April 11

Nasdaq Composite: +29.27 to close out at 2351.70
S&P600 (Smallcap Index) +3.53, closing at 373.53
Nasdaq Market Volume of 2.13 Billion shares, an increase of 17% vs. Wednesday
NYSE Market Volume of 1.228 Billion shares, up 8%.

New Highs on the NYSE came in at 37 vs. 40 new lows, although over in Nasdaq'svill the figure was not so pretty with 12 new highs being made and 93 new highs being made.

Markets opened on Thursday with a good deal of bad news, certainly enough that even just one week ago the indexes would have been sent tumbling. Oil is back over $110 per barrel, and it looks likely to settle in the $80 to $120 range for quit some time to come. UPS came out with bad news, and predictably they placed the blame right at the foot of higher energy costs. This did lead to a good number of Transportation stocks, both Truckers and Rails having a less then stellar day. Novellus (Nasdaq: NVLS) came out and said things are getting worse with new end in sight: What did the broad based semi-conductor do? It rallied, a decent rally even..this coming from one of the markets weakest overall sectors as of late. The Dollar is crashing and CNBC has even started to bring people on the network to remind us all how bad the great depression was ( I remember the great depression too, I once told my mom I didnt have to eat the Sh** she cooked, and so I was grounded to my bedroom for 10 days with nothing in there but a book, a pencil and paper...Now THAT is the depression!) and that the next one is just around the corner. We can of course take relief in the fact that the Great Depression Guru's CNBC keeps bringing out are the same idiots who have stayed bearish since the 1907 Financial meltdown almost destroyed American's young financial system.

So, in a nutshell here is what we see: The market is getting hammered, I mean pounded like my older brothers used to pound me, every single day with this company or groups bad news, or this jackass self important idiot in Washington thinking he's gonna fix the system. Overall the market has had very little but bad news through its way, but somehow it has managed to hold together very well: Not that it has gone up much, but most important is that it has not really gone down at all. A weak market, or even an average market, would have been beaten silly buy all this news, yet here we are. Now, I know a lot of people like to argue with the market: “You idiots, can't you see that all the numbers are coming out bad? Cant you see that the Fed has lost control of their mandate and they are printing dollars like they are Reichmarc's. Can't you see? You people are fools!!!”. Now you may ask how I'm so familiar with that psychosis, and the truthful answer is that I've been afflicted by it myself In the past.

Right now though I think that the market is speaking to us, and hat it might be saying is that its stronger than every one things it is. A few stocks you may want to watch on the long side LUV, RIMM, RIO, HAL (only on a pullback), CHK, EWZ, BA, PCU. The next group are all oils and steel stocks which need to pullback first in order to get a decent entry: APA (A note of disclosure I was in Toni Hansen's Free Mainstreet chatroom on April 2nd , gave the idea to the group and took it myself. I'm still long some APA from $120.35, in this case I will be looking to add exposure rather then to take on new exposure with this stock, in any even a pullback will present a nice opportunity IMO). Also on the list of stocks needing pullbacks NBL, MT, X. On the short side of the market there are fewer setups then I had thought we might have, but in particular WM, SIVA, PFE, GM and RF.

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