08:20am   Another quiet day at home planned so any trades I have will be detailed below in my Trading Diary

Market Update:

Wednesday’s U.S. trading session saw equity markets decline after large falls in Crude Oil prices and encouraging employment numbers for February which is expected to be confirmed tomorrow when the monthly Non Farm Payrolls announcement is made.  U.S. WTI Crude fell 5.38% to $50.28, it’s largest one day drop for over a year due to inventory reports that U.S. stocks rose by 8.2 million barrels in the past week.  There is a perceived support level at $50 which was touched briefly late yesterday afternoon and any move below this is a fairly bearish sign for the sector – prices have recovered slightly overnight and WTI is trading around the $50.75 level this morning.

Encouraging employment numbers should be good for equities but at the moment it merely signals that the Federal Reserve will be more likely to raise interest rates when they meet next week and this would be bad for business as it increases their borrowing costs which in turn has a direct effect on the bottom line. Surveys this week suggest a +90% chance of a rate hike on March.

Asian markets were mostly negative at the close except for a late rally in the Nikkei 225 where a weaker Japanese Yen brought buyers out.  Chinese PPI data showed a surprise rise to 7.8%, well above expectations and also ahead of government targets and this curtailed any buying enthusiasm.  European markets are opening slightly down as traders adjust their positions ahead of tomorrow’s U.S. jobs report. There was nothing in the UK’s budget announcement yesterday to spur the market on and London’s FTSE-100 index has fallen from a high of 7400 last week and is sitting at 7288 this morning although price could find some support at its 20-day moving average.

Trading Diary:

09:50am   I have just entered a ‘long’ trade on my 15-min GOLD chart, it’s a UTB price-reversal pattern and my stop loss is a paltry 10 pips.

10:15am    Just entered a ‘short’ position on my UK Brent Crude 15-min chart. It’s a Master-The-Trend Strategy-B pattern and the stop loss is a relatively high 32 pips but that does reflect the volatility and large moves in the market since yesterday’s U.S. inventories announcement.

11:05am   My Gold trade has not really achieved much so far, it’s still languishing around break even but the Brent Crude price has come down quite nicely and I have just closed my position off at +139 pips.

12:10pm   Just scanning through my charts and I’ve seen that my Gold position has been stopped out at -10 pips.  Lunch out soon so I will update this diary later this afternoon.

14:45pm   Back from lunch and nothing much to see on my collection of favourite charts so I am going to finish for the day – happy with my +129 pip score.