Turning off the tap. Thu Jan 21

It seems that the weakness in Chinese markets yesterday was caused by government efforts to slow credit growth and that weakness continued into the overnight Northern hemisphere sessions as the European markets fell around 2% and the Americans a little over 1%. It's mid morning and we're down a modest 35 points having fallen yesterday and presumably also waiting to see it there'll be any further Chinese weakness.
Gold fell quite hard overnight, almost 2.5%, and my trade for the day is a short in Lihir Gold. I quite like this because unlike a lot of the other stocks on my watch list, Lgl is not still in an uptrend.
It had an impulsive fall in early December followed by a modest, retracement style rally. There was a little sell signal yesterday afternoon which I was interested in but didn't take. Once it became clear that the stock would open lower, I felt it was worth taking a weaker entry price as it looks like confirmation of a significant change in sentiment about the stock. I'm short 16000 at 320.5 and the stock has edged lower to 318.

11.40 I bought back another 5000 Ipl at 345, close enough to my target. It's still looking weak so maybe I'll get a windfall on the rest. Profit on the second portion is 900 dollars.

12.23 I just remembered that we didn't fall yesterday, instead we managed a small rise after early strength evaporated. Right now we're squeezing up as we wait for further Chinese developments including CPI data.

2.00 I'm out of Ipl now, having bought back the last 5000 at 339 as the stock hit 335 but then blipped up despite renewed market weakness on higher than expected Chinese inflation. Profit on the last 5k was 1200 for a deal total of 2700 less 33 dollars in costs.

4.14 We drifted off to close down 41 points which is near the lows. I bought back 4000 Lgl at 314 for a profit of 260 dollars, still short 12k.