08:20am  Another quiet day planned here at home, catching upon emails and doing some chart watching. Any trades I take will be detailed below as usual, in my Trading Diary.

Market Update:

U.S. equity markets had a mostly negative session on Wednesday as traders sold stocks during the day in anticipation of a Fed rate rise. The announcement late in the session confirmed what the market had priced in anyway but the Federal Reserve also hinted at two more hikes before the end of the year- they raised the rate 0.25% to 2% and the expectation is for 2.5% by December. The S&P-500 dropped 11.22 points to 2,775.63 by the close (-0.40%) and the Dow Jones 30 was down a comparable amount.  Earlier in the day, European markets closed mainly up as traders took the expected rate hike in their stride although this morning’s moves are overall bearish in the first 30 minutes although a quieter morning is expected as the European Central Bank announces its rate decision at lunchtime.

The overnight Asian trading session was bearish overall as traders digested how the Fed rate move would impact companies in the region.  The largest faller of the session was the South Korean Kospi which dropped 1.84% to 2423.48 with Hyundai Motors dragging the index down the most with Samsung also in the red by the close.  Chinese Industrial Production numbers were released today and they came in lower than expected at 6.8% and this contributed to losses in the Hang Seng and Shanghai Composite.

Oil markets are being dragged down after U.S. Crude Oil Inventory figures showed an increase in output, Brent Crud was down 28 cents at Wednesday’s close to $76.46 and has slipped a few more cents  this morning. U.S. Crude output has increased by 28% over the last 24 months and is currently standing at 10.91 million barrels per day which is almost as much as Russia’s output.

Trading Diary:

09:50am   I have just taken a ‘long’position on my 15-min GOLD chart using the Master-The-Trend Strategy-A set-up. My stop loss is 12 pips.

11:25am    Just taken a quick 26 pip profit from my GOLD position, off out for a ride now with some fellow cyclists.

14:55pm     I am back home now and have taken a ‘long’ position on my FTSE-100 15-min chart, another Master-The-Trend pattern but this time it’s Strategy-B.  The stop loss is a reasonable 18 pips and although the index is quite extended this afternoon it should reach at least a 20 pip profit if you look at the Daily timeframe.

15:30pm    I’ve taken a quick profit from my FTSE position (+25 pips) and very happy with today’s overall score of +51 pips.  Switching off my screens for the day, not sure if I will be back in my study tomorrow watching the charts, I’ll make a decision in the morning depending on the weather !