"This past week was terrible for most of us I presume. "
why?
fwiw, it was my most profitable week all year.
Yes, my IRA didn't do particularly well, but my trading account made more last week than it made in the previous 3 weeks.
why should bearish conditions be any worse than bullish conditions? in a TRADING account, it shouldn't. there is no more "uptick" rule, so for stock traders - shorting became much easier.
as a futures trader, there is absolutely no difference between shorting and going long, and last week (especially thursday) was phenomenal for a futures trader due to massive volatility.
thursday offered a partial gapfill (long) a steady selloff of several hundred points, then a rapid bounce of approximately 150 pts, then another reversal down of over 100 pts or so.
if that's not a good trading market, then nothing is.
it's only bad if you have a BIAS (most traders have a long bias) and thus are looking for great longs on a day where the NYSE AD is .07
iow, 7 out of 100 NYSE stocks were up for the day.
well. duh
we are also starting to see some (and will see) some overreactions which will offer great value entries for IRA's looking for value.
i loaded some GSS on the pback, some BQI (which was up nicely friday).
i would LOVE to pick up some MCdonalds if it gets down to 45 or so.