08:30am  ~  A late start for me today, I’ve got a few hours here in the study replying to emails and chatting to some budding traders over Skype and then I am off later this morning for a tour of the Rolls Royce factory at Goodwood in Surrey.

Looking at my daily charts this morning it can be seen the the U.S. markets seem to have topped out, Tuesday’s session formed a small spinning top and yesterday we had a generally bearish market due to traders booking profits amid fears that Ukraine is slipping into civil war together with a sharp drop in US 10 year bond yields to a 6 month low.  This fall in yields suggests that bond traders don’t share the dwindling optimism of equity market investors about the strength of any US economic recovery and this sparked the profit-taking during yesterday’s session.

Oil prices were higher in trading yesterday, as a decline in the inventory at Cushing drove the market up. Despite a 900,000 barrel increase in the overall oil stockpiles, the draw downs at the Cushing storage facility was perceived to be more important to traders and as a result US crude rose $1.11 to end at $101.70.  As expected, Gold had a bullish  day yesterday as it benefitted from the decline of equity markets. This inverse relationship was clear to see yesterday as investors moved their money from risk assets to a safer home. Gold is now at a one week high and investors will be looking to see how the situation in the Ukraine develops, it finished the session up $9 at $1,305.

09:50am  ~  I was not planning on doing any trading this morning as I’m off soon but I have just spotted a possible UTB pattern on my Brent Oil chart – I will get in for a quick trade if the price goes up slightly.

10:15am  ~  Currently in a ‘long’ position I’ve just mentioned. Stop loss 27 pips.

10:45am  ~  The trade is currently hovering around break even, and I am now leaving for Goodwood so I have set my stop loss at minus ten pips to give the position a bit of room and profit at +27 pips.

17:10pm  ~  Back home in Chelmsford from a nice day out, so I shall switch on my S&P500 chart and see if there’s any “Trade With A Day Job” set-ups in the next few hours before some friends arrive for  a barbeque and poker evening.

17:35pm  ~  I am currently in a ‘long’ position with one of my evening strategies in the “Trade With A Day Job” manual 2  -  the stop loss is 21 pips. News on my earlier Brent Oil trade is that it was stopped out at minus 10 pips.

18:05pm  ~ Friends arriving earlier than I thought so I am out of my S&P position with a +31 pip profit.

Daily Target Reached ?  YES (+21 pips)