO, there's basically no historical trading pattern to dictate a stocks movement.   It means that they will be volatile at the early going, especially the first week or two after its IPO.    That's the way it is!    We have to accept the fact these stocks are brand new and we have to slowly work our positions for a longer time frame as oppose to treating it like a JRJC or EFUT!     If you have any doubts about these two plays, just think about the following facts.     When was the last time can you recall a Chinese IPO on NYSE that have done badly three or four weeks into trading?    Yup, we can't recall a name that we've covered that didn't give us some good movement.    WX, EJ, EDU, LDK, TSL, YGE (nice action yesterday), MR... all serve as good examples of the stocks we've been trading in the past and now months later.     If you include the good ones on NASD, then there's just tons more.     Since we are talking about a NYSE stock here, this instantly gives credibility to these IPOs.    It means that the company is not only profitable but also meets the stringent listing requirement.   CSR (CSCT.ob) got that finally and is now trading on NYSE.   So back to the question, why are these stocks down today despite some good action from other Chinese stocks?   Well, one possible scenario is that some traders were looking for some carry through action like STV on its third day and did not get it, hence they just bailed out.    That is just part of trading and we can live with it.   Other recent momo China stocks like YTEC, JRJC put in quiet red days as well, a pattern emerged quickly as these names underperformed those China names near or at highs.   Our game plan is establishing a good position at this level.   We aren't buying all of our shares at once and that would simply be arrogant and undisciplined.     Now does it mean that LFT is done gong down after today?   Well, we don't know that and there could be some more downside action but we think the downside is limited.     As far as STV goes, the recent low is still intact and we are looking to average some more into any more weakness as we see.      Basically folks, we are dealing with a couple of strong growth oriented Chinese stocks here and they have just been out on the market for a few days.     Rome wasn't built in a day,  so let's just give these plays some room and time to work.

Hopefully, you are running a balanced book of sorts and participating in more than just these IPO's.  Just look at the number of charts updated from our closely followed that were hitting new highs yesterday....CETV-CROX-DRYS-EDU-FSLR-JASO-SPWR-VMW-WBD and GHM.     There is always the big caps GS AMZN, AAPL to balance the book even more.

Solar Burn...

What is really funny about this market is that while a couple of big names that kept on going down every day, we have some names that are going the total opposite direction, which is up.   The Citi news may have very well kick started this week, but all the focus now is on Cisco's earning tomorrow night.  As oil price keeps going higher, so too are the names from solar sector.   This is really the kind of market where you are either in a lot of pain or a lot of joy.    What makes it tough though, however, is to maintain a balanced portfolio where you try to speculate on which sectors would move next.   As we have witnessed, many of the Asian names have been under pressure the last few days while some of the more expensive names on our watchlist  kept us in the game.       

First, the good ones...

FSLR/SPWR/GOOG/MA/BIDU/AAPL/RIMM,  basically, had we been trading nothing but the expensive tickers ($100+), we literally would've been making a killing in this market.    These aren't the names we are unfamiliar with.   In fact, pretty much all of these names are positions in our portfolio at one time or another.    You can say that these are some of the obvious leaders in the market and those are the ones we ought to be owning if we believe this market is going higher.   The point it, we gotta have some of these names in our portfolio.   We may not afford all of them with big sizes but these are the ones that are carrying this market higher.

Solars, JASO TSL SPWR FSLR ASTI, every time dollar gets dumped, and oil gets bid up, and then these guys zoom another 10% it seems.    Some of these names are releasing earnings next few days so we'd have a pretty good picture how traders would react to their report given the current valuation.

AIXG, a somewhat new name to these parts is this German ADR semiconductor/equipment maker bought up early in the morning after earning. It's 9mth eps.17c vs. (0.03), while revenues jumped nearly 50%.  This co' is thriving on the demand for LED units which is in a strong secular growth mode.  The order intake Q# and the resulting backlog was very good here.  In the last 3 Q it's order intake has gone from 40 to 50 to 70mln euros resulting the co' largest ever order backlog.   This stock trades overseas as well and takes it's open gap cue from its action over there.

GHM/DXPE, these two are couple of the recent earning plays that are being bid up quietly.   We definitely don't want to ignore these as they can creep 10% on a weekly basis.

