Posted by barkand on November 9, 2011 under Fundamentals and macroeconomic data | 
Molycorp (MCP) is due to report earnings tomorrow and so the question is: do you feel lucky, punk trader?
Taking a quick look at the daily chart, we see that MCP is slowly pulling out of a base, and doing it on moderately strong volume. We would have preferred even more volume but, eh, it’s not bad. And since the lows of early October, there has been a healthy pattern of accululation. Generally, things are looking positive for MCP. What’s not to like?
Personally, we don’t like to hold positions during earnings announcements. Anything can happen. Anything. Consider these two items regarding Molycorp this week:
We prefer to live for another day even if it means missing out on an earnings “pop”. Good luck to all bullet counters, whether you are long or short.
Posted by barkand on November 8, 2011 under Classic chart patterns |
Just a short note today about the Russell 2000 (RUT).
The Russell was one of the last major indexes to break out of the trading range of the past several months. But it has been catching up, outperforming the S&P 500 since the end of September.
RUT has formed a symmetrical triangle beginning with the lows from the latest congestion area and the high formed a week later. It seems set to break through the triangle in an upward direction today, if the futures prices are any guide. Of course, alot depends on what happens in Rome. So maybe it is more appropriate to refer to this chart pattern as a “triangolo”.
Posted by barkand on November 7, 2011 under Classic chart patterns |
We have a chart today which illustrates a seldom-used chart pattern some like to call “railroad tracks”.
On the daily bar chart of PPG Industires (PPG) seen below, the two latest bars together produce a set of railroad tracks. Both bars cover roughly the same territory and close at roughly the same place. Proper railroad tracks should be reasonably long, as these are.
This should be thought of as a “continuation pattern” in the sense that prices should continue moving in the direction of the closes. In this case, prices closed near the highs so we expect PPG to continue moving higher.
So long as we are looking at PPG, we would point out also that this boring industrial company has been strongly outperforming the S&P 500 since late September. The market had one of its best months ever in October and PPG did even better. The stock is now back to its pre-”Euro crisis” level in the high 80s.
Molycorp (MCP) is due to report earnings tomorrow and so the question is: do you feel lucky,