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What a pooper...
If you scroll down and read the stream of babble apropos of last night's S&P hack-job, you will see why it pays not to try and punt long when the nuffnuffs are still keen to try shorting a low.
First, the entry coincided with one last lurch downwards - the last little grind down to lure in the breakout nuffies - which meant that the long position was underwater for longer than I like them to bne. Second, for those who left the trade on after the initial target was reached (at which point I indicated that setting stops at breakeven would be sensible despite a declaration that the market was likely to close with a gain), the bloody thing came back and clipped those stops as if it was predestined to do so.
So instead of waiting for the last flush down and then being able to confidently ride a long position all the way to the close, we were left holding a loser for 90 minutes... then sitting after the target was hit, then giving it all back.
Although I said eplicitly that it was only for the super duper keen, I'm sure that quite a few folks took the punt - I only hope that they had the sense to use a looser stop. From the mail flow, I know that at least five people did precisely that - and they also had the benefit of entering slightly later, after three points of the five-point flush had already happened... so they entered at a lower price and held until the close. For the session they picked up an absolute poultice... well played.
Still, this is designed mostly to help the less-initiated, so I am declaring it a wash - not a loss, but no gain will be presented in the RantRecord despite everything panning out in the end. I think that's fair to all concerned.