Now the nervous ones...

STV/LFT/CISG/GA,  all these have one thing in common and they are recent Chinese IPOs.    Aren't we supposed to be up 25% by now by holding these?   Right now, we are as puzzled as many others as to why all of these names aren't getting any momentum to the upside.    It feels like in  20 more trading day, there won't be anything left in these stocks;).     At this point, we simply have to play the statistics and probability game.    Any of these would be considered longer term plays and we just have to play that way accordingly.    The quiet period is going to end soon enough for some of these names and earnings are coming up as well.    We are looking forward to those events as they can be the kind of positive catalyst that can drive these stocks.    The bottom line, these plays are still at the beginning.

Simply, you cannot hold one or a few of these IPO's, 'nervous ones' without balancing out your book by trading/ holding the 'good ones'.  That is missed opportunities day after day.

CSCO..the straw that broke the camels back?

..or is it really the last straw that broke the ' donkeys' back?.  Cause that's what this market is!...A wobbly donkey!.    We'll know soon enough, but this report/ outlook was not one that was expected and wanted.   This was not the 'water' the donkey/camel was in much dire need of yesterday after being pummeled by more of the subprime storm during the day.  This time from Morgan Stanley/AIG.. Of course, the USD played a big part too as did the talk of the Chinese putting their foreign exchange reserve into euros.  Hell, you got Brazilian models asking to be paid in Euros now.lol..who's..what's next in regards to the USD fallout.  Some intervention is needed here.  After loading up the markets back with all these subprime issues since summer, we've been able to still move thanks to the big techs earnings reports...RIMM, GOOG, AAPL, MSFT.  Now what might be a inconsequential seemingly in the grand scope of things, CSCO not giving a glowing outlook might cloud us even more.   There is a limit to everyone's endurance and everyone has a breaking point.  After literally trying to carry the market on its back, you have to wonder if the techs have had enough now.    Exhaustion might be here.    A breaking point might be reached, it is damn close with us.   What we said in the weekend chart note is we don't want a close under 1500SPX/ 13500 DJIA, well we got that as the market broke down these levels hard.  We are in a very cautious stance as seemingly nothing now can stimulate the market.   We will get the customary bounce very soon, but we'd look for that as an opportunity for the investor/ trader to sell some into and catch their breath.   Be selective if buying and go in smaller sizes.  Look for pockets of strength (eg. solars still?) and earning reports should still provide opportunities in individual stocks...eg...MA, we'd just not fall in love with too many of them and take profits sooner. 

When the subprime winds started to blow this summer, we suggested a potential switch into more Chinese and Russian (of the BRIC) stocks as this might be looked as a possible way out of what we were seeing and getting in US stocks.  This worked!.  The same concept might develop now if the techs can no longer carry the market and traders money looks elsewhere to park.  Considering all the new Chinese issues have been taken apart since the crazy run recently,  we'd not be surprised if the hedgies turn their attention on this group soon again to make some money off momentum.   Maybe it's just wishful thinking on our part, but if these guys are not meeting their goals again , they might as before and run these from the lows this time around.  It would be easy.  In the meantime, we still have the solars booming and today many names familar to DJIM, SPWR JASO etc.should benefit from darling.. FSLR report yesterday. 

earnings of $0.49 per share, excluding non-recurring items, .29c better than the Reuters Estimates consensus of $0.20; revenues rose 289.7% year/year to $159 mln vs the $120.7 mln consensus .See $480-485 mln, consensus is $412 mln, expect total production output of 200MW; planned start up costs are at the lower end of previous guidance range of $18-20 mln; 24-25% operating margin; taxrate for Q4 is 29-30%; CapEx for 2007 is $280 mln... Epcect $760-800 mln in revs in 2008, consensus is $699 mln; 1H08 revs will decline sequentially over Q4 in 2007 due to contractual price decline and foreign exchange rates;

YTEC also reported and looks good sequentially most importantly....beats by $0.06; gives outlook Reports Q3 (Sept) earnings of $0.18 per share, ex-items, 0.06 better than the Reuters Estimates consensus of $0.12. Revenues rose 44.0% sequentially, net income up 39% seq. and 51% YOY.   Co gives outlook saying, "We see Chinese banks continue to invest in IT infrastructure in order to further improve their operational efficiency and profitability, especially in our core service areas such as electronic customer service channels like web- banking and call centers, and risk management/performance solutions. We also see that small to medium sized banks are becoming more aggressive in IT investment as they prepare for public listing and increase their competitiveness in the industry. Since the acquisition of Easycon that was completed last quarter, we see great opportunity to penetrating this niche market, and we will expect greater contribution to our revenue and profit from the small and medium sized banks.

