As we enter the official beginning of summer, it’s hardly surprising to see us priced at the middle of what could be our range for the next six to twelve weeks.  Most of my positions discussed in the iBC forum are swings with the occasional multi-quarter hold.  Therefore the daily candle chart is my primary focus when trading.

Taking a look at the SPY daily, there are several reference points suggesting range bound sideways action:

The QQQ’s have the same look.  So if you share the sentiment that we’re range bound you have a few positioning choices:

1. Cash – spend your time building watch lists or perhaps ignoring the market entirely
2. One Direction (no homo band) – Enjoy gut wrenching doubt at opposite range extremes
3. Mixed bag – perhaps a slight directional bias, but hedged and with some cabbage on hand (my favorite)

The thing about a range is it eventually ends, and often in a violent manner.  It’s fun like most forms of violence.  I think the range eventually ends to the upside.  Therefore I am keeping a long bias via my favorite tech/mobile names TRIP, ADS, YELP, OPEN, P, and (sigh) GSVC.  Weighting is in order of listing.

I’m playing the downside (hedging) via short the Euro dollar using EUO.  As chess has been discussing, the Euro is considered a risk currency.  I could go long US dollars and have similar positioning, but I figure the butt fuckers in Europe give the hedge a bit more downside spice potential.

Finally I hold around 42% of my portfolio in cash and AWK.  I pool the two together, and this may be unwise, but I don’t expect much of anything from AWK except its coupon and I always add some more when the weekly chart gets oversold.  My current basis in the shares is $26.00

The plan is to ride out the summer, be ahead of the herd when we bust ahead, and bank a few percentages in the meantime.  Simple.

Care to share your positioning? I’d love to hear.

Also, it’s all about the summer chic pool party music on Songza:

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I promise you radio is big business.  It’s a big business being invaded by Martians.  The push made by Pandora sent shockwaves.  They made streaming radio work.  People like it.  I think it’s safe to say they’re executing their business plan well, and profits are soon to follow.  This I don’t doubt one bit.  This is why Spotify and the gang are all clamoring to catch up, they smell opportunity.  And being little dogs , they make so much fucking noise every time they take a nip at Pandora’s heels.  But that’s all they’re doing.  Or so I thought, until I streamed in Songza to the old iPhone.  Quickly, see this:

The above is data point 2.0, yes? It’s our way of gauging the competition in an otherwise murky environment. If you’re someone who enjoys music, give Songza a try and thank me later.

“BUT WHAT DOES THIS ALL MEAN AND WHAT ARE ITS IMPLICATIONS ON PANDORA STOCK?  We WANT STOCKS THAT BANK US COIN. GNAM GNAM!”  – Internet Cretin

When I saw the 109% two day review jump I could have liked to been sick.  I was holding around 15% of my risk assets in Pandora.  Since then I’ve gotten light for three reasons: QE mania, summer range, and Songza.  After tomorrow however, I’ll look to start building my position back because I THINK PANDORA HAS A GOOD QUARTER GOING AND THEY WILL FUCKING SMASH SKULLS RHINO STYLE.

Regarding price:

Ideally the stock never visits $10.00 again but if it does we need to see buying demand.  A loss of this level could damage many a bull’s fragile eggshell ego.  A hold above 10.50 tomorrow would be very bullish as would price holding above $11.50.  $11.20 has seen tons of fast moves around it and is a key hold also.  And clearly we need to break the fuck higher than the $12.50 outlier earnings pop.  I bet you want a chart, instead you get this:

Lest I not leave you song less!  That would hardly be apropos.  Enjoy some trill straight out the dirty dirty uugh:

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Summer trading ranges, god I love them.  Trading in the summer months truly is a feat of handling a double edged sword.  This is especially the case if you’re playing around with dynamite aka highly speculative spaces like mobile future stocks.  Today the market looks to have taken the penultimate step before leaping to the top of the range.

Explosive in nature, the penultimate step is used by competitive jumpers to fling the body to its final resting place, as far as possible.  The better the penultimate step, the longer the jump.  Today’s session was beautiful, but not perfect.  We closed off the highs and it may not propel us to the very top end.  Hence therefore hearto I’ve begun positioning for the top bracket and my expectation that it will prove resistant.

