08:15am  CET  ~  Subject to the ups and downs of Spanish internet I shall be here in the study this morning doing emails/Skype calls/chart watching – or down at the beach if it all goes the same way as yesterday…

The markets in the U.S. continued to move upwards and onwards yesterday as they shrugged aside the large falls in Japan early on Monday morning – the Dow Jones was up 13 points at the close but there does seem to be a temporary ceiling at 17,700. The wider S&P 500 index has been hovering around it’s current level for the last week so it could signal a slight move down before the pre-xmas rally resumes. After the sudden fall yesterday, the Japanese Nikkei 225 recovered slightly, moving up 370 points equivalent to over 2% although elsewhere in Asia, Hong Kong and Chinese shares fell for a second day after the debut of the new Hong Kong-Shanghai trading link as traders continued to take profits after the sharp rise in the past week  Pessimistic  Chinese home prices data also kept sentiment in check.

There is still too much supply in the Crude Oil market although the U.S. WTI Crude price held quite yesterday, forming a Doji on the daily chart as it bounces around the record low just above $73 – commodity traders are now looking towards the OPEC meeting next Thursday.  The 13 members of OPEC usually meet around twice a year and as a group, they control around 40% of the world’s oil production, so they do have a big influence on price and output. With the dramatic fall in price in the past few months cause dby falling Asian demand together with the success of the U.S. fracking scheme means that this meeting will be more closely watched than normal.

Market Close Monday 17th November 2014:   Dow Jones 30  +13.01 @ 17,647.75  S&P 500  +1.50 @ 2,041.32  NASDAQ  -11.20 @ 4,213.79  FTSE 100  +17.60 @ 6,671.97  UK AIM  -0.04 @ 716.41  DAX 30  +53.41 @ 9,306.35  CAC 40  +23.64 @4,226.10  IBEX  +161.00 @ 10,309.00   Nikkei 225 (Today)  +370.26 @ 17,344.06  Hang Seng (currently)  -224.48  @ 23,572.60

All times below are Central European Time (CET)

11:20am  ~  It’s been reasonably quiet this morning on my charts — but there does seem to be a UTB ‘short’ opportunity setting up on my Brent Crude chart.

11:30am ~  If the price goes below 7963 a ‘short’ will be triggered. Stop loss will be around 33 pips.

11:55am  ~  The price did drop enough and I’ve been a ‘short’ position for a while now, currently the trade is sitting at +6 pips.

15:05pm  ~  I am still in my Brent Crude trade and there’s now a possible ‘long’ opportunity setting up on the S&P500 – it’s a trendFX strategy 3 pattern. Just missed a ‘long’ on my Dax 30 chart, I was outside enjoying the midday sun !

15:40pm  ~  Now in a 2nd trade, the aforementioned S&P 500 position.

16:25pm  ~  The S&P has shot up nicely but the upward momentum is slowing and profit-takers have come out in strength, so I am now out out of my position. I have managed +48 pips.  The Brent trade is currently hovering around +100 pips.

16:40pm  ~  The Brent Crude price has hit a temporary support it would seem so I’ve just come out of my position as I am happy with +114 pips.