08:30am  I am planning a quiet day at home today so any trades I take will be detailed below in my Trading Diary.

Market Update:

U.S. equity markets were weaker yesterday as the S&P-500 closed down for the third session in a row which has not occurred since the middle of August.  Traders are starting to take some profits off the table as they wait for more concrete evidence that Trump’s tax reforms are actually going to materialise. Tech stocks were the best performers however with Alphabet, Facebook and Netflix all closing up on the day, bucking the general trend although all sectors are down this morning in futures trading.  The overnight Asian trading session has followed on from the U.S. weakness and also closed negatively across the board with the Japanese Nikkei-225 index fairing worst at -2.0%. Australian GDP figures for their economy came in below expectations which dragged down the ASX-200 and the Hang Seng was also lower by around 2% as well.

Gold had a negative session on Tuesday and fell $10:70 through the day to close at $1265:60 last night as a reaction to a rising U.S. Dollar and also funds being diverted into tech stocks.  It is now below its 200-day moving average which is a fairly bearish sign but watch for a small bounce back up today as bargain hunters come into the market.  Oil is suffering overnight as reports of a growing U.S. inventory emerge ahead of today’s official weekly Crude Inventories report, U.S. WTI Crude ended Tuesday’s session flat at $57:46 but is slightly lower this morning at $57:31.  Expect some volatility later today before price settles down, a move towards the 20-day moving average looks likely.

Trading Diary:

09:35am   I have just taken a ‘short’ position on my S&P-500 30-min chart, it’s a Master-The-Trend Strategy-A set-up with a 25 pip stop loss.

11:55am   I am also in a ‘short’ position on my Brent Crude Oil 30-min chart now, it’s another Master-The-Trend set-up but a Strategy-B pattern this time.  My stop loss is 29 pips.

12:20pm    My S&P position has just been stopped out at -25pips.  I am also watching my Brent position carefully as volume (and movement) will slow soon as we have the U.S. Crude Oil Inventories announcement in a few hours.

12:45pm  The Brent Crude price has dropped sufficiently to allow me to get a +29 pip profit, covering my stop loss which is an acceptable result I think considering the price action is starting to become slightly volatile now ahead of the Inventories Announcement.  Being out of the position also allows me a relaxing lunch out as well.

14:35pm    Just back from lunch and there’s a ‘long’ trade that has triggered on my UK FTSE-100 15-min chart and as the price has not advanced much I have been able to enter at a very good level cutting my stop loss down to just 18 pips.  It’s another Master-The-Trend Strategy-B pattern.

16:05pm   The FTSE price has wandered slowly upto to the 7370 level where it seems to be unable to advance any further so I am now out of my position at a slightly lower level giving me a profit of +26 pips and an overall score for the day of +30 pips.

That’s it for today but I am planning to be back here in front of my screens tomorrow as usual.