I started the day with Pandora being my largest position.  The trade was relatively easy to manage and was commentated all day over @twosmuth.  I took a ¼ scale at $11.37 but the position remains my largest holding.  Today also involved buying OPEN along with RaginCajun.  Healthy looking chart, hype to boot with iOS and Microsoft integration speculation, and a feeding ground for shorts.  Finally I initiated a position in EUO the ultrashort Euro ETF.  I liked the pull higher on the 6E after its beat down, and am using the position as a hedge against the rest of my portfolio.

In the past I’ve FM’d (failed miserably) attempting to hedge with UVXY, QID, and TZA.  Let’s hope my setup doesn’t go 0/4.  HOPA!

The following are my current holdings by weight: P, EUO, TRIP, ADS, YELP, OPEN, GSVC (lol), and NTAP.  40% cash and AWK.

Good day pen pals.  Let’s hit‘em again tomorrow,

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Santa Maria, I had a pleasant morning.  After my usual “commute from hell cattle corral” I poured a small cup of coffee.  After adding my usual dash of cinnamon I raise the Styrofoam cancer cup to my lips for my first surprise of the day, ice coffee.  Puke the hot plate wasn’t on.  My second surprise came from fucking Richard Greenfield over at BTIG.  He’s going around touting SONGZA and its potential to cripple Pandora.

At first I think no big fuggin’ deal right?  Spotify and Yahoo Radio and I <3 and them all circle jerk and suck, so what’s another sucky radio stream right?  Eh…no so much; it’s pretty great.  As good as, if not better than Pandora.  POOF!  Your bullshit moat has dried up.  I’ve been listening to it all day, banging out this bullshit paper-pushing project, when I started thinking about how much I’ve discussed Pandora in this open forum.  Two-three-fifteen times or so.  You’re all smart and up with the newest apps.  I know someone knew about SONGZA.  SOMEBODY…YOU!  Hook a player up, please.  Throw any insight my way.  Let’s talk about it.

Aside from these digressions, stocks went up today.  They can go up for several days, or down.  We’re range bound, that’s how it works.  Use the goalposts I laid out earlier this week and position yourself.  Or be a cool cat and let this turbulence give way to direction.

AND TELL ME NEXT TIME ONE OF MY INVESTENTS GETS BESTED!

How I will treat Pandora going forward:  It’s forming a head and shoulders on the daily chart and I’m looking for it to head fake lower then reverse and obliterate.  I’ll tighten my scales lower as I pretty much want to lessen my exposure in the name.  I want to hold a small piece through earnings as they appear to be executing their business plan very well.

The rest of my portfolio ripped, but it was all muted down to mere basis points by my largest position getting SONGZA’d.

Regards,

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I was having a relatively strong day until peaking and turning south about the end of #WWDC.  My technology portfolio held strong most of the day led by sleeper Pandora.  Their CEO is doing his best in DC to level the playing field for radio royalty costs.  Apparently his run at about 50% of revenue where satellite provider SIRI runs at around 7%.  Not much other big news out of the name but it displayed relative strength only to fade slightly into the close.

Beyond that we have exactly the type of gyrations one could come to expect from summer trading, what with its low volumes and young interns and news sensitivity.  My portfolio sits around 40% cash and AWK, with 60% allocated to the following names, by weight:

P, RAX, VHC, TRIP, ADS, YELP, GSVC, NTAP

The above theme is mobile-social interactions.  RAX was weaker than normal and I have a stop in place at $43.50 as I don’t intend on letting the name get away from me.  The bears remain at the reins on this one after a brief bounce last week.  It looks great on the weekly chart, but needs to recapture the $45.00 level which was the primary breakout at the beginning of this year.  Fly has the name on his avoid list until they produce better earnings and this, combined with its lack of bounce from support, has me keeping a tight leash on the name.

Everything was floating near unchanged during the session, even showing shades of green for a bit.  However most of the progress diminished into the close.

RAX is the only name nearing stop.  All others are behaving well, considering the misfits they are.  I was prison shanked into the close bleeding out for nearly 1%.

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Well thank you, hutzpah and all other pagan celebrations.  This week our benevolent overlords rolled out the dick guillotines into town square and sent a clear message:  We’re not crashing this summer.  We just wanted better exchange rates for our European vacations.

And my how simple it was for our Leaders (Leader is good, Leader is great) to shop vac the souls out of bears.  A fucking murmur or two and poof your bearish momo is dead.  They were getting way ahead of themselves, playing the European fiddle and watching the rats march out of town.  Read the blogs and tweets of Scott Bleir and you come to realize it’s a #Costanza market.  Fly knew and continues to know it too, but wants to play the bigger move.  They both knew the market would get weak into early summer.  Anyone who has participated in this market expected likewise.

