If You Must Short...

By IBTimes Staff Reporter | January 04 2010 2:30 PM

I eagerly await the return of a normal era when the market goes up for 2 months, then down 1 month, then up 1 month, and then down 2 months. This currenct circus is not that time, hence one mostly has downside protection via such things as cash and a handful of bad charts (they are out there, but more rare by the hour).

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If you *must* short to hedge against your long exposure (or belief the fairy tale ends soon and the correction is over the horizon), here are some candidates which have run nicely into resistance... these are some previous long positions I exited, but I keep an eye on as I like the fundamentals, and want to jump back in if they clear some moving averages. In fact, if the the melt up is real these could be long candidates very soon - but for most you have very obvious places to put stop losses and hope a huge gap up doesn't occur overnight to take you out at a bad price:

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Or you could try something in free fall; reader suggestion (not a stock I have on a watch list)

However, what makes any name trecherous to short is what happened to anyone who was using charts to short names such as these 2 below... from out of the blue, with no warning came huge moon shots.

You lose!

Good day sir!

With the market gapping up almost every day now (what is it? 9 of the past 10 sessions) forces are certainly not in your favor. Especially invisible hand forces. Short at your own risk... Ben Bernanke dares you.

p.s. Uncle Ben reiterated over this holiday break that the Federal Reserve had just about nothing to do with the housing bubble. The same stance that caused my jaw to drop in the Time Person of the Year article.

Bernanke told the American Economic Association meeting in Atlanta the Federal Reserve's low rates had nothing to do with the housing bubble

I just want you to be aware with what kind of man you are dealing with, as you try to bet against his unlimited printing press - this thought process is somewhere between delusion and denial. This is the same man in 2005 when asked if housing was could be a bubble or could cause a recession replied:

Well, I guess I don't buy your premise. It's a pretty unlikely possibility. We've never had a decline in house prices on a nationwide basis. So, what I think what is more likely is that house prices will slow, maybe stabilize, might slow consumption spending a bit. I don't think it's gonna drive the economy too far from its full employment path, though.

Remember, Ben Bernanke can remain irrational far longer than you can remian solvent.