Guessing at the odds

What are the odds?

I have taken profits on all my shorts. Percentagewise it was a great success - 4.5% on the UK market in three days and over 4% on the US market in an even shorter campaign. But I did not have enough money committed to a very high probability trade. Never mind better luck next time.

Although the market looks set for the next up move I do not feel too confident about the odds. Although that 17000 support level does look like the bottom of the channel and the last down move has touched I have lingering doubts. I have drawn the line as a solid one and taken it back to January when it briefly represented resistance and to March when it offered spongy support. You can see how tentative some of this analysis is. The result may be that before the evening is out I will buy a small holding in bottom feeding shares to make the most of a possible rise to the top of the channel and even a possible break out.  I can see the possibility of a winning move but I am not confident about the odds.

In the mean time my holdings in gold, and especially silver are crucifying me. I am not too worried about gold and have increased my stake by 50%. I just sit and hope. The charts do not look disastrous yet and so far I can bear the pain.

My overall position is 24% gold and silver, 5% commodity, 2% equity, 69% cash.


I have watched two lovely French films.

Beautiful Lies is a sort of follow up to Amelie. It is a charming comedy of errors which plays games with the mess that happens when lies are told, even with the best of possible motives. It is a frothy soufflé of a film set in a hair dressing salon bathed in the beautiful sunshine of the South of France. Audrey Tatou makes irrisistable watching and Sami Bouajila will keep the ladies happy as he woos the daughter and then, reluctantly, her mother.

Potiche is an extraordinary film. It goes back to the late 1970s. It succeeds in capturing the spirit of the time but also the style of film making. Potiche means trophy wife and that is the role that Catherine Deneuve plays. The film is an homage to the early days of feminism. Deneuve takes over her husband's role as the director of HER family's umbrella business sweeping aside his authoritarian and confrontational style. It is her own daughter who pushes her aside because she wants the role of a wife and mother and wants her own husband to have a job that keeps him at home. Her mother rises above this setback proving that women can act out a major role in the world.