The key to success in today’s market is having a game plan and sticking to it. And while I hate to sound like a broken record, and I constantly repeat it, the game plan for success today is simple: “Buy trend channel support and sell trend channel resistance.” OR “Buy the dips and sell the rips.”

Last week we heard everyone saying you have got to buy stocks in the falling market.

That’s a classic herd mentality – what’s the point in buying stocks after we’ve already run? But the fact is, despite Friday’s sell-off, the uptrend remains intact and we simply followed the plan we laid out for you last weekend — ride our shorts down to support in the charts of the indexes, cover them there and look to buy stocks that are at support.

This Week’s Game Plan

Last week, the market was at resistance, so the game plan was to stay in our existing short-sell positions until the market hit support where we would cover and go long on stocks that were also at support. And this week, the game plan is exactly the opposite.

Why’s that? Because the market is right at support — yes, it’s only been five trading sessions and that’s all it took to take the market from resistance to support.

So as long as support holds, the game plan for this week is to stay in our existing long positions as the market attempts to stage a snap back rally.  When that occurs, we’ll take our profits on the long side and look to go short again as the rally set-ups stocks on the short side.

We don’t make up the game plans though — all we are doing is simply reacting to what the market is telling us and trading what we see. And here’s what we see:

As you can see from this S&P 500 index chart, our big picture uptrend is still intact and oversold at current levels. That doesn’t mean that they can’t go lower here, it just means that we’re at levels that ought to act as floors below.

Make note of is the pink bearish channel back in June and July…I’m bringing it up because it’s what we want to be on the lookout for with any rally from this point forward. It’s called a snapback rally and it’s a reaction to oversold market conditions that causes a fast bounce upward. But when the fundamentals are still bad on a snapback rally, it’s actually a very bearish signal that means stocks are headed decidedly lower.

To give you an example of what a snapback rally ought to look like, take a look at OmniVision Technologies’ (NASDAQ: OVTI) chart below…

The name of the game for next week is watch for a snapback rally or dead cat bounce. When all said and done it ought to look like some sort of bearish channel then we take profits on all long positions and start shorting.

When the market makes a noticeable bounce, watch very closely before going long. If the market turns tail, it’ll happen quick and you won’t want to be on the wrong side of the action.

Sincerely,
David Grandey
AllAboutTrends.net

November 3, 2009

David Grandey

David Grandey is the founder of All About Trends, an email newsletter service revealing stocks in ideal set-ups offering potential significant short-term gains.  A successful canslim-based stock market investor for the past 10 years, he has worked for Meriwest Credit Union Silicon Valley Bank, helping to establish brand awareness and credibility through feature editorial coverage in leading national and local news media.

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