DJIM #49 2007

Tis the giving season and Tuesday afternoon,  we're gonna get some in the way of a FOMC rate cut.   Following Fridays data, a .25pt cut is the most likely outcome, but there are enough still in the .50pt camp.  One thing is for certain is the decision won't be unanimous as we'd all like and all eyes and ears will be fixed on the statement attached.  Unless there is a knockout grinch punch to the market in the language, we think the market will move forward and set it's course on continuing the recent rally into the holidays and New Year.   Basically,  just get this over with and lets move on the heels of last weeks bullish days as the indices finished near the weeks highs.  Last week many quality stocks continued to get out of their bases with many more bouncing off the 50MA with follow through days.   Also, recent quality earning stocks showed some life as quiet a few closely followed at DJIM broke to new highs during the week.    They include...

MA, ISRG, AAPL,  we have always preached set ups with NCH's in place or in sight.  The market started to provide these trading opportunities once again after a long lull as these leading stocks in the past regained their lofty positions.  That's the kind of action any growth investor or just any trader wants to see and trade. 

VIP, MBT, SIGM, WDC, PSEM are the other recent EPS stocks that reported very good numbers and are now being recognized and given spurts of buying leading to NCH's almost daily.   MBT and VIP have an overweight initiation out from Lehman this morning.

SOLARS, the picture was not so clear heading into Fridays trade, but as we noted there were a couple of buy upgrades on YGE and SPWR to possibly play a part ahead of the trading day.  These upgrades definitely fueled the solars up again as many had nice days, including JASO again and STP...FSLR ran up on rumors of a contract.  We've seen the firms 'lead' this sector forward before when they start with upgrades, initiations. We might have some of that starting up once again.

Our closely followed China stocks LFT, STV, WX, EJ, EDU snailed to a 2nd consecutive week of gains since we turned our focus back on them. The volatility seems to have been removed for the time being and we started to call this group of stocks a Mutual Fund as they creep slowly higher and higher.

After weeks of trying to find a decent play, the market has started to give us plays that fit our methodology, eg NCH's and we welcome it and will concentrate on the above sorts with the usual sector (solar, china, shippers) tossed in.  It is a time for all of us to look at the 52week high lists and find more names that might provide a good trade while they trade at these levels.  You will start to find many former DJIM site names thrown around in this crop of stocks as you do your nightly homework...BOOM FWLT FSTR GEF LIFC PTT RICK TXT VE WGOV etc.   You want to trade strength and get out of any bad habits you've found yourselves in trying to trade a corrective market, such as bounces etc.  This may really be the time once again,  if we clear tomorrows FOMC hurdle in one piece.

A new day with different drama....

One way or the other, it's not so easy to take advantage of this headline driven market.    Extreme emotion leads to extreme volatility and we have just witnessed two of the most volatile trading days.     Now that the Fed thing is over, we can move on and focus on events that'll shape up the rest of the year.   The big picture is that we are still in a much better shape than a month ago.   Regardless how you judge Fed's recent decision, Fed is doing something to help out the credit crunch by addressing the liquidity issues.    That to us, this the encouragement this market needs, but we have to see if it's enough.  Financial stocks are just weighing in on this market, day in and day out too much.    Soon we will get some good insights off reports from LEH and GS.   Hopefully, these two would provide the kind of certainty this market needs to get some stability from the sector.

Solar plays,  basically you just can't go through a trading day without playing these it seems.   Crude broke $90 signalling a possible technical recovery and that should bode well for the solar group again.   LDK has been active the last couple of days and think this one needs to catch up to others in terms of valuation in light of the recent development and therefore might have more leg room.  SOLF is also becoming one of our favourite to trade along with STP JASO and FSLR.  Again, remember we noted the upgrades seen recently as a possible prelude to their action as we've seen in the past.   At least, 2 more are out this morning, including one on FSLR with a $300+ target.

