What An Annoying Market (Nothing New There)

Obviously the machines are in control, as once again a whiplash move in the final hour of trading undermines any logic that may exist in this market. It feels like the action is driven primarily by the daytrading of ETFs, with market players trying to catch trends that last 15 minutes or so. They all pile in at once and then hit the exits at the first sign of weakness. On Monday, they ran them down into the close, and today they ran them up. The finish one day has little correlation to what may happen tomorrow. The only constant is the volatility, with the "new normal" vix appearing to be 50 instead of 30, for example.

Frankly, I'm finding this market very annoying, as the volatility remains excessive and the time frames far too short to trade. However, I did buy more FCX today, as well as starting a position in DRYS, which I think is hideously undervalued. It could be a fund name (that's being liquidated). I'm sure there are a few traders who have a style that works in this environment, but I don't know many of them. Holding positions is still darn near impossible, and these spikes, up and down, especially in the last hour, destroy a systematic approach with prudent money-management discipline.

I don't know what will cause the volatility to slow, but until it does, daytrading of ETFs (using very little capital) is going to dominate the market action. At some point, individual stock picking will matter again, but it is going to take some time for the character of the market to shift away from this chaos. Fun!