In this article I’d like to share with you what I consider to be a perfect (or “textbook”) position trade: a trade that ran to a good profit over the course of three months and which along the way took more in dividends than it cost in financing charges.

When spread betting company WorldSpreads collapsed, it had a knock-on effect on some of its “white label” and partner spread betting brands, including potentially Ladbrokes. Indeed, if I view my overall Ladbrokes account now – which also encompases other forms of gaming – I see that the balance in my Financial Spread Betting wallet is… Unavailable.

Although I’ve not been documenting my trades recently — but I might, when things really pick up — I did make a trade this morning which is notable by the fact that it is an exception that proves the rule about never ‘buying higher’ something that I last sold lower.

Did you read the shocking news about the trouble at WorldSpreads, and did you then visit their web site to be greeted with the following message from the administrators?

It was a toss up between titling this article ‘Who wants to be average anyway?’ and titling it ‘Can you beat the market?’ Either way, it amounts to the same thing.

Most of the spread betting companies allow you to trade most of the big-name equities, but not all spread betting companies provide equal access to the lesser known stocks.

In this article I’d like to encourage you to stress test your spread bet portfolio, to discover how you would cope in the event of a market meltdown.

Don’t Panic! When I say Game Over, I don’t mean in terms of my trading trail portfolio. Although it turned down this week, to sit below the normalised FTSE 100 and FTSE 250 indices (see latest equity curve below), the portfolio value is still ‘above water’ at £1033.

Although some of us may speculate in the markets mainly for fun (even if we don’t admit this to ourselves), and some of us do it so that we have something to rant about (i.e. me), the main reason we’re doing it should be… to make money.

Having previously reviewed the mobile trading apps for Android phones provided by Capital Spreads I now turn my attention to the CMC Android App.