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David Fry
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David Fry writes a subscription newsletter focused on technical analysis of exchange-traded funds, called ETF Digest (www.etfdigest.com). Dave founded the ETF Digest in 2001 and was among the very first to see the need for a publication that provided individual investors with information and... More
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  • NEFARIOUS ALGOS STOMP MARKETS 2 comments
    Feb 29, 2012 7:41 PM | about stocks: SPY, IWM, QQQ, QQEW, AAPL, XLK, RYT, TOL, ITB, JPM, KBE, XLF, XLB, XRT, IEF, TLT, LQD, HYG, EMB, UUP, FXE, GLD, GDX, SLV, JJC, DJP, USO, XLE, JJG, EFA, EEM, EWJ, EWG, EWU, EWY, EWZ, RSX, EPI

    The big story Wednesday was a "bear raid". It began with what some initially referred to as either a mistake ("fat fingered") with unusually large selling of Treasury futures contracts (over 100K contracts in one trade). The trade, later described as legitimate (see WSJ story) was based on the idea Bernanke would take QE3 off the table sending interest rates higher. The size of these trades created a domino effect triggering heavy selling in commodity markets, especially with precious metals which are also on an options expiration cycle.

    Much of the related selling was triggered by HFT algos piling headlines with selling. It's also been common the past couple of years now to see some deliberate manipulation of prices by a handful of institutions in precious metals markets at the futures and options exchanges. Gold prices fell over 5% and silver almost 7% as trailing stops were triggered. These have been termed "bear raids" by most participants. It makes being involved in these markets like swimming with sharks.

    <READ MORE>

    Stocks: SPY, IWM, QQQ, QQEW, AAPL, XLK, RYT, TOL, ITB, JPM, KBE, XLF, XLB, XRT, IEF, TLT, LQD, HYG, EMB, UUP, FXE, GLD, GDX, SLV, JJC, DJP, USO, XLE, JJG, EFA, EEM, EWJ, EWG, EWU, EWY, EWZ, RSX, EPI
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  •  
    So what does this mean for SLV? Is this sell-off a brief one or two day event ?....and will SLV soon recover today's loss in a couple of days?.....or can we expect a lot more selloff pain?
    29 Feb 2012, 08:56 PM Reply Like
  •  
    Being in APPL, SIRI, and SLV has been quite an education in the dynamics of the free, efficient market. LOL
    1 Mar 2012, 09:30 AM Reply Like
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