Ratan; I don't know what you guys are doing with the S&P futures,
have never looked into buying or selling or shorting them..
I do know that some big sharks play these things, and they can
trade in a heart beat..it's used as a hedge by some index managers
they can munipulate it no end..as they know what stocks they are
going to buy or sell, before they make the futures bet..
the big players have the inside feel..and thats why the market
will early on follow the direction of the S&P futures..on most
days, but they could lay a few bets the oposite way
in the eve, then take them back the next moring and reverse
the bet.
If I was BIG enough and was going to sell a bunch of S&P stuff
I'd go short the futures..if going to BUY I'd go long..thing is you
don't know if I'm long or short the futures.
With commisions and all I never could see any way to play these
things, I'm to small a fish to get into this water.
NOW the SPY tracks the S&P and is another thing..but I never
short it..always buy..on up turns..in the long run you can
hold the SPY and finally come out..you may have money tied up
but don't bet with what you can't tie up..and while that money
is tied up..if it's long enough the SPY at least pays you
a dividend...shorting it can be a bad dream if the market takes
off..I only momentum buy..with the S&P in one window and SPY
in the other..I wait for the S&P to make a turn up from a good
down swing..when it first turns up sometimes SPY will linger
or even go on down..so I put a bid in after I see the S&P turn
up..just below were the SPY is..if I get it good..if I miss it
I haven't lost anything..if the S&P turns back down I kill the
bid..and try again..but my playing SPY is via the internet.
and fast and small time..bought 100 today at 95-1/4..if the
futures are down Monday mourning I'll sell on the open at
market, but I look for a rally Monday..maybe short lived
but a rally is past due, and the WEBS on the AMEX looked
positive for a change. If I'm right SPY will go up..I will
sell her for sure Monday eve except if the AMEX webs
end real strong then I'l hold, right now I got a 1/2 cushion
How do you buy the futures ? not that I want any but it's
intresting..be carefull, shorting them takes a lot of
guts, more than I got, good luck..you may want to look
at SPY..it trades just like a stock on the AMEX..runs
about 10.03% of the S&P as a norm..if your fast you can
sometimes get it at about 9.97%..and then have a small
cushion...as if the S&P drops SPY seems to hesitate a bit
it did not go down as fast as the S&P today..but did dip
a little lower at 2:15 I pulled the trigger at 95-1/4
I think it went to 95-1/8 before it started up..trailing
the S&P..in 30 mins I had my cushion..I held because the
WEBS had reversed their direction and were going up also.
Had they started down that would have also been a sell
signal.
What if I ran a big fund, and shorted S&P F before I sold,
than as I started to sell off the stocks..and F droped,
I coverded knowing MOnday I was going to buy back the stocks
after I covered I bought the Fs..then monday morning when
the pits total up orders before the market..and the
clowns saw all the buy orders the futures would go up..
the big playes sure have a serious edge on these futures
contracts.
Jim |
