Posts Tagged ‘Swing Trading Strategies’

Swing Trading Week in Review – November 5, 2010

Sunday, November 7th, 2010

Swing Trading Blog – Swing Trading BOOT CAMP


Finally!!!

Swing Traders got the breakout they have been waiting for as the market traded to NEW HIGHS for the year this week.

As you would expect most of the sectors followed suit by rallying higher this week as well.

DIA

The sector ETF's making NEW HIGHS for the year this week were Agriculture ($DBA $MOO), Energy ($XLE), Real Estate ($IYR), Semiconductors ($SMH), Airlines ($FAA) and Technology ($XLK).

SIlver ($SLV) and Gold ($GLD) also rallied to NEW HIGHS as did the Gold Miners ($GDX).

Another interesting thing to take notice of is that there is finally some strength coming into the weakest sectors.

The Financials ($XLF $IYF) and the Hombuilders ($XHB) ETF's broke through key overhead resistance levels this week.

IYF XHB

The Broker/Dealer ETF ($IAI) also broke through the resistance in the $25-$27 area.

IAI

All of these ETF's broke through these prior resistance levels on BIG volume!

Follow through is the key but the amount of volume we saw at the end of last week in a hopefully a sign of good things to come.

In last weeks BLOG POST we told you that there were a TON of stocks pulling back nicely off of their most recent highs.

Hopefully you were able to get into some of these trades this week.

There were loads of what we call "text book" swing trades to take this week.

A few stocks with favorable risk/reward setups were $MEE, $EC, $ANN, $GS, $BBY, $SKS and $APC to name a few.

GS

$SPG ripped and even $F was a rock star this week!

F

There were some stocks that actually rolled over this week but with the market breaking out to new highs we have no need to focus on the SHORT side.

Although we will continue to watch BOTH sides of the market to determine overall strength and weakness just remember that CONTEXT is the KEY that allows you to take action.

CONTEXT tells us the market is way too strong to try to fight it but that being said it is also warning us NOT to chase it up at this point!

If for some reason you missed last weeks action BE PATIENT and wait for your trades to set up for you.

Sometimes it is hard to sit and wait when the market is moving up the way it is but often times that is the smartest thing to do.

Until next week…Good Trading to YOU!

Swing Trading Week in Review – October 29, 2010

Sunday, October 31st, 2010

Swing Trading BLOG – Swing Trading BOOT CAMP

Well the DJIA and S&P took a little break this week but the NASDAQ continued its upward momentum.

SPY

With the tech heavy NASDAQ showing such strength it is no surprise the the Technology ETF's pushed higher as well.

The Technology Select Spider ($XLK) traded to NEW HIGHS for the year this week.

XLK

The Semiconductors also helped lift the NASDAQ and the Semiconductor ETF ($SMH) continued its up move this week after its most recent pullback.

If you Swing Trade ETF's then these two sectors did give you an opportunity to get LONG this week but almost every other sector followed the overall market.

SMH

Energy, Retail, Oil Services, Real Estate and the Steel Sector all pulled back with the market this week.

Gold and Silver popped a bit this week as $AEM and $PAAS rallied to NEW HIGHS for the year.

The Agriculture ETF's ($DBA and $MOO) continue to stand out as the sector ETF "rock stars" as both once again hit new yearly highs this week.

As far as individual stocks go we saw some big moves in $RIMM, $VRSN, $VSEA, $MOS and a huge GAP UP in $CSTR and $EL to end the week.

A few stocks took a beating this week but one to watch next week will be $HAL.

HAL

Moving forward there are still a TON of stocks pulling back nicely from their most recent recent highs.

The market did take a healthy (and much needed) breather this week but be prepared as w open up for trading on Monday.

A continuation of the recent pullback towards the 50 day SMA wouldn't necessarily be a bad thing but neither would a rip straight up to NEW HIGHS!

Until next week…Good Trading to YOU!

Swing Trading Week in Review – October 15, 2010

Sunday, October 17th, 2010

The rally continues! (well kinda)

The major indices finished UP yet again this week.

SPY

Although we closed the week on a positive note the move itself was less than spectacular.

It was more like a sideways Monday, nice day of trading Tuesday then a GAP UP and trade sideways to close the week.

Now don't get me wrong…We aren't complaining!

The very BULLISH price action we are seeing is a nice change of pace from the last few months of the "stop, chop, and reverse" type trading that we were seeing.

As a matter of fact this week we saw a lot of the strong stocks on our list continue to move strongly to the upside.

AAPL and AMZN are continue to defy gravity as both stocks ripped to NEW HIGHS this week.

