08:30am   Back home after a short break away and today’s plan includes some chart watching and catching up on emails – any trades I take will be detailed below in my Trading Dairy.

Market Update:

U.S. markets did not perform well on their first trading day of the new week, the Dow Jones has experienced a 4-day losing streak and closed down by 14.25 pips (-0.06%) although the wider S&P-500 did manage a tiny profit after a late flourish, it ended ahead by +0.01%. Tech stocks weighed the indices down with Netflix, Amazon, Google parent Alphabet and Facebook all closed in the red although companies that are reporting 1st quarter earnings are mainly showing good numbers but traders are reporting some concerns over increasing bank interest rates in the coming months.

The overnight Asian trading session was affected by the U.S. close although most markets ended ahead with the Shanghai Composite coming out as the best performer of the session at +1.97%. One of the only losers of the night was the South Korean Kospi index which closed down 10 pips as Samsung Electronics and chip maker SK Hynix both fell significantly through the session. Oil markets are still looking bullish as rising demand and a tighter supply situation impact on the price – UK Brent Crude is almost at the significant $75 level this morning after a good showing yesterday, it rose $1.01 to close last night at $74.75 but is slightly down this morning as traders take some profits off the table.

Gold closed at its lowest level for two weeks last night, it finished at $1324.60 (-$10.30) but seems to have found some minor support at $1322 so we may see a small move upto today as bargain hunters come in to the market. A rise in the value of the U.S. Dollar and year U.S. Treasuries has dampened demand for the safe haven commodity.

Trading Diary:

10:10am    Nothing on my collection of favourite chart so off for a run.

11:10am   I have just taken a ‘long’ position on my GOLD 15-min chart. It’s a Master-The-Trend Strategy-B set-up and my stop loss this time is 12 pips.

12:00 Midday   My Gold trade has been stopped out at -12 pips.

13:55pm   Now in another Master-The-Trend Strategy-B position, this time it’s on the German DAX-30 15-min chart with a 17 pip stop loss.

15:30pm    Now out of my DAX position with a score of +78 pips.  The price was struggling to go much lower than 12,500 so came out at a good level.  Finished for the day now, screens off until tomorrow morning.