Choppy Pre Holiday session
Market in no-men's land.
All fireworks I was expecting from HLF turned out to be damp squib. It would seem Icahn should focus on Ackman instead of opening his mouth on TV - that act alone shaved some 3$ from the share price and as I write this post HLF is close to yesterday's close giving up nearly 10$ of over night market gains. I am glad I took advantage of the after hour trading madness to exit at 46 and to get into a risk free trade. The close shave with meteor also did not produce any fireworks. And even though our market made violent moves today downwards, it is still stuck neither here nor there. Looks like S&P will paint another green week close - 7th in a row. Here is the 5 min day session chart for E-Mini.
I came in the day cautiously bullish as per this trade plan. Overnight markets were bullish and acting in line with long set-up however due to option expiration I was expecting a choppy day. Markets opened strongly and after gap fill, kept moving higher on high volume and mainly traded around the VWAP for most of the early part of the day. I was beginning think I will not get entry to my anticipated support zone. After making high of the day at 1521.75, there was reaction to the down side near European close. Market traded just a tick above 1515 expected low of the day and I got just one fill at 1516 in my 1516-14 support zone marked by first arrow. So far the things were according to plan but I was suspicious of the reaction from the support zone mentioned in this comment.
The reaction was not sharp and volumes were low on the move up. It was classic algo driven volume to pump to VWAP. I decided to take profits at VWAP and then re-evaluate. Finally I got out at 1519 (second arrow. Immediately after that market started tanking on high volume as if the big guys were waiting to fade the VWAP as expected. Since I had bullish bias and market was adopting bearish tone, I decided to take an early weekend and look for the meteor instead (which I could see only on TV - not in sky). As I write this post markets are grinding up again to possibly to close at VWAP (or even to try to close S&P green for the week). Monday is holiday in US so most traders have already left the floor.
So what do I see now? The major long trend is not broken and today's trading was bit "un-eventful" even though the energy on down side was visibly present. It would seem we will get a clue next week.
There was no major change in my stock portfolio.
Day session range was 11 pt and overall range has been 11. VIX climbed up but did remained below 13.
