TO SHORT OR NOT TO SHORT

SELL AGA @19.50
Metals appear to have a correction here as most of metal stocks are down. Up or down, it's all related to the five-letter word: CHINA. To short or not to short, that is the question. Steel price starts to roll-over, so did most of steel stocks. I sensed that the speculators may start exiting the sector. So I put out a little AGA for a trade. I do not want to take too much risk on this though, so the stop is pretty tight at 20.01. Let's see if it's going to work. Early indications do not look good. Man, these early calls are not working for me. They generally almost always fall into "good idea, poor execution" category. I got to stop these early calls.


The market's reaction to the early earning reports is pretty much as expected. But if that is the case, isn't the decision to buy ATY inconsistent with the theme of the quarter. Yes, guilty as charged. The ATY purchase may be ill-timed. While the support for the theme is strong, the question whether the poor Q3 results are discounted has always been lingering, and this doubt was somewhat confirmed by the two early returns, INTC and YHOO. The results, while not bad, certainly were not impressive. The market's early reaction was enthusiastic, although the rally petered out. The market faked, trapping more bulls, and promptly resumed heading south. Its reaction to last night's results had been more predictable, which casted doubt on the ATY purchase. Having said that, it behaves reasonably well today, I do not believe we should dump it in panic. I guess I just have to sit it out.


The acquisition of ATY proven to be a terrible decision (down 6% in one day), and it just proves that a good company does not necessarily mean a good stock. I always believe that picking stocks is really not that hard, having convinction is. This will certain test it. There could be potential more down side risks as more bad news are being delivered. Going through the reporting cards, most appear to meet or beat, but guided lower. Despite the setback, I can't be unhappen given the triple digits loss of DOW.