The 10 Best Random Trading Strategies

SAN FRANCISCO (MarketWatch) — S&P downgrade. Risk off. Hurricane Irene. Risk on. Obama’s next speech. Risk off. German court ruling. Risk on. Italian austerity? You’ve got to be kidding.

The markets are moving so fast these days that fundamentals are out the window and meaningless grasping at headlines is the only hope for investors to avoid the coming global economic train wreck. Which makes it a great time to be in the headline business. Unless you have to rank them. 

[7]. A paralyzed President faces a hostile nation with nothing more than a warmed-over stimulus plan and an oratorical insistency that has long since triggered the automatic mute button. Risk on. Dow industrials average rises 276 points. 

[2]. A well-baked Lothario thumbs his nose at Europe while playing politics with an austerity plan that’s the only hope of dragging Italy out of a widening chasm dubbed Lehman 2. Risk off. Markets plunge. A week later, the Italian parliament passes said plan with almost no teeth in it whatsoever. Risk on. There will be another one soon enough. 

[10]. A revered central bank turns its back on global markets and institutes a rigid currency floor against the euro in a desperate attempt to save itself from being dragged into recession by the popularity of its currency, the Swiss franc. Risk off. Nobody likes a currency war. 

[5]. Comment on Swiss National Bank move from Maurice Pomery, chief executive of Strategic Alpha, speaking to the Financial Times. “After currency wars come trade wars, and as we see the exporting world pressured, as the developed world contracts, tensions will rise.” Risk off. Great Depression redux, anyone? 

[8]. Gold falls $50. Risk on. Forget precious metals or the Swiss franc. The Norwegian krone is the new global safe haven. The downside is they only come in coins, and you have to take delivery. 

[3]. The markets are so bad, and Fed chief Ben Bernanke so unwilling to flood the financial industry with a third round of bond-buying, that investors are looking to emerging markets, such as Brazil, for badly needed liquidity to keep them afloat. Everybody now in unison with Roy Scheider: “I think we’re gonna need a bigger boat.” See MarketWatch story on hopes for emerging markets rate cuts. Risk off. 

[1]. The trigger to the collapse of Europe, the global financial system and capitalism as we know it lies with the financial stocks. Heads they lead us out of purgatory into a new, frenzied era of profits, housing bonuses and derivative trading products. Tails we look back fondly on the collapse of Lehman. Place your bets. Risk on.

[9]. Forget Greece. There’s a mergers-and-acquisitions boom coming in the tech sector as the doors to tens of billions of dollars of corporate cash hoards are thrown open to spend on buying Yahoo YHOO +3.38% , Hewlett-Packard HPQ -0.12% , Research in Motion RIMM -0.66% , Netflix NFLX -1.59% , and AOL AOL +0.96%  at crazy cheap prices. In the end, there is only Zynga, and we are all merely characters in its Animal Farm game. Risk on. 

[6]. When investors do return to fundamentals, and they always do, they will find the bond bubble still there and Treasuries will be the last place to be, as yields leap and China cashes in some chips. Stocks, overlooked now for more than a decade, will finally attract attention again and the dollar will trend shift back into its traditional reserve currency role. Companies will start hiring again and someone will offer to buy your house. Risk off. Hope is not an investment strategy, as they say. 

[4]. Buy-and-hold is not dead. It’s just not fun, as proven by its performance since 9/11 a decade ago. But considering what everybody was thinking about the future after Sept. 11, 2001, it hasn’t been the worst investment plan either. Afghan heroin poppies? Now those were a bad investment. Risk on. 

By David Callaway is editor-in-chief of MarketWatch.

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Perang Mata Uang, Segera di Mulai

Semua terhenyak melihat pergerakan market saat itu. Selasa sore (06/09) Tidak semua Trader siap dan mampu mengantisipasi pergerakan harga yang tiba tiba bergerak liar satu arah dan meninggalkan jauh hampir  seribuan poin dari posisinya semula. Genderang perang mata uang (currency war) sepertinya mulai ditabuh setelah bank sentral Swiss mematok nilai tukar mata uangnya untuk pertama kali sejak 1978. Negara-negara seperti Jepang, Swedia dan Norwegia kini kebakaran jenggot akibat keputusan Swiss National Bank tersebut.

Swiss National Bank telah menetapkan batas minimum nilai tukar franc terhadap euro sebesar 1,20 franc untuk mempertahankan laju pertumbuhan ekonomi negerinya. Bank sentral Swiss ini juga siap memborong mata uang asing dengan dana tak terbatas untuk mengontrol penguatan franc. 

Franc memang telah menguat tajam seiring investor memburunya sebagai safe haven. Nilai tukar franc telah menguat sebesar 8,4% terhadap uero pada pukul 17.15 waktu London menjadi sebesar 1,203 per euro. Penguatan ini merupakan yang terbesar sejak Uni Eropa memberlakukan mata uang tunggal.

Analis menilai, keputusan Swiss National Bank ini akan mendorong investor memburu mata uang lainnya yang lebih menguntungkan. Salah satunya adalah yen. Yen merupakan mata uang save haven kedua setelah franc. "Jadi sangat mungkin yen akan menarik para pembeli untuk menghindari risiko," kata ekonom Meiji Yasuda Life Insurance Yuichi Kodama.

