no i didnt do anything. all i succeeded in doing was convincing my wife that i dont need her exclusive ok in order to change around our portfolio. which is pretty major.

the main thing i wanted to do was switch out of conservative-mode into day-trader-mode to avoid some of the initial downswing. one particular stock that we have carried for awhile, GNW, is extremely volatile, and generally speaking, when the market goes down 1%, GNW will drop 5%, and when the market goes up 1%, GNW shoots up 5%. im still convinced theres some underhanded manipulation going on with that stock, due to its constant top standing on highest volume of trading. anyways, i believe in the company, and believe it is going in a good direction and will recover itself to the $20+ level in a few years.

anyways, leading up to this past week, weve had that stock for about a year, bought in around $12 i think. it went up it went down. but my wife is more keyed up on the whole, you must own a stock for at least a year so you can dodge the taxes on it. while im like eff the taxes, if we hold on to it for this week instead of selloff-now-and-rebuy-in-5-days, we will save ourselves way much more than wed save ourselves from taxes.

so i wanted to selloff GNW in particular when the AA+ news came out. and then rebuy after it had its initial dropoff. turns out we woulda saved about $1/share if i had done that instead of wait for my wife's approval. ohwell. no way am i selling it off now, as i think it will go up in value for awhile now.

basically, i want to daytrade more, but not become OCD about it, just daytrade whenever 1) the market will obv tank for a day or two, or 2) GNW just underperformed their quarterly, which always results in a bad day.

sorry for the tldr

take a look at TNA. its 3x Rut2000 Bull liquid cocaine

I used to trade TNA; it's definitely volatile.

lol at Europe contemplating a short-sale ban:

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/08/12/business/global/europe-considers-ban-on-short-selling.html?_r=4&ref=business

This is sooooo stupid. Only a politician would come up with this kinda stupid idea. "Hmmm stocks dropping is bad for my career; Ding! I know! I'll make it illegal to sell stocks. Brilliant!"

The USA tried this and it only made the market more nuts.

"Govt is the shadow cast upon society by business"
------------------------------Noam Chomsky


be careful on that TNA. DC is right about it being volatile. I suggest, which is totally illegal, that you approach TNA with a call calendar using options.

"When To Use Calendar Call Spread?
One should use a Calendar Call Spread when one wishes to profit from an underlying asset that is expected to stay stagnant or within a tight price range and also wishes to keep a long term call position for if the stock breaks out in future."

http://www.optiontradingpedia.com/free_calendar_call_spread.htm

Sell the Aug 47 @ 2.50
Buy the Jan12 50 @ 9

Total Risk : $650/contract

try 10 Contracts and sit tight. You would have till Jan 19 2012 before your long contract would expire. If we do move lower in the short term, sell a Sept call and lower your risk. The key is where your Jan12 call is come January.

Like all speculative investments there is risk and you could lose money. Consult DC or consider your risk tolerance when investing through options.

Personally I would stay away from options unless you are willing to lose some money learning by trial and error.

I tend to be somewhere between noob and intermediate in options. I only really use them to gain leverage on a position without having to devote cash.

dont be a pussy deadcode. i thought you were smart

i love how after 4000 years of governments, markets, values, gold is the keystone, what the hell is wrong with us?

secondly, I believe it was Condoleezza Rice who exited as the Secretary of State saying

" It's kind of ironic, Thomas Jefferson came in worried about pirates, it looks like I'm going to leave, worried about pirates. But, it is seriously an important issue to maintain freedom of navigation of the seas. And some of it of course, comes - most of it comes from the instability in Somalia, so that is also an issue that we're spending a lot of time on."

I guess the lesson here is that we should all invest and act like historical figures, and buy like the Romans!

I'm a pussy when it comes to Option trading.

Recently I tend to trade leveraged index's (tna, ugl, agq, dig) using principle + margin with tight stop-losses. Then I use TA to choose good entry points where I expect running room.

Either I lose 2-3% (my stop loss) or I gain +6%.

Yeah wishbone it is funny how it works out like that. There are a number of reasons Gold ends up being the best store of value (currency-wise) though. Limited supply (you can't print it); deposits are evenly dispersed around the world (no one can own it all); has uses in industry, science, etc (it is unaffected by changes in the economy; for the most part). This and other qualities all come together to create a relatively stable value.

And by best; I mean best at holding it's value.