This year the news cycle was Europe’s leaders are gluttonous retards who couldn’t balance their fat asses on an office chair yet alone ring-fence the fucking debt with a side of “Facebook: The Reverse QE.”  Last year it was we’re all going to die, one Greek or Egyptian Molotov cocktail at a time.  Lean in for a second, I need to tell you a secret…FUCK NEWS.  Fuck news and fuck our population for watching that shit every night.  Gint nailed it when he wrote (back in the 80’s) calling it Kabuki Theater.  Once you accept that it’s entertainment you can redirect your brain capacity to banking coin.  Don’t get me wrong I get the news, but I consume it new school: through the lens of real people (Twitter) filtering and interpreting.  Very nice, very clean.

Now this week, just in time to rout the bears, a couple cock suckers (Fedwire and them) told a couple talking heads the printing presses are warmed up.  And boom we’re forming the bottom bracket for a summer trading range.  At least this is how I’ll be paying the market in the weeks to come.

Talking SPY levels:  133.50-133.75 is our mid-point.  Lots of confluence there.  Look for the possibility of another attempted leg lower next week.  Any higher low around 130 is very bullish and could pump us clear to the top of our bracket, near 138.  Be cautious adding long exposure above 133.75 and look to accumulate stocks demonstrating relative strength below.  A new low south of 127 signals reassess.

If you’re not embracing the internets for all its data filtration might, catch up playa.

The bears thought they were clear sailing, but unlike this guy, they hit the fucking ground:

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What website has 1.1 billion user hours in the month of May, 70% mobile traffic, and an effective mobile advertising strategy?  Yes exactly, Pandora.  So 770 million hours of mobile traffic were glued to Pandora.  Wow, big number.  That’s plenty of time to throw in a MILLION commercials or so.  You think commercials are free?  All this I’m saying to pry your eyes from the subscriber rates.  They don’t matter.  Stop it.  They don’t.

I know people enjoy Spotify.  That doesn’t bother me.  What, we can only have one online radio in the world?  Watch for Pandora listening hours to continue increasing and this to inevitably lead to a profitable quarter.  Then calmly walk to the nearest door and slam it on your toe if you think the company is a broken business model.  People take pride in curating their Bon Jovi channel.  They love fingering the “thumbs down” and mentally saying, “Fuck you and your music John Mellencamp.  You pussy!  It’s my life!”  So while Spotify lets you share how culturally sound you are with your Facebook friends, Pandora takes your input and builds stations you love to listen to.

It’s not broken.  And it’s going to be harder to obsolete than maps and business reviews.

Perhaps it doesn’t stroke the ego as much as other social companies.  But what it lacks in wack it more than makes up in panache.

Now that I’ve aired out a bit of objective data and a whole slew of subjective data, let me briefly show you what actually has me positioned aggressively in P.  Behold! The chart art:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_bGjWPRIG5A&feature=youtube_gdata_player

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It’s been humbling riding the entire death wagon of the post Facebook roadshow.  Oh how naïve I am, to think I would make short term gains playing a hot sector.  Correction: I am naïve for ignoring the charts and everything they were telling me.

This is what happens when you find a stranger in the woods.  This is what happens.  I have a methodology.  It’s simple really—and it’s based on price action just as it has been for years.  For years it has treated me well.  Then I thought, “Hey, let’s change things up a bit I love social stocks.”  So I built a portfolio consisting almost entirely of social names.  All was well as the charts supported the thesis at the time.  But soon I was caught, deer in the headlights, as an envoy of fifteen Mack trucks barreled down a steep grade carrying sell orders.  Instead of sashaying my rickshaw of stocks to the shoulder, up atop a hill in cash, I figured fuck it, I’ll jog down the middle of the road and onlookers will watch with suspenseful glee as said death trucks part like the red sea.  LET MY PEOPLE GOOOO MUTHA FUCKAAAS.

