BSE Sensex - Sideways Susie !

BSE Sensex: The above chart clearly shows the Sensex has drifted into a sideways pattern after the initial advance from the breakout zone. Immediate resistance is present at the 28500 levels while the support zone marked earlier has held out at the 27400-27500 levels. Sooner or later a move out of this sideways pattern will occur. Watch and trade accordingly!

Flied Lice anyone ?!!

Check out the charts via the link below.

Chinese Markets Chart Snapshots

Take the world’s largest populated country, open a stock exchange, ensure that a majority of the companies are owned by the state, add to the excitement by making sure that only a 1/3^rd of the total listed shares are free float (means public can buy/sell freely). Now add fuel to the fire with the abundant financing options for stock market transactions – margin financing. Oh, and I almost forgot a majority of the folks who dabble in Chinese markets are below the age of 35 – meaning still learning! Ouch!

So you have a LOT of young/inexperienced people chasing very FEW stocks with a LOT of cheap money!!  

As long as the market is up all is well, but the moment markets head south it turns into a bloody stampede. As is evident from the recent events unfolding in the Chinese stock markets. 

Knee f***ing hao folks! Welcome to the party and please bring some “flied lice”!! mwahahah….

 

Global Booze Stats !

Take a look at the above chart. It looks like there is a big chunk of market yet to be tapped in India & China. So now you know, which stock to buy on the next major correction?!

Market Updates...

Its time to eat humble pie?! not clear yet. But looks like a sharper pullback within the bullish trend than earlier imagined. 

BSE Sensex: With the derivatives settlement approaching in a couple of days, there is a strong chance that this fall might be bought into and overall the markets turn sideways. Supports exist at 27600 odd levels.

Shanghai: After the crash down to 3500 levels last month(where there is ample support) the index did bounce back and is now retesting supports to confirm that the crash is indeed over. Situation is still unfolding though hence a little bit of wait and watch to confirm the trend is in order.

Dax: A case of a stronger than anticipated pullback within the bullish uptrend. Has a couple of decent gap-up support levels approaching at 11000-11150 levels which could prove to be the trend decider.

Dow Jones: Is back down to its 200-DMA with 4-5 days of straight decline. Could be oversold on the short-time frame charts. Cluster of tops around 18100-18300 range needs to expand though for some comfort on the medium term time frame. 

Will keep updating as the situation unfolds. Traders would do well to absorb their stop losses and look for opportunities to re-enter.

Au Revoir - performance appraisals as we knew it !

 

 

 

http://wapo.st/1gMZZw5

The above is the link to a 1 minute video on the Washington Post, in which the CEO of Accenture speaks about how his firm is doing away with the traditional performance appraisal process.

Sounds intriguing for sure. I found out that Deloitte has also gone ahead and junked its performance appraisal process and settled for a simpler "4-questions format" to judge its employees. Here are the 4 questions that Deloitte thinks are pertinent for this process;

1. Given what I know of this person’s performance, and if it were my money, I would award this person the highest possible compensation increase and bonus. 

2. Given what I know of this person’s performance, I would always want him or her on my team.

3. This person is at risk for low performance.

4. This person is ready for promotion today.

 

The conspiracy theorists would say, "these guys are brilliant, they just cooked up another way to earn money because now they will have to help thousands of companies worldwide on how to adminster and manage the new performance appraisal process"!! hehehehe.

Or it could be simply them trying to avoid thousands of hours lost in the performance appraisal process not to mention the unproductive unbillable hours (or do they bill them still to some hapless client?!) heheheh..

Too early to say but i like the 4-question format of Deloitte. Keep an eye out for this to hit a company near you soon! cheers....

Jio aur Jeene Do !!

The above chart of Reliance Industries clearly shows the stellar runup from the sub-800 levels recorded in April 2015. It was a screaming buy at that point and has more than justified its presence in a model portfolio.

Having gained over 25% in a space of only 4 months and with its quarterly numbers also out, what’s in store for the stock? Here are my observations on that;

1)      Given the sharp nature of the rally, it’s quite obvious that short-term and derivatives traders should unwind their long positions or atleast hedge fully with ATM put options.

2)      Technically speaking, the stock has arrived at a point where it should find reasonable resistance to its immediate upmoves. The next week could see some sort of a sideways to a mildly downward reaction, if that happens, the low of the week should be used as a stop loss for long positions. On the upside, further rallies can be had only upon convincing crossover of the 1050-1060 levels with greater volumes.

3)       An intermediate term target of Rs.1350-1400 range appears achievable by March 2016.

Hey, let's start a hedge fund !!

The above picture is of one of the coolest chaps from the hedge fund industry in the US - George Zweig, who worked with the much admired hedge fund "Renaissance Technologies LLC". After he left Renaissance about 5 years ago, he is now at the age of 78 starting off a hedge fund by the name of "Signition" ( Signal and Recognition are the words mashed in there!) with a couple of other partners who are about half his age!
The following lines from his interview to WSJ caught my attention,
1)  " I've still got it" and 2) "life can be very boring without work"

lol... So true. For those who have never invested (let alone dabble in hedge funds) in the financial markets, starting a hedge fund at age 78 is a task that no sane man would like to attempt, especially after having set a good track record in the years before - check this out,

" Launching a new hedge fund is the latest of multiple reinventions for Mr. Zweig, born in Moscow to Jewish parents who emigrated to the U.S. shortly before World War II. He grew up in Detroit and earned a Ph.D. in theoretical physics from the California Institute of Technology.
Work he and another scientist conducted independently of each other suggested that protons and neutrons are made up of smaller particles known as “quarks.” The 1964 finding was initially dismissed by other scientists. but quarks have since come to be known as a fundamental building block of matter.
Mr. Zweig later migrated to government and academic projects that involved the search for signals amid noise.
He was one of a handful of academics to propose a system designed to stop the flow of troops and materials from North to South Vietnam by creating an electronic barrier consisting of sensors and mines. He eventually left the project amid his opposition to the war.
While teaching at CalTech he helped invent the algorithm that underpins cochlear hearing implants, electronic devices that can provide a sense of sound to the deaf. He also founded a company that leased software to the National Security Agency.  "

hmmmm.. So what on earth is Ol' Georgie trying to do? (My disclosure i am listening to the "Ghani Bawri" track from tanu weds manu returns while typing this out! check that out too...)