Anyone who has been actively trading the past few months probably has noticed a few peculiar occurrences. The USD/Equities correlation has been running the show for months causing added intra day volatility when anyone speaks about currency. A great example of a correlation beginning to move markets separately is GOLD. One can argue the dollar moves gold, thus equities follow the lead of the dollar.. but i have been noticing disconnects intra day, ABX will start selling before gold spot, then you will u will see the dollar catch hold, THEN equities fall on higher red volume than green. This is telling me the dollar carry trade is starting to loose its iron grip, or is it not? Where does trend come in? Well, stock or ETF's cannot keep a trend intra day for the whole day, it will flip flop two or three times, making intra day swing trading damn near impossible.
Today gold names, specifically GLD & ABX reversed trend twice, with ABX leading the show completely. Today taught me a lesson, do not try to and flip flop the trade using options in a lower vol environment, because options markets are incredibly wide(market makers know something is brewing) and the underlying simply will not move enough(trend in any direction) to cover the cost of the trade. If i would have just went long gold once i realized they were not gonna let it fall (the constant relentless bidding every time it fell alerted me of the trend) I should have got long and held it. BUT i was finicky and tried trading it both ways, i lost, and will probably lose every time i try to do this in this market.
It seems lines on a chart are merely lines, in reality that is what they are, though in theory they provide great insight into trend/support/resistance. What do these lines tell me now? They are telling me not to bet anything on them because they are not working, you gotta adapt and roll with it. The algo's will push stocks above or below these lines for a few seconds just to trigger stops...I honestly had zero trades today which worked, though i was right in the direction of the underlying options simply didn't pay. This is a good example i knowing when to switch gears and scalp equity instead of the derivative. I believe gold will be in play for the next few weeks, the trade will become much more interesting if they actually let the index's fall. Today we saw downside volume spike around 2pm, yet we were bought back up on less then 1/4 the volume in a 15 min period.
By Sellputs
Anyone who has been actively trading the past few months probably has noticed a few peculiar occurrences. The USD/Equities correlation has been running the show for months causing added intra day volatility when anyone speaks about currency. A great example of a correlation beginning to move markets separately is GOLD. One can argue the dollar moves gold, thus equities follow the lead of the dollar.. but i have been noticing disconnects intra day, ABX will start selling before gold spot, then you will u will see the dollar catch hold, THEN equities fall on higher red volume than green. This is telling me the dollar carry trade is starting to loose its iron grip, or is it not? Where does trend come in? Well, stock or ETF's cannot keep a trend intra day for the whole day, it will flip flop two or three times, making intra day swing trading damn near impossible. 