Of course anyone watching saw the carnage to follow:

My left arm, amputated by the mirror of the first truck (ZNGA)

Both legs, mangled and partially severed by two trucks passing each other (SVVC and GSVC)

My dick, smacked by a large rock hurling from a gravel train (AMZN)

And the rickshaw continues to be dragged downhill, by two hand job homos in a small Volvo truck (YELP)

And here I lay, a bloody mess, confident in my only remaining appendage, my strong arm.  In it I hold two items:  a match, and a stick of dynamite.  These last two shreds of dignity, are what I intend to use to propel my mangled body to the top of this hill.  TRIP AND PANDORA.  TRRRRIIIIP AAAAAND PAAAN DORA the explora.

They still look good on the charts, they fucked shorts up during last month’s earnings more than any other name, and they could rip hard.  I have a few other names, buttons on my jacket if you will.  But what are left of this idea, this thesis, are TRIP and P.

And they could still be losers.  So don’t be a loser but instead trade them well and based on your own risk profile.  I have mine all wrapped up on these names.

To the moon if it’s the last goddamn thing I do.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4AD5fX4sveo&feature=youtube_gdata_player

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I find the market behavior into the close very interesting and significant.  If you’re trading a daily chart, a setup isn’t official until the close.  The close also has potential to feature the tension of bloated fat fucks who have watched a position reverse.  Such was the case of all major indices into today’s close.  But while the squeeze occurring in the indices didn’t last and has completely vanished afterhours, Pandora closed high-of-day.  Then it spent the next 15 minutes after cash close BLASTING ~4% higher on 2 million shares.  Eventually it settled out around $10.73 just over a percent higher.

Without reading too far into the move, I refilled my position.  I did this for three price behavior reasons:

Pandora’s relative strength throughout an otherwise murderous social sector

If Pandora can trader higher tomorrow, it’s setting up a higher low trough into the weekend

It backfilled the earnings gap

As a company, I continue to enjoy the name because they are the mobile pimps thus far.  The analysts seem too focused on premium member growth rates and the $10.00 price point.  I care for premium users not one bit.  It’s an excellent advertising venue on mobile.  That’s huge hombre.  That’s something Facebook and to a lesser extent Google struggle with.  MONETIZING MOBILE TRAFFIC IS THE BIG TO DO.   Music Genome Project is a fun music discovery tool and provides value where competitors don’t.  We’re down nearly 40% since IPO.  Fucking murderous.

So I’m looking for price to continue behaving well going forward.  A massive win for the bulls is recapturing $12 and holding above.  Bears want the opposite sub $10.  These are your signposts.

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I trigged a stop on my AMZN position today.  It was one of my larger positions and my risk was $212.50 where we spent several sessions basing.  It’s a name I still want a piece of but the equity environment is filthy.  Valuations continue to be questioned and growth stories have taken a back seat to risk off positioning.

I’m 6% off my high watermark set pre Facebook IPO.  Am I saddened?  Sleeping with whores and abusing drugs in a relentless pity party?  Clubbing with down-and-out Paris Hilton offering my rebound services?  Certainly not fine chaps!  I don’t have time for foolishness.  Instead I’m being a good trader.  Assessing the damage and learning how not to blow my fucking dick off again.

First things first, 1.5% portfolio gyrations are something one comes to expect when trading hot money speculative stocks.  I’ve accepted this and given my positions room to, “do their thing.”  The gyrations are certainly more acceptable when they end the day green.  Something they haven’t done for eight trading sessions.

Stocks that behaved well and adhered to a semblance of charting: Z, TRIP, YELP, PCLN, AMZN, and P.

Stocks that knife through support and resistance while throwing up gang signs and giving you a lawn job: SVVC and GSVC

Stocks whose cocks are right like broken clocks: FB

You see the thing with YELP is, and this is what the trolls on Fly’s board were phallicly exclaiming, the chart has a series of lower lows and lower highs.  That’s momo 101 for lower prices.  Sell the rips, cover on the dips.  Hence why I own the stock still, some 25% underwater {sarcasm}.  This may seem like a dickish armature move, noob follows pro, noob gets squashed.  But I’ve expected very little from the name except face numbing volatility.  It’s been one of my smallest positions this entire beating.  I’m patient as a monk with the name, and will add to it very soon.  I know, don’t add to losers.  I know.  I am averaging into the name and plan to hold it a long, ass, time.  Because I like mafias and they offer internet “protection”.  As long as they keep the IRS off their books it’s a sound business in my opinion.

So if you made it to the end of my post, you’ve read through much dick verbiage.  Congratulations and thank you for reading.

Current holdings by weight: Z, TRIP, ADS, AWK, NTAP, YELP, GSVC, FB, and P.  Cash around 45%

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