07:45am  (UK time)  ~  A nice quiet day here at home for me today so I will report back later if I have any trades.

Equity markets were fairly bullish yesterday after generally optimistic sentiment concerning the crisis in Ukraine and the Greek problems – the U.S. Dow Jones 30 index rallied over 70 points by the close to edge closer to the 18,000 level as the Greek Finance Minister Yanis Varoufakis announced that a compromise deal would be on the table by Monday although reports out overnight have put Asian traders on the back foot concerning this situation and the Dow has retreated back to 17850 in overnight futures trading.

Crude oil was in the news once again as the U.S. stockpile situation grew to a larger extent than first estimated which inevitably bought the price tumbling down. There was a build of nearly 5 million barrels at Cushing according the to weekly report and this news sent WTI Crude down $1.62 to end the session at $49.43 although it has made up some ground overnight and is now sitting at $49.87 and a move above $51 this week will signal further bullish sentiment towards the $54 resistance level.

Gold is in the doldrums and well out of favour as a safe haven hedge, it lost another $16 yesterday to end at $1218 and it seems as though the next support is at $1200. The prospect of higher U.S. interest rates and falling Asian demand at this time of year is keeping traders focused on other assets at the moment.

Market Close Wednesday 11th February 2015:   Dow Jones 30  -6.62 @ 17,862.14  S&P 500  -0.06 @ 2,068.53  NASDAQ  +16.13 @ 4,297.28  FTSE 100  -10.95 @ 6,818.17  UK AIM  -3.02 @ 696.93  DAX 30  -1.72 @ 10,752.11  CAC 40  -16.27 @ 4,679.38  IBEX  -135.30 @ 10,364.80   Nikkei 225 (Today)  +327.04 @ 17,6979.72  Hang Seng (currently)  +87.84 @ 24,402.76

08:05am  ~  Not much happening on my collection of charts so I am going to take an opportunity to get out on my bike and go south along the beach path towards the power station.

12:10pm  ~  Been back a few hours but all has been quiet on my charts, however there is the start of  a UTB pattern on my S&P500 chart.

13:35pm  ~  No UTB but I have just got into a ‘short’ position with a 27 pip stop loss on the same chart with my ‘Magic-Line’ strategy.   Always risky taking a trade right on the market open in the U.S. but I do have my stop is in place on the MT4 platform in readiness.

13:55pm  ~  Out of the trade with a quick +29 pip profit.  Late lunchtime up the road …

18:40pm  ~ Going to switch on my MT4 platform to watch for any ‘Trade With A Day Job’ set-ups.

19:30pm  ~  I am now in a ‘long’ position on the S&P 500.  My stop loss is 18 pips.

20:25pm  ~  The upward momentum of the S&P index has calmed down quite considerably so I am now out of my position – the result is +26 pips