To: SJS who wrote (8361 ) 4/25/1999 6:13:00 PM From: Thean Read Replies (1) | Respond to
Speaking about memory lane, investing in the drillers has really been educational for me. I can remember my early days... My first two buys were CDG and MDCO in the fall of 1996 on the basis of improving fundies (rising dayrate, rising utilization etc.) There were just a couple of hundred posts on the SD then. No one claimed to be an expert, everyone just wanting to learn more. Then came the TA part after I sat through a 40% correction in Jan-Mar 1997. I was convinced then the fundies were only part of the story and there were pretty good TA indicators (long stocastics, BB etc.) that could be utilized to take advantage of the perpetual mini-cycles. I remember at one time my read of those indicators were so scaringly accurate that I could call intraday moves that even surprised myself (had self-doubt but they turned out to be correct anyway - and I tasted what it means to be on-the-roll). Then came the top blowout in Oct 97 but bought back in too soon thinking the worsening fundies were overdone. Then after a few more rounds of TA where the stochastics changed from long to short to irratic, I decided the best way to trade them was to follow the street sentiment. Mo-mo were everywhere and big speculators with the help of media (CNBC, internet writers, journals, etc.) created big fear-greed cycles on the street. Then came the slow death beginning in the summer of 1998 after OPEC cheated heavily and the only thing mattered was the price of oil. Then came the re-excitement with OPEC putting up a very good marketing show to convince people they should be taken seriously this time. Which leads us to where we are today.
