Good evening StockBandits!
For a holiday-shortened trading week, last week proved interesting as Middle East concerns over the previous weekend delivered a sizeable downside gap to kick off trading Tuesday. That was followed by further selling pressure into Thursday, before a relief rally finally arrived. The indexes finished off their lows Thursday and then posted across-the-board gains Friday, but for the week the major averages gave up 2%.
In the big picture, that’s certainly not a lot. We’ve been rallying since March of 2009, with the most recent leg having started on September 1 of last year. It’s been quite a while since we saw anything but dips getting bought, and this one may prove to be the same as all previous pullbacks. What’s a little different is the fact that in the short term, we’ve not seen a multi-day pullback since mid-January, so that may keep traders on heightened alert in the days ahead.
The situation in the Middle East could still escalate further, so the bulls aren’t free from worry just yet. What they do have is an established uptrend and opponents (bears) who have little confidence at this point. That could result in a trading range up here for a little while, which is my hunch at the moment.
I expect the day-to-day action to remain headline-sensitive for a little longer, but now that we’ve gotten an initial pullback and a bit of a rebound, it could keep the volatility up and that’s good for trading. Last week I kept my timeframe shortened to day trading, but am expecting this week we’ll see more swing setups emerge and provide some multi-day moves.
I’ll cover my game plan for tomorrow in the video, and as always, feel free to share your own thoughts, trade ideas, and questions down below in the comments section.
Here is tonight’s video:
The Bandit Broadcast Video – Click to Watch!
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Video Stocks Discussed: GPOR, DVN, WCG, FDX, OXY
Swing Trading Candidates:
OXY recently left a multi-week base to head higher, and last week we saw this one pull back just slightly to find support above that prior resistance zone. That’s technically positive, and now I’ve got my eye on this consolidation. A push past the upper descending trend line at $103.45 will trigger a buy for me, as that could free up this stock to head higher once again. As with all swing trades, my stop and target levels for this trade are found on the Hit List here inside the Hideout.
Bullish Watch:
NXPI, ATW, TSO, CNQ, OXY, PXD, BHI, OAS, PTEN, DVN, DAN, GMCR, NBR, WNR, TLM, CVE, SLW, GPOR, WCG, WOOF, HS, BP
Bearish Watch:
TIF, CMI, AIG, FCX, WLT, BIDU, WMS, FDX, GR, MELI, SCCO
The Hit List is a separate post which contains discussion on open positions and swing trade stops and targets, so be sure to check it for further details on swing trades.
