David Fuller's view On seeing some downside key day reversals in European indices yesterday (mentioned by Eoin in his Audio last night) and with a number of leading western stock market indices looking temporarily overextended following their uptrend extensions over the last seven weeks, plus every financial TV commentator saying "buy Wall Street", I opened a hedge short in the Nasdaq 100 Index (weekly & daily) early this afternoon, just after the slightly better than expected employment figures were released. I sold a March position at 2292.1, including a 4-point spread-bet dealing cost. This position is now protected with a tight, breakeven stop and I am not looking for more than a short-term reaction and some mean reversion towards the medium-term uptrend represented by the 200-day moving average.

Later this afternoon a breakeven stop was triggered in half of my rough rice (weekly & daily) long position. This was sold at $14.3250 for the March contract against my purchase at $14.310 on 31st December. I then sold my other March position at $14.3425 against its purchase at $13.7775 on 12th January. These prices include spread-bet dealing costs. The decision to sell looked overly cautious by the close.

This evening I opened a short in the S&P 500 Index (weekly & daily), selling the March contract at 1275.63, including 1-point spread-bet dealing costs. The March contract actually had a small downside key day reversal yesterday.

Stop Press: Today's NDX short was stopped out at 2290 against my earlier sale at 2292.1. These prices include all spread-bet dealing costs.


Excellent report on Uranium - My thanks to a subscriber for this informative report which I commend to readers who are interested in the uranium industry.

My view - Note the growth trajectory for nuclear reactors on the second page.

Among the many important points made in this report, I did not see reference to either the likely influence of speculation, or that of crude oil.

Regarding uranium supplies, I maintain that China's stockpiling can only influence other countries with large nuclear power programmes. This will encourage hedge funds and other speculators, many of whom are already interested in commodities, to buy uranium and uranium shares.

Among the risks not mentioned I can think of two: 1) the possibility of a major accident at one of the old, inefficient and far less safe nuclear reactors currently operating. While hopefully unlikely, such an event could be a significant setback for the industry. 2) The price of crude oil. While I think the price of crude will continue to range higher, if it does not for any reason (the most likely game changer in my opinion would be the rapid development of additional shale gas reserves, from Europe to China) there will be less urgency to stockpile uranium and complete new reactor building programmes on schedule.