Just a little bit longer. Fri Aug 6

It looks like I'll have to wait until at least Monday before the market moves out of this small congestion. For the fourth consecutive day we're sitting in a band between 4540 and 4585 on the Xjo index, with the market down 16 points at 10.40 am. US jobs numbers are out tonight and that should be a catalyst. I'm leaning towards the bullish point of view on the DJIA, it's a similar state of affairs as the Xjo but with less retracement.

I've missed a trick with Fmg which has just run up from a flat open to 454, a rise of 3%. I sold this yesterday for 438, a touch better than breakeven, on the basis that the chart was giving mixed signals. While it now looks better, it still runs the risk of failing to break the June high of 463 and drifting off. It's largely academic for me now though, I'm unlikely to get a buying opportunity in the near future.

As a pointer to the iron ore sector, there is some practical value in the strength of Fmg because when I look at Ago and Mgx which my assistant covers and which are also performing quite well, it implies that Murchison will join the party once the agressive seller, hedge fund Harbinger, has got out of the stock. It sold down its holding from 12.7% to 6.3% of the stock in two or three weeks and (I'm not sure of the regulation here) it may be that it's no longer required to disclose the selling once the holding goes below 5%.

Typically, half the market will be watching for the selling to disappear and it could rapidly bounce. At the moment, it's in a very tight band.

Rio reported overnight and although the stock is flat, the results confirmed how much money is being made out of iron ore at the moment.

2.22 The market is chopping around in a desultory fashion, down 8 points now. I'm just waiting for next week now and holding on to my positions.

The only new trade is buying a few Mmx with a stop below 179 as a little pre-emptive trade.

3.56 The market is almost done for the week and is just down 3 points.

I needn't have pre-empted Mmx, there's still a wall of selling, while I ignored a good buy signal in Aristocrat. I thought about it yesterday and this morning and was scared off by the long downtrend. Really though, it was still worth a small trade. Here's the daily.