How to detect huge price movement

ken0012 · Jan 21, 2003

How does one know when the stock like CAMZ is going to move like it did today before it happen? This assuming not violating any insider rule and all that stuff. Just being a trader how can u detect huge movement like it did today or is it just luck. It always seem that by the time the news come out it already jump. What's the trick to staying ahead of it.

aphexcoil · Jan 21, 2003

Quote from ken0012:

How does one know when the stock like CAMZ is going to move like it did today before it happen? This assuming not violating any insider rule and all that stuff.

That's the million dollar question that everyone would love to know.

cheeks · Jan 21, 2003

sometimes you will volume pickup as word leaks about potential M&A. It the case of CAMZ, there does not appear to have been any clues you could have acted on.

This is one of the reasons you do not want to be short beaten down stocks. You can wake up and see your account destroyed.

SocalTrader · Jan 21, 2003

There is no way of knowing ahead of time of deals like this unless you have inside info. Outside, from a technical perspective, I like to look at stocks that are trading at relatively very high volume. That sometimes give you a heads up. http://www.trade-ideas.com/SingleSymbol.php?symbol=CAMZ&more=1

Hope that helps

optionsplayer · Jan 21, 2003

Quote from cheeks:

sometimes you will volume pickup as word leaks about potential M&A. It the case of CAMZ, there does not appear to have been any clues you could have acted on.

This is one of the reasons you do not want to be short beaten down stocks. You can wake up and see your account destroyed.

Speaking of which...did any of you happen to see EMC Feb 7.50 Calls today?? There were several huge blocks that went through. Volume on the day was near 5,000 contracts. Apparently there is some "major" announcement coming Feb 2nd from the company. I am hesitant to jump on this as EMC is notorious for breaking down at resistant points. $7.50ish to $8.00 range is starting to look like a nice ceiling right about now..........

ArchAngel · Jan 21, 2003

Quote from optionsplayer:
...did any of you happen to see EMC Feb 7.50 Calls today?? There were several huge blocks that went through. Volume on the day was near 5,000 contracts. Apparently there is some "major" announcement coming Feb 2nd from the company...

Ah, but was the volume from initiated buys or sells?

optionsplayer · Jan 21, 2003

Quote from ArchAngel:

Ah, but was the volume from initiated buys or sells?

Good point...but believe it or not, most of the large blocks went through on the ask side. So either covers or new long positions. Tomorrow will be the tell tale as we can see the updated open interest at that strike...................

hardrock375 · Jan 21, 2003

Quote from ArchAngel:

Ah, but was the volume from initiated buys or sells?

Always a good question to ask...

Avalanche · Jan 21, 2003

Quote from ken0012:

It always seem that by the time the news come out it already jump. What's the trick to staying ahead of it.

IMO volume is the cause and price is the effect. A lot of scanning software compares the current 5 minute (10, 15 whatever) bar to the previous few time periods and that can give you a heads up as to when a big move might take place intraday because it brings it to your attention faster.

If you aren't running a volume scan you might still see it but likely the stock will have already run a bit and gone to highs or lows.

Ron In-a-sauna · Jan 21, 2003

re: price and volume, volume scans, etc....IMO you must so some tape reading here too or be familiar with stock and be aware of other extraneous events that could be causing volume, other wise you may be going in somewhat blind and entering with lower probability, although you will def. find some good trades, but you have to find a way to make it work with good success rate. i used to use this method exclusively and did decent.