Although this site is about 'Trading The SPI', there are other 'futures' type opportunities in the Australian Market.

With the popularity of Spread Betting, 'futures' like positions (that is short term highly geared positions),

can be taken in most of the Top 200 Australian shares. Rather than solely focusing on the SPI and missing

out on these opportunities, I will start to identify some of these other opportunities on these pages.

Date

 Comments

25/07/2007

The Hourly SPI chart of the last few sessions is below.

Although getting hit pretty hard today, on the back of large falls on Wall Street, the Stochastics has now turned up and is approaching -40 from the downside and the momentum is just about to cross zero - both bullish signs on a short term basis.

20/07/2007

We saw prices break through and close at a high on the XJO cash index today (although we've seen a slightly higher intra-day high).

The SPI pushed higher as well, although hasn't quite broken out of the trading range of the last 10 days.

With a bullish looking Wall Street, hopefully the US will put on a strong showing overnight to help us push higher on Monday a break past 6450.

Hourly SPI Chart

19/07/2007

We've had a few consolidation zones since the last chart I posted.

We're headed back up to highs and I'm thinking that this time we should break through.

Despite the SPI's choppy behaviour, my share positions are holding up well and should benefit from new highs on the SPI.

Hourly SPI Chart

13/07/2007

We had a strong swing up today (the cash actually made a new intraday high), thanks to Wall Street's 2% rise overnight.

The hourly SPI chart is below and things look good for more highs next week. Hopefully, Wall Street will continue tonight and help us higher next week.

Hourly SPI Chart

11/07/2007

With the SPI much weaker at the start of yesterdays night session, due to falls on Wall Street, I was wondering where this would leave my spread bets on shares.

Interestingly, all were in tacked and looking ok at this mornings open.

What I've realised is that when trading the SPI, stops are actually really tight - in % terms. A 50 point stop (if the SPI was 6300) is only about 0.8%.

But, with spread bets on shares, the stops are typically around 7-8% - because you have to place a reasonable stop when you place the bet.

Of my open positions, this is how the underlying cash prices faired today, despite a fall in the XJO which was down 36.40:

MIN: +0.03 (at high of the day)

MAH: +0.005 (wide range day, but closed just over half way up in daily range)

RIV: +0.05 (made a new high of 3.70 before coming off a little)

WTP: +0.04 (at high of the day)

Basically, if the market takes a temporary dip, often SPI positions are stopped out. But with shares, there's enough room for the dip and the position to stay in tacked. In fact, shares that are in strong trends seem less effected than the main index. Today the XJO was down but the 4 positions I have open were up.

10/07/2007

Unfortunately, I was stopped out of my position in PMM today after some fairly quick gains - the Sep 07 price peaked at just over 1200 yesterday, so around 100 points (cents). Fortunately though, I've been moving my stops up and I was stopped out with a marginal profit after covering costs and dealing spreads. Prices bounced back later today, but if you look at the chart it's getting too volatile for my liking.

With the capital I protected on the PMM trade, I opened a position in another share I like the look of, RIV - Riversdale Mining. Similar to the others, it's in a strong uptrend, so I think it's in a good position to continue up, as I believe the market will push higher soon.

RIV Daily Chart

Here's the SPI for today. Stochastics is below -40 and momentum oversold, so we could move higher from here.

Wall Street is looking like it may move to new highs, so I'd expect we will follow the US action.

SPI Daily Chart

09/07/2007

My next two share trades as as follows:

WTP - Watpac Ltd. This share is in a long term bull trend and with the SPI moving higher, it should hopefully progress even higher.

WTP Daily Chart

MAH - Macmahom Holdings. Another strong bull trend that jumped higher today. I'm expecting higher prices as the overall market moves up.

MAH Daily Chart

08/07/2007

One point to note about the shares I've posted (and futures ones too) is that I'm trading using spread betting that offers 'futures' type contracts. For PMM and MIN below, I've used the Sep 07 spread betting contract.

Like real SPI futures contacts, the price isn't the same as the underlying 'cash' market, because it's the price the market makers think the share will be by the Sep 07 expiry.

For example, at Friday close PMM Sep 07 was quoted at 11.17 - the cash was 11.00. Similarly, MIN Sep 07 closed at 3.72 and the cash at 3.64.

The higher prices of the Sep 07 contracts reflect that the market makers think the price of the shares will be higher by the Sep 07 expiry (this is normal since over time the market tends to rise). These prices will also change with the expectation of the general market movement in the current or following trading session or other considerations.

I normally trade contracts that are a few months until expiry, so  don't have to roll into the next contract, adjust stops and/or pay additional fees.

The main point to note is that if you compare these share charts to a cash chart, these prices will be slightly higher - however, the price movements and trends are pretty much identical.

06/07/2007

MIN - Mineral Resources is another opportunity.

Again, this share is in a steep long term up trend (last 6 months data on daily chart below). It has outperformed the XJO Cash Index by 90% in the last 6 months and hasn't seen at many setbacks as the SPI in recent weeks.

I bought at the blue line with a stop at the red.

MIN Daily Chart

This is today's SPI chart. The Stochastics has turned up and the momentum is about to cross zero so these are bullish signs.

SPI Hourly Chart

04/07/2007

PMM - Portman Ltd is the first share I'll look at.

There is no doubt that PMM is in a bull run (see chart below). Even the recent setbacks in the SPI haven't dented the trend.

I like this share not only because of the strong trend, but because the share price is fairly stable.

With the SPI, because so many traders focus on it and it's influenced overnight by other markets, it's very volatile.

PMM is slower moving, in a strong trend and using spread betting a similar 'futures' type trade can be made.

Spread Betting firms will often quote on the End of Day prices as well as Quarterly (like the SPI - March, June, September and December prices).

I bought PMM yesterday where the blue line is on the chart below, with a stop at the red line. The green line indicates an area of support/resistance and prices should hold above this.

Trading with shares like this, it should be possible to build up a portfolio of geared positions on slower moving shares, with a weeks/months time horizon - hopefully, with the added benefit of not being stopped out too often due to volatile prices.

The theory I'm following is that in the Top 200 shares, some shares are in up trends, some in down trends and some sideways moving. When the overall market is trending up, trade in the up trending shares. When the overall market is trending down, trade in the down trending shares and when the market is moving sideways, review positions or take profits and take a break from trading.

When the longer term trend in the SPI turns down, I've got a few shares in mind that are in long term downtrends, that could prove profitable.

PMM Daily Chart