I started this blog in January 2010, and I include information on the stock trades I am making in my Covestor account. But I have had a blog on Covestor since 2008. Covestor date stamps the blog posts to maintain an accurate history of stock trades and blog posts. My Covestor blog can be viewed at Covestor.com by searching for Robert Miller. But below are copies of the earlier stock trading blog posts that are on my Covestor blog:
Relm Wireless
Dec 15, 2009. Today I covered my short position in Relm Wireless (RWC) at 3.20 for a nice short term gain. Shorting RWC was an idea from Timothy Sykes. I got a little nervous when Tim bailed out early back on December 10 when the stock didn’t drop right away, but since volume fell sharply I decided to stay short for almost a week and the trade eventually worked out well. Thanks Tim!
Covered Netlist
Dec 2, 2009. I shorted Netlist (NLST) on November 23 at 6.50. I had an automatic buy to cover order in at 5.22 which filled on November 30. The stock is still falling and last traded at 4.74. I guess I bailed out too early.
Bought USO Today
June 3, 2009. I bought USO today, the Oil ETF, at $36.20 a share. It has been in a definite uptrend for a while and slipped over 3% today so I decided to take a position. It traded around $50 for quite a while back in 2006-2007 before the recent boom and bust cycle, so I think there is not much question that it will trade at that level again in the future. The only question is whether it will sink back to its lows of earlier this year before getting there.
Covered US Global Investors
June 3, 2009. Today I covered my short position in US Global Investors at $9.00, the same price I entered two days ago. The price had slipped as low as $8.50 today but then climbed back at the close. Considering that the broad market fell considerably today, this was a display of significant relative strength so I thought it unwise to hold any longer.
Sold Short US Global Investors
June 1, 2009. I was waiting to see how the market would respond to the General Motors bankruptcy, and it seemed to pay no attention to it. I guess it was expected and already priced into the mix. Investors were quite bullish today with the S&P moving up almost 2 1/2 per cent. I shorted US Global Investors (ticker symbol GROW), as it jumped over 32% today. I am trying to follow Timothy Sykes on this one. He is well known on Covestor.com. He shorted earlier and got out with a small gain, but it rallied sharply on the close so I think there is plenty of room for it to backtrack a bit. I shorted at $9.00 a share. I did some research and the company actually looks like they will be alright, but the stock has rallied 63 per cent in just the last two days which looks a little over done. So this is a very short term trade. I will know in a day or two if I entered too late or made the right call.
Decided to take the quick gain on DXD
Aug 25, 2008. The headline story on Bloomberg last friday was that stocks advanced because of oil’s plunge and a possible buyout offer for Lehman Brothers from Korea Development Bank. Its true that oil prices fell sharply friday, but they are still about 80% higher than a year ago. I have read the financial news for years but putting forward the idea that a possible investment by a Korean Bank in one troubled Wall Street firm could help turn around the US financial crises and was the cause of a one day market rally is one of the most far fetched reports I can remember. If traders were bidding up prices on that news I decided it might be a good time to go short. In fact, the market was probably rallying for reasons completely unrelated to the Korea Bank story but the press likes to put forth explanations like that. In any case, and probably more importantly, the Dow Jones was running up into its short term downtrend line. So I bought DXD near the close at 60.27. Today the Korea Bank story unraveled and new worries about the banking system sent stocks lower. DXD, an inverse ETF, moved up sharply and I decided to take the quick gain and sold at 62.57. Thats only a 3.8% gain, but money managers are buying bonds today hoping for about a 3.8% gain over the course of a year, so if I could get 3.8% in one day I figured I should take it. I don’t think this downtrend has played out yet but things could be choppy for the next couple of days.
UltraShort Dow30 Proshares
July 2, 2008. The UltraShort Dow30 Proshares are an ETF that moves twice the inverse of the Dow Jones 30 Industrial average. The ticker symbol is DXD. This is an easier way to short the market than buy actually shorting stocks, where you have to pay margin interest and so on. I first took a position in DXD on June 5, and added some more just a couple of days ago on June 30. The Dow Jones broke its short term uptrend about May 20th and has been trending relentlessly lower ever since. The fact that the price of oil has stayed high since its big jump on June 6, is a major factor weighing on the overall market. Clearly high oil prices will be a drag on the US econoly at these levels. Fed Chairman’s Bernanke’s recent statement that the odds of the US entering a recession have decreased recently, sounds more like political posturing than serious economics, although the market did uptick on his statements for a day or so. Its taken a while but the Euro is almost back to the peak it hit against the dollar in April. Tomorrow the European Central bank will meet and probably raise interest rates to slow the inflation they have been experiencing. That would probably cause the dollar to slip further which would lead to a further increase in oil prices in dollar terms. That may send US stocks lower still. I think the UltraShort Dow30 Proshares are a good way to hedge against falling US stock prices over a short time span. The trends of a weaker US currency and rising oil prices seem to be well established at this time.