Wednesday, September 17, 2008

Crazy Daze

What a day. Hope everybody survived. I was, wait..... I just had to turn Cramer off. OK, I'm back. I was short MS, GS and UYG pre open and took that wonderful trade for a huge ride until I got long after John Mack from Morgan started throwing a hissy fit that the reason his stock was down was because of the shorts. No shit Sherlock. I guess John was never shorted a stock in an industry that was imploding by the nanosecond. Give me a break. As if he and all the others aren't to blame for the credit default swap mess that helped push the stock to new lows. Hey, it's an illiquid asset class, what can I tell you.

It did however get me long the financials because in a small way, at that point in time, the rhetoric was "poor me" lets get the shorts. Well guess what? It worked. Goldman ran, and so did Morgan. Everybody loves an underdog or a cute little abused puppy and it was game on. It didn't last long but I caught a beautiful trade from the long side. After being short GS all day I actually caught GS long at $99, something to tell my kids before they laugh at me for not waiting for $75.

So, right or wrong I got long UYG and MS and took them both home. Yes, I took a financial home on the long side. I twittered it around 3:40 that they were talking. CNBC reported the same thing later. I may get my neck snapped off, but I have a ridiculous cushion, so why not? I'll stop it at the open if I don't get any follow through, but I will tell you, even I got tired off shorting the financials today, Enough might be enough---- for now.

Hank Greenberg seems like a nice guy, he fought for our country and started AIG from a small office to an empire, but he and what army are going to take over AIG? I guess I never lost $20 billion in a week.

Take a look at the VIX. We either crash tomorrow, or go up.

3 comments:

MatchPointTrader said...

That was a MONSTER trade! Congratulations. I am amazed that so many people(shorts) have made so much money during one day!
This might be a stupid question, so apologies in advance -
Q) GS posted better than expected profit(though missed revenue) and it seemed to be climbing higher a bit earlier in the day. Then, how come you held on and got it right? Did you use any particular strategy(technical analysis?).
Also, why did you decide to go long again later in the day when the market was tanking? Is it because of your gut feeling or chart analysis?
I understand you said you had a cushion - but is that the only reason?
I am just trying to understand - you seemed to pick up bottom perfectly in this wave.
Thanks much!

upsidetrader said...

a little luck, but i love playing extremes--way overbought/way oversold-nothing goes strait up or down forever so they reveal themselves as trades-on days like that the charts are meaningless to me-fear and emotion dictate everything

MatchPointTrader said...

Makes sense. Thanks much upside-trader.

About Me

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I am a former hedge fund manager, broker and capital markets dude who now trades for his own account. I love what I do. I will try to post some stocks and an occasional chart that looks attractive for entry.I will also try to point out the idiocy of conventional wisdom and the lack of value added by the mainstream financial media. These postings should not be viewed as recommendations.