UNG update

Here's the last update on the UNG long trade idea from Friday...

 UNG has recently seen a change in character in trading, I've mentioned several strange things such as the Congressman asking Bernie during Congressional testimony to espouse the virtues of Natural Gas even though Bernie has nothing to do with Energy policy, but it was a nice time to give props while virtually every trader was listening to his testimony. The trend and volume itself suggests something was up as did 3C.

 I view this as a base and the area in yellow as a shakeout because we saw 3C positive divergences on the shakeout move. UNG was held up Friday at resistance of a small consolidation (red arrow) and today, thus far, has broken through with a 2+% gain.

Here's the congestion area on a 15 min chart.

If you like the idea of the UNG trade, this may not be a bad area to add or initiate a trade. I may add some to the model portfolio later if I have time. I'd like to see a test of former resistance first.

ORCL Follow Up

ORCL was a trade idea (short) from March 13th. ORCL has poped off several alerts this a.m., this is kind of a similar situation like we see in WMT.

 Here's the long term daily chart and what I believe is a large descending triangle top.

 Note there is a bear flag breakdown and ORCL has not been able to make it to the top resistance trendline, often a sign of weakness, especially useful in broadening tops after 5 points of contact with the trend lines.

 ORCL today is just below the bear flag, there could still be some volatility on the break of the flag's support, but ORCL looks like it's falling apart here.

 The 60 min chart of the bear flag has been leading negative  since about the time ORCL popped out of the bear flag on a shakeout move.

Here's the more recent 15 min chart showing a leading negative divergence, so it's no surprise ORCL is where it is.

Email me if you need stops for ORCL, obviously there are several different length trades one could take considering we still have the top's support below.

Parabolic moves

And here's a perfect example of why I never trust parabolic moves....

That's the IWM by the way, now at a 0.16% gain

With the SPY at +0.15%, the DIA at -0.08 and the Q's at +0.17%, the IWM is the odd man out at +0.52% but was recently higher.

Remember the rhetorical question I asked last week about "Why?" the IWM was showing better relative strength vs the other averages and I posted a chart? the IWM hasn't done 1 thing that all the other averages had...

Post a breakout high, closing and intraday. Actually last week it posted a marginal breakout new high, obviously you know what my thoughts are on this action and why the IWM was palying catch up all last week.

ES Update

Here's an ES negative divergence in 3C in premarket sending it lower and a smaller relative positive in premarket. The current price action is a little too parabolic for my liking and a negative divergence has started to form. ES could move a bit higher I think as the divergence is rather new, but I suspect this will send ES lower soon.

WMT Follow Up

The last substantial update for WMT with the different entry options was Friday here....

Quite a few alerts have gone off this a.m. and although I'm not a fan of morning trade and volatility, you should be aware of where WMT is now in relation to some of the proposed entry options.

 A break of the 60 min Trend Channel was one option which started Friday near the close and is below on the open today. This was one entry option being a stop could be placed nearby above the recent highs.

The Second option was a move back inside the bear flag which we are seeing today as well. The daily chart shows a bearish Engulfing pattern at the yellow arrows and a break inside the channel at the red arrow.  The last entry is a break below the bear flag.

AAPL's Dividend and Share Buyback

Here's the PR from AAPL:

CUPERTINO, Calif. -- March 19, 2012

Apple today announced plans to initiate a dividend and share repurchase program commencing later this year.

Subject to declaration by the Board of Directors, the Company plans to initiate a quarterly dividend of $2.65 per share sometime in the fourth quarter of its fiscal 2012, which begins on July 1, 2012.

Additionally, the Company’s Board of Directors has authorized a $10 billion share repurchase program commencing in the Company’s fiscal 2013, which begins on September 30, 2012. The repurchase program is expected to be executed over three years, with the primary objective of neutralizing the impact of dilution from future employee equity grants and employee stock purchase programs.

“We have used some of our cash to make great investments in our business through increased research and development, acquisitions, new retail store openings, strategic prepayments and capital expenditures in our supply chain, and building out our infrastructure. You’ll see more of all of these in the future,” said Tim Cook, Apple’s CEO. “Even with these investments, we can maintain a war chest for strategic opportunities and have plenty of cash to run our business. So we are going to initiate a dividend and share repurchase program.”

“Combining dividends, share repurchases, and cash used to net-share-settle vesting RSUs, we anticipate utilizing approximately $45 billion of domestic cash in the first three years of our programs,” said Peter Oppenheimer, Apple’s CFO. “We are extremely confident in our future and see tremendous opportunities ahead.”

Apple will provide live streaming of a conference call to discuss its plans beginning at 6:00 a.m. PDT on Monday, March 19, 2012 at www.apple.com/quicktime/qtv/call31912. The Company will not be providing an update on the current quarter nor will any topics be discussed other than cash. This webcast will also be available for replay for approximately two weeks thereafter.

AAPL To Announce Dividend Tomorrow Morning?

It's breaking news, no body really knows what it's about except AAPL's cash situation. It's been widely expected that AAPL would announce a dividend since last month. Trade has been a little uncharacteristic in AAPL the last few days so...???

SKEW RISES AGIAN FRIDAY...

Stress Tests not so Stressful

From Bloomberg:

Class Dunce Passes Fed’s Stress Test Without a Sweat

The most important thing to understand about the Federal Reserve’s latest stress tests is what they were not intended to do. Their purpose wasn’t to test whether the nation’s biggest banks could survive a financial blowup like that of 2008 without government assistance."


the Fed’s “comprehensive capital analysis” are more about public relations and manufacturing confidence than they are about disseminating reliable information on banks’ health. Citigroup Inc. (C) was deemed well capitalized under the government’s methodology when it got bailed out in 2008. So was CIT Group Inc. when it filed for bankruptcy in 2009.

How stressful were the Fed’s tests? One anecdote stands apart: Regions Financial Corp. (RF), which still hasn’t paid back its bailout money from the Troubled Asset Relief Program, passed.

The footnotes to the company’s latest financial statements tell the story. There, the Birmingham, Alabama-based lender disclosed that the loans on its books were worth $8.1 billion less than what its balance sheet said, as of Dec. 31. By comparison, the company’s tangible common equity, a bare-bones measure of net worth, was $7.6 billion.

So if it weren’t for the inflated loan values, Regions’ tangible common equity would have been less than zero, with liabilities exceeding hard assets. In short, the test was a joke, although it had its intended effect. Shares of Regions and other large banks soared, and Regions raised $900 million selling common shares on Wednesday. The company, which hasn’t reported an annual profit since 2007, plans to use the money to help repay the $3.5 billion it got from the Treasury Department in 2008.

More at the link above....