Today was another day that I didn’t need to do to much in the markets. I bought some sugar to add to my position, and watched the grain markets go down a bit more. Luckily for me, I’m hedged in my grains. I watched gold make new highs, and have been plotting my exit point, while buying a couple more contracts, then buying some puts. It’s confusing, but I know the quick downdrafts that the metals markets can have, and have experienced them first hand. My lovely wife is still in the hospital, and I hope to bring her home later this week.
Jeff
Hi Jeff,
Good luck with the sugar and the other trades. You seem to have it all well in hand. I decided to re-establish my Forest Labs position (which was doing fine until I scrambled to increase my hedge last week), and finally took a small initial position in the Canadian financials ETF. The short/long spread has increased in lenders’ favour, and they should all be making more money as a result.
I’ll be trying to get through this without pushing the panic button. I want to at some point introduce some commodity ETFs (gold (already in on the short side), natural gas, oil, and grains) - on which I can go long or short. My plan is to use the long one of the long/short pair when commercials are heavily net long, and switch the position to short when the commercials are heavily net short. This way on average, I should be pointed in the right direction, meanwhile trading off the volatility using my REAP system. I think I’ll keep the 3 short ETFs I already have in the portfolio, and add one more at an appropriate time (which I’ll have to guess) - just to mitigate a totally one-sided melt-down should that occur. But I can’t keep letting myself get shaken out. Inevitably it will be at the worst time.
Cheers,
George
Comment by allocator — January 29, 2008 @ 4:11 am
I just read you last post over at Daily Speculations “Pulling money out of the pits …”. That’s fantastic stuff. Like I said over there, you should really write a book. (I want the first copy.) Most of the futures trading community would buy it, as would many other investors and speculators. Apart from the great stories, anecdotes, and trading insights, it’s valuable American economic history.
You need to get yourself in the Library of Congress buddy.
Cheers,
George
Comment by George Parkanyi — January 30, 2008 @ 8:32 pm