the Trade-Radar + TradingStockAlerts blog

We constantly talk about trends here at Trade Radar and now we have an excellent post from our affiliate friends at Market Club that digs into the subject: Trending And Trading Markets – Finding The Best Indicators For Each . The post discusses the difference between trending markets and trading markets and looks at the different strategies that are required for each type of market. Different indicators may come into play and assume greater importance depending on which kind of market we are currently experiencing. Investors should remember that individual stocks may be trending while the overall market is in a trading range and vice versa. It can get complicated but Trade-Radar can help. Primary among the features offered in the Trade-Radar Stock Inspector software is automated trend identification. The software will take a chart and display the classic trend line that touches either the highs or the lows. In addition, the software plots the regression line that shows the slope...

Another day when a bellwether couldn't save the market. Apple couldn't do it last week and Amazon couldn't do it this week. Even Microsoft's earnings beat today didn't help. You can see in the chart below that the NAZ was up nicely on Friday but couldn't hold on. Distressing signs that are developing include the fact that MACD is sneaking negative. The 12-day EMA has moved below the 26-day EMA, a bearish signal if it continues. Williams %R shows the index falling out of an over-bought situation. Where it goes from here is, of course, the big question but it does seem to be skating on thin ice now. I've been trying to examine the Alert HQ signals over the last couple of weeks and losing confidence in the ability of markets to make significant new highs without some kind of pullback happening first. It seems like tentative signs of that pullback are starting to show up. Is the NASDAQ Now in Thin Air? Readers of this blog may be familiar with one of our affilia...

Those of you who follow this blog and check out our Alert HQ BUY and SELL signals know that I'm always jabbering about trends, moving averages, Aroon, MACD, Bollinger Bands and other techniques for technical analysis. Today we have a guest post from Adam Hewison who is a co-founder of our MarketClub affiliate. He has a program that will bring you up to speed on many of these technical analysis methods and tell you how to use them in your trading. I think it could be very educational so, without further ado, here's Adam... First of all I wanted to thank Trader Radar for having me as a guest today! My name is Adam Hewison. You might want to Google me to confirm what I am about to share with you. There are plenty of people out there that create “exclusive email courses” with little or no credentials to actually backup their teachings. So, I think it’s right that I share a little bit about myself with you before we even start. I was a former floor trader on the IMM, IOM, NYFE and L...

I know that it really isn't proper to do technical analysis on leveraged ETFs. I know that it is always better to analyze an underlying index. Nevertheless, I was struck by the fact that out of the 25 BUY signals on our Trend Busters list this weekend, fully 23 of them are inverse or inverse leveraged ETFs. In other words, they have all broken above downward-sloping trend lines and are threatening to initiate a new upward trend. Here they are listed below: Symbol Name DPK DIREXION DAILY DEVELOPED MARKETS BEAR 3X SHARES EDZ DIREXION DAILY EMERGING MARKETS BEAR 3X SHARES ERY DIREXION DAILY ENERGY BEAR 3X SHARES FAZ DIREXION DAILY FINANCIAL BEAR 3X SHARES DRV DIREXION DAILY REAL ESTATE BEAR 3X SHARES TYP DIREXION DAILY TECHNOLOGY BEAR 3X SHARES SEF PROSHARES SHORT FINANCIALS RWM PROSHARES SHORT RUSSELL2000 SBB PROSHARES SHORT SMALLCAP600 SPXU PROSHARES ULTRAPRO SHORT S&P 500 SMN PROSHARES ULTRASHORT BASIC MATERIALS...

When I write about stock market sectors or individual stocks, I generally give an overview of the fundamentals. On the other hand, all the BUY SELL signals we offer at Alert HQ are strictly based on technical analysis. Whereas the Alert HQ methodology primarily looks for technical indicators that are in agreement in order to generate its signals, there is an important school of thought that says that it is important to note when indicators are not in agreement. This is known as divergence. More precisely, divergence is when the price of an asset (a stock or ETF, for example) and an indicator, index or other related asset move in opposite directions. An investor looks for those instances where the trends begin to head in opposite directions. This is interpreted as a signal that a turn in the asset price is imminent. The difference between stock or index prices and MACD is one of the more common divergences that investors watch. Others involves prices and either stochastics, Money Flow ...

Does this rally have any gas left? Don't know what CMF means? Hopefully, we can shed some light on both topics. After a week of consolidation, where every day stocks struggled to close with a gain, I thought it might be a good idea to look at one of the indicators that takes into account the closing price relative to the high and low. That indicator is Chaikin Money Flow. Developed by Marc Chaikin, the Chaikin Money Flow oscillator is calculated from the daily readings of the Accumulation/Distribution Line. The basic premise behind the Accumulation Distribution Line is that the degree of buying or selling pressure can be determined by the location of the Close relative to the High and Low for the corresponding period (Closing Location Value). There is buying pressure when a stock closes in the upper half of a period's range and there is selling pressure when a stock closes in the lower half of the period's trading range. In this chart of the S&P 500, we can see the tai...

Question of the day: Is it really just a bear market rally when we are starting to see so many ETFs moving above their 200-day moving average? Many analysts consider a stock moving above its 200-DMA to be a buy signal. Furthermore, it is also said that a bull market can be defined as one where major market averages are trending up above their 200-DMA. Through most of this bear market, we haven't seen many stocks or ETFs anywhere close to their 200-DMA. Now, that seems to be changing. In my highly unscientific sample, I'm seeing a number of sector ETFs as well as the NASDAQ 100 have moved above their 200-DMA recently. Included among the ETFs I am tracking are the following: Technology iShares (IYW) Network iShares (IGN) Semiconductor iShares (IGW) Consumer Discretionary iShares (IYC) Comparable ETFs from the SPDR family of funds are essentially doing equally well. In addition, the NASDAQ Composite is a hair away from crossing over its 200-DMA and the Telecom iSh...

It's been a while since I did a post devoted solely to technical analysis of a stock or index but now seems like a good time. Market technicians have been watching in awe as the market put together six straight weeks of gains. Every pullback turned out to be a "buy the dip" opportunity for the bulls. Today, we finally had the kind of down day technicians were predicting given how far and how fast the market had climbed. With IBM and Texas Instruments beating earnings expectations after the close today, perhaps the market will rebound as it has done so often over the last six weeks. If it doesn't rebound, though, where might we be headed? The move from the March 9 low to the April 17 high is so clear that it seems to cry out for Fibonacci retracement analysis. Rather than draw a bunch of lines on the chart below we have added two bubbles. The light green bubble is in the vicinity of the 38% retracement which would be at roughly the 796 level. Note that this is also an ...