Clear Trades

Bought 270 shares of the FAS (FINANCIAL BULL 3X) at 4.90 per share.

Buy, FAS

I bought 500 shares of Citigroup (C) this morning, purely as a speculation of course. I didn’t read the news as being quite so bad as the stock seemed to show with its reaction, but I’ll be keeping a tight stop on this as I certainly can’t say I have much hope in a company like Citigroup.

Buy, C

I bought 300 shares of Bank of America (BAC) at 5.60 per share this morning.

I set a stop loss order at 5.32. The reason for this stop loss is to limit my potential loss to 2% of my trading capital.

I don’t have a clear plan for when to sell, which is a problem, but I’ll probably begin looking to sell at 5.80 and/or simply continue to raise my stop order if the chart continues to look positive today.

Below is today’s chart up to the point that I entered my trade (the green arrow at 11:44 AM). You can see this doesn’t look like a very positive time to buy, but I expected some support around 5.60.

Below is a 5 day, 15 minute chart of BAC. Again, note the green arrow as the point I entered this trade. I was looking for the pullback to the moving average and expecting the trend to continue up. Obviously, I’m not a technical analyst, but I’m learning and these are my basic thoughts as of now. Of course, I also have in mind the general positive trend for financials this week and even more so today.

BAC, Buy

This was a quick buy that I made while watching the Bernanke hearing on CNBC. The bank stress test sounded a lot less ominous than I believe was previously thought. That made me think BAC would be good for a quick trade.

BAC, Buy

After realizing lots of losses, this is my hope for salvation. At 2.01 per share this just looks too cheap too me and I think we are closer to getting good news in the Financial sector than we are more bad news.

This purchase gives me a total of 2,350 shares of UYG at an average price per share of 2.30.

Buy, UYG

Bought 100 shares of SSO in After-Hours trading at 19.92 per share.

I guess you could say I’m averaging down here. I think the short-term trend still feels relatively bad, but I really don’t think we are going to go much lower. I think SSO under 20 is a good opportunity for decent gains over the next couple of weeks.

This brings my current long position in SSO to 200 shares at an average price of 21.35.

Buy, SSO

I’m going long GE (General Electric) for the dividend and for a short term trade. Like most things today, I think the drop is an over-reaction and I expect to see this come back soon. The dividend yield isn’t bad either…assuming they pay it of course.

Buy, GE

I bought another 750 shares of UYG (Ultra Financials ProShares) at 2.61 this morning.

I still want to reduce my exposure to the Financial Sector, but the selloff this morning didn’t make any sense to me so I thought it would be a chance to lower my cost basis on the UYG. I don’t want to be in this for long and I’m hoping to trade out of it soon.

This purchase gives me a total of 950 shares of UYG at an average price per share of 2.71.

Buy, UYG

Went long 150 shares of Barclays PLC (BCS) at 6.57.

I think BCS is one of the safer Financials to hold right now and I thought I was getting in at a good time on the price. Unfortunately, it continued to dip further after the Geithner debacle, but I still feel confident at least over the short term holding BCS.

BCS, Buy

Went long 200 shares of XLF (Financial Select Sector SPDR) at 9.50.

The XLF is a Financial Sector ETF. I already hold some shares of the UYG, which is another Financial Sector ETF, but I now plan to send more money to the XLF instead.

I bought today because the price dipped (though I could have waited a bit longer for the aftermath of the Geithner debacle). I plan to replace my individual bank holdings, such as BAC, over time to lower my exposure to individual banks, though I remain bullish on the Financials and I will seek to diversify by holding ETFs instead.

Buy, XLF