Trading Psychological Levels It’s sometimes surprising to see how the charts perform, and how much human psychology is intertwined with what might be regarded as more of a mechanistic value. Take for example trading the indices, whether the FTSE 100 or the Dow, which is made up of 30 companies. Despite the fact that the […]

Understanding Volume It’s curious that so little attention is given to the volume of shares that are being traded. After all, technical analysis is the study of market action, which includes price, volume, and open interest if trading in the futures or options markets. Certainly, price is the most important, but volume of trading can […]

Understanding Price/Earnings Ratios Perhaps one of the most common measures used in determining whether a share is good value is the price/earnings ratio, or P/E ratio as it is most commonly known. This represents the share price divided by the after-tax earnings per share (EPS). EPS is in turn calculated by dividing a company’s 12-month […]

Scaling Into Trades for Profit: Pyramiding Up Scaling into positions is something that many traders do the opposite of, to their detriment. Certainly, it is a known technique, but how many apply it when they are spread betting their favourite financial instrument? Pyramiding is a term used to describe the adding of more shares or […]

Auctions Pre, Post and Intra-day The advent of SETS on the London Stock Exchange in October 1997 and the introduction of the pre-, post- and intra-day auction processes in June has led to regular additional trading opportunities. Often the best prices for the day are achieved in the auctions. During the post-market auction, trading is […]

Spread Betting – Director Dealings Monitoring the activity of Directors’ transactions and ‘shrewd’ investors can also prove profitable for those without the resource to do their own analysis and research. As well as providing long and medium term stock investment ideas, short-term trading opportunities can also present themselves when the newspapers highlight or write up […]

Why look at Directors Share Purchases? by Simon Winfield I’ve spent years and years listening to what directors of listed companies say. I find their body language, relationships with each other, and what they don’t say to be much more informative. I’ve also started to analyze their share dealings. My theory is that it’s what […]

Get Shorting Definition of Shorting Shares: – selling securities you do not own in the hope of buying them back at a lower price in the future and pocketing the difference. Example David thinks share in XYZ Plc are going to fall from their current price of 450p. He enters a contract to sell them […]

Short Selling – Spread Betting I’m not quite sure why, but it always seems more satisfying to make money from shorting a share (profiting from it going down). Maybe it’s because it doesn’t feel conventional. With shares doing so well at the moment and some looking overbought, I feel that now is the time to […]

Spread Betting Tips for Short Selling Have you heard about short selling or shorting? I have already gone through a short introduction to shorting and placing down bets in the introductory series but here I’m going to review some helpful tips for spread betting which I’ve mostly learned from experience. Spread Betting and Shorting (Down […]