GXDX, this is a biotech co. similar to WX and it's based in U.S noted in the forum Oct 31.   It came out with an eps report tonight and we think it's a very good report that showed a tremendous growth rate.    The issue size was only 5 million shares.    This one also doesn't trade a lot so the volatility can be high when it comes to trading.    Knowing what they just reported, we are putting this one on our active playlist and will add incrementally when opportunity comes.  There hasn't been many good eps report from small caps lately, so this is definitely refreshing.  It will be interesting to see if there is interest in this kind of play from the market.

Turned out the prudent thing to do yesterday was to sell the gap and not just consider it as we noted in yesterdays pre trading note. The swings are wild and you have to your trading hat on or lose all or most of your gains as the market digests the rate cut and the follow up liquidity plan.   It may take a few more days and it's best we wait it out to see a trend emerge.   Again.. .."what we need to see is the indices recover and hold 13500 on the DJIA and 2700 on the NASD to start thinking of accumulating positions of substance".  This would be a start!

..some calmness

Seems many gurus are writing off the market saying this latest liquidity plan is just for the big boyz to get out higher and fry us all.  Hell, many have predicting doom since summer or years for different crisis situations, but we just keep playing along with many of you as we have done so for 3-4-5 years.   We love conspiracy theories , but we don't trade them unless they are ours and we won't give up now thinking this market can trade up still.   Maybe , we are too simple and too simple in our methodology... We/You are not giving our neighbour a loan and they won't give us one and so the banks have the same situation.   They don't trust each other and so the liquidity plan comes to fruition.   Simple...  someone steps in and helps both sides.   We are in favor of this intervention and think this will help soothe out things eventually.   It's a start.   The last time anything close to this being done  on such a worldly scale was after 9-11.  That puts things into perspective in more than one sense.   The severity of it all now and the ability to fight back is there as we've seen before.    Day by day things will clear... if the market can't hold a13500 DJIA or NASD 2700 close in the short term, we'd start to worry more from a technical standpoint.   But...until then we are ready to jump on Santa's sleigh and go for a ride with a few of his helpers.     Well, the DJIA did hold 13500 (barely) and the NASD is still some 30 pts away, but we all know what 30 points is like and that's a half day of a run these days.    The way RIMM, AAPL BIDU performed makes it even more plausible soon and therefore an opportunity to strike these names up again will come.   We are encouraged by today's action, the lows of Wednesday were hardly touched on the indices and we worked higher into the close.  A little grit and determination was seen today and everything held together after yesterdays big intraday slide.  ' If ' we get a manipulated CPI number premarket, we could have an added ingredient for a move starting for next week.   We are getting to the biggest time of the year for manipulation as the volume will soon start to dry up.  This is the time for all the manipulators to step forward..big and small and boost year end totals on all boards.    Surely, a BIG lot(s) will be there to help out the market.  You help us out with liquidity....we'll help up you in other ways, guys!.. told you we love conspiracy theories, we just like'em on the bull side.

LRN,   K12, how cool a name is that!;).  Anything/anybody to help the kids from Kindergarten to grade 12 surf online other than us is a great concept!.  Okay, so its a little more than that as LRN offers a 'real' curriculum of educational services, lessons.    A virtual public skool alternative to supplement the kids education.  A recent educational IPO, APEI serving the military/law enforcement had a big run since it IPO'd as we noted with LRN today in the $22's.  It had nice full day trading to the $25's and we were trading/taking positions throughout the day.  A 6mln float makes it attractive to boot.

MELI, a long standing citizen here and a recent alert this week at $45 was making some people very happy last night as it traded to $58 AH's off Cramer.  It's only a recap if you are not trading it this week as it's held its ground near highs through all the volatility we've seen.  We have always liked to sell to an incoming herd from another source.

MA,  another long term play here and again highlighted a few times this week hit a NCH with a $224 close with a converted touchdown and field goal day..10pts. No yellow flags with this machine.

Solars, we highlighted this bunch into the trading day and it was really the only 'group' action going with FSLR, ESLR leading the way off the upgrades mentioned in the morning.  JASO, SOLF, YGE all held green as well and if we keep seeing this group up, STP, SPWR will join the ranks again.

