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How was that for some intraday whipsaw action? The Qs ran through almost $5.50 of up- and- down swings before finally ending only about 50 cents above where they opened. I think back to the days when I would have lost half my account on action like this… going short, then getting spooked and flipping long, then losing money when it headed down, only to double-up on the next short to “make my money back” at the precise moment when it turned back up for 80 or 90 cents.

There are some proficient daytraders out there who likely made more today than any other day of the year, leaving the people who just look at closing numbers to scratch their heads and go, “The Qs were only up 37 cents, how did they make so much money?” Over five dollars’ worth of long, smooth swings, that’s how.

Me? I was at work all day, and it’s just as well. I can daytrade pretty well when we have some noodling and then the formation of a good intraday trend, but a wild day like today would probably still have me mopping up blood at 4pm Eastern Stupid Time.

To the swing trading: I’ve been waiting on that 2nd “Buy” signal I wrote about a couple of posts back. It would have officially triggered on a close above $146.49 on the SPYders today. Had I been home, I’d most likely be long even with them closing a few cents below that. Here’s why:

The action today drew a daily bar which dipped below the prior low, then rallied to close back above it. That’s a buy signal. Unfortunately, that low happened down near $144 at about 15:00 EST, and that buy signal happened 45 minutes later at a price of about $145.50, with a whopping 15 minutes left in the trading day. Not much time to jump in there.

But the late, strong rally on very heavy volume means I’ll be looking for an opportunity to buy tomorrow for a short-term swing trade.