{"id":6413,"date":"2013-02-21T07:33:26","date_gmt":"2013-02-21T12:33:26","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/leavittbrothers.com\/blog\/?p=6413"},"modified":"2013-02-21T07:33:26","modified_gmt":"2013-02-21T12:33:26","slug":"before-the-open-feb-21-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.leavittbrothers.com\/?p=6413","title":{"rendered":"Before the Open (Feb 21)"},"content":{"rendered":"

Good morning. Happy Thursday.<\/span>
\nThe Asian\/Pacific markets suffered some big losses. China dropped 3%, Australia more than 2% and Hong Kong, India, Japan and New Zealand more than 1%. Europe is currently down across the board. Austria, France, Germany, Amsterdam, Norway, Switzerland, London, the Czech Republic and Greece are all down more than 1%. Futures here in the States point towards a down open for the cash market.
\n<\/span>
\nThe dollar is up. Oil and copper are down. Gold and silver are up.<\/span>
\nThe bears finally got a big down day yesterday. After weeks of being in disbelief and missing a great 180-point, 3-month S&P rally, they finally got what they were waiting for. For whatever it’s worth!!! Missing such a great move and missing so many great rallies from individual companies is hardly worth being able to pound you chest one time. A stopped clock is right twice a day. After singing the same song for months, the clock stopped yesterday, and the bears finally got a chance to brag. Am I poking fun at the bears? Yeah, it’s fun, and they’re an easy target. But don’t get me wrong. I like the bears – especially the perma bears – they’re the ones who keep adding fuel to the uptrends. They are, after all, partially responsible for the the uptrends lasting longer than they should. And for this I am thankful. They allow me to play the uptrends for longer periods. <\/span>
\nMoving to trading, I cannot emphasize this enough – you must not give profits back. You must take what the market gives you. If you bought a stock at 30 and had a 34 target, and the stock only rallied to 33 before reversing hard yesterday, you should have been stopped out. Forget your target; forget a trailing stop. Don’t give profits back. If you played a breakout at the beginning of the year, you can give it time and space to move around. But if you played a breakout in the last couple weeks when the risk\/reward wasn’t as favorable, you have to be ahead of the curve taking profits. The same chart in different environments will yield different results, and you must make the adjustment. More after the open.<\/span>
\nheadlines at Yahoo Finance<\/a><\/span>
\nheadlines at MarketWatch<\/a><\/span>
\ntoday’s upgrades\/downgrades<\/a><\/span>
\nthis week’s Earnings<\/a><\/span>
\nthis week’s Economic Numbers<\/a><\/span>
\n