Markets are all pushing higher with the Dow staging another impressive rally, FTSE ending higher and Oil pushing higher, yes even oil is in on the action. The only thing that fell was gold. At this point you will find me musing over the daily charts, my smoking jacket adorned with a slightly raised monocle hinting at vague concern. No, the truth is I’m perplexed, deeply perplexed. Yesterday the FTSE 100 waddled along like a drunken duck neither pushing too high nor falling too low. Today enter stage left drunken duck part two.

I don’t know where to best enter under these conditions. Even though I’m 5.50 short I want a decent push higher followed by a good fall lower. My last trade was at around 5400 and hasn’t gone too far either way. With oil making a push higher yesterday will this put a dampener on a rally or will we see this as a turning point lower. I’m inclined to believe we are heading lower. All we need now is bad employment figures on Friday. The ADP report yesterday was the curve ball the market wasn’t expecting and as we know the government’s figures and the ADP rarely tally.

For my part I will be sitting on my hands till a move past 5450 allows me another short entry. Till then I will just have to hope the little drunken duck starts on shots.

The Irish Economy
On a more regional note NCB stockbrokers say the Irish economy is in an extremely weakened position and predicts a recession. How far behind the curve do you have to be? Yesterday the live register figure jumped 17,429 for June to 238,240 the second largest increase on record. From my perspective we are six months away from the messiest period in recent Irish economic history. The Celtic tiger seems to have teamed up with the drunken duck and is downing tequila slammers. From a ground level the Irish and Spanish economies are in serious trouble. Spain has the advantage of being a few months ahead but over here we are accelerating towards an economic correction equal to our vulgar excesses.