MBT, VIP, after making NCH's recently they have tested 9ema and seem ready to resume if the market gives them a chance.   The telecom sector has been one of the leaders on bad days in the market and with Russia's political picture clearing up it should bode well for these ADR's soon enough.  These have always held up during the rocky days of November.    ROS,  a secondary play on the above when we started coverage back who knows when is a clear beneficiary as its practically a 'state owned co'.  The other two offer volume and so we'd continue playing with them.

RICK, so this is where all the bankers are striking up liquidity plans these days!..No wonder they have no $$$$.  This one just keeps on doing a slow dance up.

GXDX,  no big surprise the traders didn't show up the day after EPS.  We've outlined numerous times recently that small/ float EPS plays are not getting the love immediately as we have been used to in the past. The chasers are still not there as we saw today and since this stock had a very nice pre earnings run, its really not surprising to see profit taking come in.  Keep it up there on your potential playlist.  A pullback always balances your risk/reward out.

Oh yeah, RIGL,  wait till phase 3 comes out, it will go to $100..;).  The beauty of this action is there's crazy foolish money out there still to play feverishly and we like that.   Along with interest seen in the IPO LRN,  it gives us more hope in the coming weeks for plays as there is a willingness to put money to work.  It's sporadic now and sometimes doesn't last too long , but that could all change as spreads widen in more names when the volume starts to dry up into the New Year.

Santa showed up...

The so called Christmas rally or the Santa Claus rally has been something of a mixed bag in the past.   There were years we just wished the Christmas season would last longer and there was last year which we all would like to forget.   This year, Santa is back to give us traders something to remember as of now.    This of course, is probably due to the fact that we had a very very tough fourth quarter coming into the Christmas holiday.     All of the problems we have had to endure as traders during the last while, from credit crunch, housing bubble and recession worry are being put behind this last few days of the year.    Put it this way, we won't deal with it until the new year.    It is about time that we can end this year in a rather peaceful way.

If it's peace you want, then you are glad to know that major indices have held up well and many big cap stocks have either inched up or stayed unchanged, in a non volatile way.    If you are like us who like to take advantage of this opportunistic time, then the only thing you'd be doing on a boxing day is buying and selling hot stocks online.     People, if you are serious in trading like us, then you would've tied yourself to your chair during the last few trading days.     These past few trading days have produced some of the best action since early October.    And if you were hurt by the downturn in the late November period, then now is the perfect time to get some respect back from this market.

Basically we are about half way over this holiday trading and we'd imagine most traders would be back in force after Jan 1st.    This gives us another 2 1/2 holiday trading days to do our thing.     Right now, we are playing stuff that are currently in play.    It is crucial that we stick to that theme for the next few days.

Solars, 2007 is the year of the solars and we think we'll carry some good momentum into the new year as well.    Today's action seemed to be spreading all over the smaller and less established solar players which include SOLF CSIQ CSUN ESLR CTDC etc., while the bigger names seemed to pause to catch some breath, with the exception of FSLR.      Yup, we are playing just about every single one of those smaller names today and we'd continue to play until the momentum stops.    Keep in mind, many if not most of those less established solar names are still not proven in terms of earning track record.    When some of these names reverse, it is crucial that you don't buy the dip thinking all solars are created equal and have awesome earnings growth.     Buying dips on plays like FSLR STP JASO SPWR... have good probability that they will come back in a hurry.   Buying dips on the smaller ones may get you into a situation that you'd lose another 30% before even seeing an uptick.   Bottom line, you have to know what you are playing distinguish the type of plays among solar names.

MELI, then there's this one!   If you cashed out last time after Cramer's mention, then today's the day to get it back.    We alerted early in the morning that it looked promising but we did not imagine it'd pull a move anywhere close to 20% today.    This one, unfortunately we have to agree with Cramer for once, has the marking of being a monster.     Yes, it can definitely go into triple digit based on what we have seen with other similar type of stocks.

Bottom line, there's no need to go nuts with all of the hot plays out there and just trade the ones you are most comfortable with.   Stay focused and stay clear headed, and we may just finish this year on a high note.