Oct-18-2005
Capital Spreads Market Commentary
Once more it appears that I am talking scratched record time. The US markets attempted to follow the rest of the world higher but by the close in the states the various indices had drifted back to virtually unchanged. The Dow is called at 10835-39 unchanged overnight and the Nikkei, which managed to reverse a 200 point fall in late buying to close virtually unaltered, has given some stability this morning. The Nikkei (march contract) is quoted at 15950-70.
The FTSE is called a little lower this morning but clients are not rushing to sell. FTSE called at 5579-81 and the Dax likewise a bit lower at 5386-88.
Burren Energy have come in with a production announcement from its fields in one of the eerr.. dodgier parts of the world in the Congo. This should give the shares a bit of a welcome fillip this morning. OPEC stated yesterday that there was sufficient oil currently being supplied for present demand which may cap the price at the mid $60's. Burren is quoted at 926.4-928.3 in early pricing.
Sterling had another of its doom laden days as the market digested the possibility of rate cuts from the MPC versus likely hikes in the rest of the world. With a weakening economy just as everyone else appears to be waking up dealers are looking at a return to bearish Sterling fundamentals (it seems just like the old days!). Cable is at 1.7432-35 unchanged overnight and Euro is at 1.1835-37 similarly unmoved.
As mentioned yesterday commodity markets are entering their year end phase as most dealers shut up shop until January. This can often have one of two effects the first is that nothing happens as volumes decrease and volatility dries up and the second is that with the removal of the big players prices start to act 'irrationally' as juniors man the desks. Oil is quiet this morning at 58.71-77 as is Gold at 494.2-494.8. The betting this year is for a quiet Christmas break but punters have been caught out before!!
Tags: announcement, Burren Energy, buy, Capital Spreads, Commodity, commodity markets, Forex, FTSE, market, MPC versus, price, quoted, sell
> All the currency brokers require the fax request to withdraw funds.
> Each has its own format. I consider it "safer" that MG requires ID
> along with the request form.
Interactive Brokers has a secure online withdrawal request that works w/o
the fax fuss, as one only has to create the bank destination once, instead
of filling out the same information repetitively. No charge for the first
withdrawal of the month, although my bank charges $4 for each transfer. The
costs of doing business, I guess, but I don't want the paper check in my
mailbox.
I have a jpeg image of my signature and driver's license, so for the MG
withdrawal (of which I've only made one so far) I have a jpeg of the
withdrawal form that I open in an image editor, add the text to complete the
form, and add the images of my signature (on the line) and driver's license
(overlaid on the boilerplate at the bottom), then use the computer fax
printer to send it to them, which suits their requirements. That fact seems
to obviate their photo ID requirements, as anybody with half a talent can
digitally fake or alter such things.
FXCM requires the same type of withdrawal form but w/o the photo ID
requirement, so it's slightly simpler. I haven't made a withdrawal from that
account yet as it's fairly new and "managed", so I want to let the manager
(a personal friend of mine for whom I've provided some important
programming) have his way with it. In 8 days (2 trades) he's made 30% on the
balance. He only makes a single EUR/USD position trade per week (usually of
1-2 days duration) based on some Fibonacci and Elliott Wave stuff, of which
I know virtually nothing, but he has netted 50-100 pips per week since he
developed the technique at the end of June. Very disciplined, very
conservative, very successful.
I just don't understand why MG and FXCM require a re-statement of the bank
routing and account numbers each and every time, or why they require the
form download, "printing", completion and faxing, when the IB secure online
withdrawal method works so well.
Seems absurd to me, but that's what it takes, I guess. I'm a firm believer
in diversification, even to the point of multiple brokerages and trading
styles.
Tags: 
USD/JPY has hit our price target of 115.00. While we don't see any imminent signs that the trend is weakening, we are beginning to enter an area of higher risk and thus will trim back on the size of our position to lock in some of our unrealized gains.
EUR/USD is once again challenging the critical support level around 1.19 and continues to see buying come in near that level. It would appear quite evident that at least a few large institutional players have been defending that support for quite some time. If you look at a daily chart of EUR/USD, you will notice that the bounces have been considerably smaller on recent tests of the 1.19 level giving big players less time to sell into strength. If we get back down close to 1.19 a couple more times, it would seem as if a breach of this level of support would be increasingly likely. This could potentially open the door to a move back around the 1.14-1.15 level.
AUD/JPY continues to slowly drift downward on seemingly little volume. This one might start to look attractive for a long position if we can get a little closer to the bottom of the uptrend channel near 85.00. Stay tuned, we always like the opportunity to hold such a high yielding pair....
As expected, USD/JPY broke out of a nice bull flag pattern to the upside and hit a new high for the year. We may see a little bit of a pullback here but as long as the breakout holds, you should be OK to keep your position. The market seems ready to price in a USD interest rate hike for both the November and December Fed meeting at this point. If this continues, I would expect to see a brief pullback in USD/JPY followed by continued pressure to the upside.
Tags: 
Trades from this morning has made +150 pips so far. Here is the update from recent trades.
1. Oz Special:
EUR/USD - Long: Third lot closed at +150. Last Lot closed at BE.
USD/CHF - Short: First lot closed at +50. Rest of the lots closed at BE.
2. Daily Signal:
USD/JPY - Long: Second lot closed at +100.
AUD/JPY - Long: Third lot closed at +200.
GBP/CHF - Short: Fourth lot closed at +200. Exiting last lot at +140
3. AES Signal:
EUR/USD - Short: First lot closed at +50.
Tags: 