AAPL

CF and AGU also continued to rally after last Fridays breakout.

RIG and DO had a nice week as well as the Oil Services and Energy sectors remain strong.

DO

There are also a lot of strong stocks on our list that used this week to digest some of their recent gains.

AVP, CCJ, MMR, JWN, DE, STJ and DOW are a few names that are on this list.

DOW

This is a good sign and should give us very nice trade setups in the days to come.

The sector action was mixed again this week.

The Financials (XLF IYF) still cannot find any legs and actually sold off pretty hard to close the week.

IYF

Retail (RTH) is still trading sideways but Real Estate (IYR) finally got a little lift this week.

One sector that did finally make its move this week was the Technology sector.

After last weeks consolidation XLK finally made its move higher closing the week a new multi month highs.

XLK

As expected the Tech heavy Nasdaq got a lift this week as well.

The QQQQ gets our vote for "Index of the Week" based on its great chart.

QQQQ

As the bull marches on we expect to see some follow through in the days to come.

Be patient and wait for your trades to set up.

The market is in a VERY BULLISH phase right now but that does not mean that decent pullback is out of the question.

Be prepared for anything and trade your plan accordingly.

Until next week…Good Trading to YOU!

P.S. – Our last strategy class of the year will be our PVT Trading Tactics class on October 30th. If you are interested in learning more about trading with trend lines, volume, and price action then don't forget to sign up now!

Swing Trading Week in Review – September 24, 2010

Sunday, September 26th, 2010

Swing Trading BLOG – Swing Trading BOOT CAMP

Well we FINALLY got the directional move in the market that everyone has been waiting waiting for.

The BREAKOUT we saw on Monday was quickly followed by a 3 day shallow pullback which had some traders thinking the market was up to it's same old tricks.

SPY

With the way some of the individual sector's were acting we were actually thinking the same thing.

After holding up nicely for so long the Real Estate sector ETF (IYR) broke out with the overall market on Monday.

For the 3 days following the BREAKOUT sellers aggressively came in and drove this ETF well below the level of last week's consolidation.

Here is the chart…

IYR

You can see how this BREAKOUT failed and stopped us out (and a lot of other traders I would assume) as it retraces all the way back to it's 50 period SMA.

A swallow pullback in lines with the overall market was expected from such a strong ETF so this type of price action was not only frustrating but concerning as well.

The Energy sector ETF (XLE) had similar price action after giving us a LONG signal on Monday.

XLE

The retrace that followed created an "equal bottom" and came very close to our initial STOP LOSS level.

Friday XLE continued it's move up as the overall market BROKE OUT again.

The Retail sector ETF (RTH) continues to be the rock star!

RTH

Even after being short term OVERBOUGHT we saw RTH break to the UPSIDE Monday.

RTH then created a nice swallow, almost sideways consolidation during the 3 days that the overall market pulled back.

Friday the strength in this sector continued as RTH gapped up and traded through the $94-$96 level we mentioned last week.

One sector in transition this week were the Semiconductor's.

SMH

The SMH has been a real laggard but this week we saw buyers step in a finally bring this ETF back above it's 50 day SMA.

Although CREE and SNDK did result in new SHORT trades for us early in the week overall this sector seems to have found some new strength.

KLAC and NVDA stand out so we will watch some of the other stocks in this sector as we move into trading next week.

Friday was one of those days that there were so many trades that were triggering that it was hard to keep up!

We saw a ton of stocks BREAKING OUT and some stocks that just continue to RIP to the upside without even taking a breather.

Amazon (AMZN) opened this month at $126 and has gone straight up since then!

No retrace, no pullback just a parabolic RIP up to (so far) $160!!!

AMZN

Apple (AAPL) has basically done the same thing by going from the $240's straight up to close above $292 on Friday!

AAPL

Some of the BREAKOUT stocks our list included AGU, MMR, CCJ, INFA, HAL, SMG, WYN, NTAP, QCOM, CMI, EQIX and our recent money machine SOHU.

Not our entire list but a good list of stocks to watch as we move forward the next few weeks.

There were also a TON (way too many to list here) of non-breakout LONG trade setups last week.

This is a good sign of overall strength in the market and much better than just one or two sectors leading the way.

All in all the market is looking stronger and stronger but as always FOLLOW THROUGH will be the key.

Although there are a few stocks on our list that look weak it is hard to make a case for getting SHORT in light of the recent strength the market has shown us.

That being said we will continue to do what we do each day and prepare accordingly for each and every outcome that the market can present us.

Doing so allows us to react accordingly (and hopefully profitably) when the market decides what to do next.

Until next week…Good Trading to YOU!

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