daytrading july 4 afternoon

Thanks Endless. I didn't answer your question yesterday - not heading to Scotland this trip, but somewhere warmer. Need to thaw out.

Half-time round-up:

The share market's roller-coaster week continued with an upswing this morning that left the market little changed after four days of violent directional shifts.

At lunchtime the ASX 200 was 47 points or 1% ahead at 4791 and just 11 points lower for the week despite daily swings of more than 1.7% over the first three sessions. A patternless morning saw all sectors rise except IT (-0.4%), led by health +2.5%, gold 2.2%, the Small Ordinaries +2% and energy +2%.

"As far as we're seeing, it's a correction from probably what was over-done yesterday," IG market strategist Evan Lucas told Fairfax. "The volatility is ginormous and a lot of movement today will be quite violent because people don't have the gauge of what's going on in the US with their big holiday - so there will be a lot of positioning and correction."

Asian markets were mixed following a night of political upheaval in Egypt and Portugal, declines in Europe and slender gains in the US. Shanghai dropped 0.16%, Hong Kong's Hang Seng advanced 1.71% and Japan's Nikkei eased 0.33%. Dow futures were recently up 12 points or 0.1% heading into tonight's Independence Day market holiday.

Building approvals declined by 1.1%, slightly more than economists expected, in May. Approvals were 3.2% lower than the same time last year.

Crude oil futures eased two cents this morning to US$101.16 a barrel. Spot gold was 70 cents stronger at US$1,252.60 an ounce. The dollar was buying 90.94 US cents.



Crazy week, with these erratic swings suggesting total confusion about where the market is going next. The XJO daily chart seems to be pointing towards a basing pattern but nothing would surprise from here. With a three-week personal holiday looming, I started the day with two incompatible objectives: to make bucketloads of money while running absolutely no risk of getting stuck with a new position. Yeah, that was never going to work. The result was a morning spent mostly twiddling my thumbs. Eventually dipped a toe in CPL when it reached support.