Bila ini terjadi, perekonomian Jepang bakal sedikit lagi ke jurang resesi. Sebab, selama ini penguatan yen telah menggerus nilai ekspor Jepang. Penguatan yen itu membuat ekspor Jepang tidak kompetitif bila dibandingkan China, Korea Selatan dan negara lainnya.

Menteri Keuangan Jepang Jun Azumi telah mengingatkan, keputusan bank sentral Swiss itu akan membahayakan nilai tukar yen. Dia membawa masalah ini dalam pertemuan G-7 pada 9-10 September mendatang di Marseille, Prancis

Karena itu, petinggi Bank of Japan (BOJ) segera menggelar rapat pasca kebijakan Swiss National Bank itu. Selama ini BOJ telah berusaha menahan penguatan yen dengan melakukan intervensi ke pasar. Catatan saja, BOJ telah menggelontorkan dana sebesar US$ 58 miliar untuk menjaga nilai tukar yen. Dana moneter ini merupakan yang terbesar sejak 2004 silam.

Kepala ekonom NLI Research Institute Koichi Haji memperkirakan, BOJ akan bertindak bersama pemerintah Jepang untuk mengintervensi penguatan yen. "Karena selama ini tindakan yang dilakukan BOJ sendirian tidak berefek pada pasar dan ekonomi Jepang," katanya.

Bila Jepang juga mengikuti langkah Swiss, analis memperkirakan, posisi Norwegia dan Swedia bakal menjadi rentan. Foreign Exchange Strategist UBS AG Geoffrey Yu mengatakan, investor akan menyerbu mata uang Swedia dan Norwegia sebagai alternatif investasi.

Dia memperkirakan, pemerintah Norwegia dan Swedia tentu tidak akan tinggal diam. Namun, "Seberapa lama ekonomi lokal toleransi terhadap penguatan mata uangnya," tanyanya.

Berdasarkan indeks korelasi Bloomberg, Krone telah menguat 4,5% terhadap sembilan mata uang pasangannya. Pemerintah Norwegia sendiri telah memberi sinyal akan membendung penguatan mata uangnya yang bisa menggerus nilai ekspor dan tampaknya perang mata uang ronde kedua bakal terjadi.

Media Pontianak/Kontan

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Gold Rebound

NEW YORK (MarketWatch) — Does gold’s bounce-back vindicate the bugs? They say yes!

At the CME floor close on Friday, the December gold contact GC1Z +1.89%  was up $47.80 or 2.53% on the day, and $79.60 or 4.3% on the week. It had broken out of a sideways pattern which had held since early Tuesday morning and was $170.80 or 10% higher than the low seen during the previous week’s dramatic sell-off. 

And gold went higher in electronic aftermarket on Friday afternoon. On a weekly settlement basis, this close was a record. 

Gold shares celebrated: The NYSE Arca Gold Bugs Index XX:HUI +2.39%  closed at a record high, as did the large-cap gold share Market Vectors ETF Trust Market Vectors Gold Miners GDX +2.49%  .

However, this is less impressive than it sounds. There has been little advance from the previous phase of strength in early April, although gold itself is 30% higher. What happened to the famed leverage of gold shares? 

Still, long time followers of gold are feeling pretty cheerful. Indeed, the normally understated Australian commentator who edits The Privateer was positively triumphant this weekend: “The gold price is almost all the way up to the top of its bull-market channel again. If it keeps going up from here and breaches that channel (goes above it), then there is absolutely no telling how high it could go.” 

Privateer added, characteristically: “Of course, the powers that be know that. They will not ‘let it go’ without a fight. Another and bigger margin hike by the CME is possible, indeed it is likely. Don’t forget, it took at least four margin hikes to stall silver short of the $50 level at the end of April.” 

“But in the larger scheme of things, all that is irrelevant. It is achingly obvious that gold is now the premier CURRENCY in the world as far as the global markets are concerned. Not even the Swiss franc can keep up with it.” 

Part of the reason for this confidence: It is now very well known that the fourth quarter is the season of high demand from the major gold-consuming markets, particularly India.

The ever-informative Edel Tully at UBS noted on Friday morning: “Our historical physical sales to India ... data for the last three years shows that demand typically accelerates in the last four and five months of the year, with Q4 volumes between 150% and 65% higher than Q1 and Q2 respective levels.”

With gold shares lagging the metal so much, and for so many weeks, there is an obvious possibility of a dramatic catch-up play, even if gold merely sustains these levels. 

That is why this week’s gold-share action was so delightedly scrutinized by several observers.

The author of Trader Dan’s Market Views was emphatic on Friday: “Note that the HUI has smashed, and I do mean ‘smashed’ through overhead resistance near 610 and is charging higher. … I do find it very telling that the mining sector shattered upside chart resistance on a day in which the broader stock markets are cratering.” 

Over at JSMineSet, veteran gold hand Jim Sinclair the previous evening endorsed a bullish but complex gold-share chart study by one of his contributors, saying he was “... spot on. There is a quiet but definitive technical turn taking place in the group.”

Long-term chartist Martin Pring had the same thought in his Monthly, published this weekend: “The Gold Miners ETF, the GDX, has been lagging the metal quite badly. However, it looks as though it may be in the process of breaking to the upside. …The relative action of the GDX against the S&P500 Index SPX -2.53%  also looks to be positive.” 

Maybe gold shares, more than gold, will be Q4’s stars.

 

By Peter Brimelow, MarketWatch

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