Good Evening,
I poured over charts all day long as I run what I refer to as “TSP on the street” in addition to regular TSP and nothing has changed. The defensive charts are almost all buy signals and the offensive charts are entirely sell signals. While some of those equity based charts are improving slightly, it would take several more days like today to establish a new ascending trend. When you have a few days like today that go against the prevailing trend, which at this time happens to be down, it makes a trader wonder if things might be changing. Should I put my funds in equities or not? The charts are telling me one thing, but I’m seeing another. Should I act on my emotions and shift from defense to offense (I love using football terms) or should I do what the charts are telling me? It’s kind of like playing a game of chicken, if you don’t blink you’re either seconds from glory or disaster. That’s the way this market is. As in the game of chicken, the risk is high. Taking a defensive posture is kind of like taking an insurance policy. If you don’t need it, you lose the premiums (that would be profits), but if disaster comes you are protected against a loss (that’s the market tanking). Four times last year our emotions told us to get out of the market, but our charts told us to stay in. You know the rest of the story. We stayed in and had a great year verses what would have been an average year. Now we are experiencing the same thing in reverse. Our charts still say stay out, but our hearts want to jump in. 85% of the time the charts will be right. However, they are wrong 15% of the time. That 15% is your premium. As long as the signals remain where they are, I will remain where I am. Playing defense. If I miss some profits, all well and good, I was safe. The risk/reward factor is too great to jump into stocks just because we feel like it. Now on to the days action…
Dow, S&P 500 book biggest gains of year
| 02/05/14 | |||||
| Fund | G Fund | F Fund | C Fund | S Fund | I Fund |
| Price | 14.322 | 15.994 | 22.6594 | 32.1675 | 24.138 |
| $ Change | 0.0008 | -0.0285 | -0.0387 | -0.1557 | 0.0215 |
| % Change day | +0.01% | -0.18% | -0.17% | -0.48% | +0.09% |
| % Change week | +0.03% | +0.02% | -1.70% | -2.60% | -1.61% |
| % Change month | +0.03% | +0.02% | -1.70% | -2.60% | -1.61% |
| % Change year | +0.25% | +1.60% | -5.09% | -4.46% | -5.58% |
| L INC | L 2020 | L 2030 | L 2040 | L 2050 | |
| Price | 16.6892 | 21.2528 | 22.7018 | 23.9067 | 13.4624 |
| $ Change | -0.0061 | -0.0183 | -0.0263 | -0.0338 | -0.0208 |
| % Change day | -0.04% | -0.09% | -0.12% | -0.14% | -0.15% |
| % Change week | -0.33% | -0.94% | -1.21% | -1.42% | -1.61% |
| % Change month | -0.33% | -0.94% | -1.21% | -1.42% | -1.61% |
| % Change year | -0.76% | -2.49% | -3.23% | -3.73% | -4.27% |
