Ganesan R asked:


Dow, NASDAQ, crude oil, gold and commodities market are very volatile ??

I am in india. I cant able to make out what is happening with the indian indices ( sensex & nifty ). How people in the globe are able to trade on these most volatile indices ( dow, NASDAQ, crude oil, gold and silver. How is this possible ???????

Is it that the software which guides the winners ??????

Or how to be a winner in the market. I want to win the indian market >??????????

can it be possible ??????

What should i do for this ????????

Software, technical, fundamentals ?????

Please tell me.

Everybody wants a better life, which is much more probable to achieve when you have more money to work for you. It is true that money cannot buy happiness, but the absence of money isn’t a very happy situation either. That is the basic reason why people work or start business.

In any sort of work relationship, it is all about trade. You either trade a service in return for money or you trade a product in return for money when it comes down to the basic level of thought.

But unfortunately, very often the money that you make just doesn’t seem enough to make you or the family happy. People often believe they would be much happier if they had more money.

This is the reason why many people begin trading on commodities to make a better living, and the success stories are many in the field. But let us also remember that it is risky business, and many have lost more than they have made in these waters.

It is a big mistake to put in more money in the markets than what you can afford to lose. You never want to lose money of course, but remember – even when you are dead sure of how a stock is about to move, things can always go wrong. Commodities trading is for those who already have a little experience in the stock business. It is not a bad idea at all to use simulation software to get a feel of how the markets work, especially if you are a complete newbie here.

If you are into speculating, you will study the movement of stocks and when you do you will soon be able to predict how a stock will rise or fall in the next few months. When you are sure of a stock going higher, you will want to buy now and sell later when it is at a high rate. That’s what commodity future trading is all about.

When you use software to simulate the changes in stock you will get a good feel of the surprises that the stock markets can throw at you.

But do remember that the real world is unpredictable at times. For instance if your studies show that the price of a stock of a certain crop is on its way up, natural disasters can cause a failure of the crop, which in turn would knock it out of the stock markets as well.

Whether you are into the stock business to make an extra income, or if you want to get into futures commodity trading full time, be sure you get a feel by using a simulation software before you make the decision.



By: Abhishek Agarwal

About the Author:

Caffeinated Content

sassy_czar asked:


Oil touches $103 a barrel:
Oil prices briefly surpassed $103 a barrel for the first time Friday as persistent weakness in the U.S. dollar and the prospect of lower interest rates attracted fresh money to the oil market.
Light, sweet crude for April delivery on the New York Mercantile Exchange jumped to a new trading record of $103.05 a barrel in electronic trading before slipping back to $102.02 a barrel, down 57 cents, by midday in Europe.
On Thursday, the contract jumped $2.95 to a record settlement price of $102.59 a barrel.
Prices were supported by comments Thursday from Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke, who said the American economy is not immediately threatened with stagflation, a combination of economic weakness and rising inflation.
Investors chose to see the comments as confirmation of their beliefs that the Fed will continue cutting interest rates to try to shore up the economy.
“It seems that further interest rate cuts, additional dollar weakness and more investment buying will anchor oil to higher prices,” energy risk management firm Cameron Hanover said in its daily report. “It can’t go on forever, but it looks like it can go on for a while.”
Lower U.S. interest rates tends to weaken the dollar, and crude futures offer a hedge against a falling dollar.
“Due to the weakening dollar and the rising fear of inflation, investors have put money into commodities, oil included,” said Victor Shum, an energy analyst with Purvin & Gertz in Singapore.
“Commodities, as tangible assets, do not face as much inflationary threat as opposed to holding a currency,” Shum said. “Even though the value of money is changing, the asset continues to have an intrinsic value.”
In London, Brent crude futures fell 28 cents to $100.62 a barrel on the ICE Futures exchange.
Shum warned that a price bubble was emerging in the crude futures market as investors ignored market fundamentals that have shown continuous increases in U.S. crude supply while several recent forecasters have lowered oil demand growth predictions for this year due to the slowing economy.
“We’ve seen seven straight weeks of builds in crude oil inventories. The oil market fundamentals are softening and yet we see record highs being set, day in and day out,” Shum said.
Shum warned of the possibility of a sharp correction at some point, though unlikely in the near term.
“Right now, there’s a lot of trading based on emotion — emotions are high and that could keep crude oil at elevated levels, but the market faces the risk of a price collapse.”
The Japanese government on Friday urged the oil cartel OPEC to increase output to help ease record prices.
“The high crude prices are gradually damaging the global economy. This will damage the economies of oil-producing countries,” Minister of Economy, Trade and Industry Akira Amari said.
The Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries holds its next policy meeting on March 5. It is likely to decide to keep current production levels unchanged, or even cut production, according to reported comments by OPEC President Chakib Khelil.
Khelil noted that oil inventories were growing, and that the recent rally in oil prices has been driven by the U.S. dollar’s weakness and speculative trades amid geopolitical risks.
“Several OPEC ministers are just itching for a reason, any reason, to cut output. A number of OPEC countries have become as addicted to high prices as the West has become to their oil,” Cameron Hanover’s report said.
“The ministers may not be able to find any reason to cut production now, especially if oil prices keep rising. If they cannot, they will plan another meeting in five weeks and will cut output at the first hurdle.”
Crude prices are within the range of inflation-adjusted highs set in early 1980. A $38 barrel of oil then would be worth $97 to almost $104 today, depending on the how the adjustment is calculated. A direct comparison with daily Nymex prices is difficult because historical data, gathered before the crude futures contract was created in 1983, are based on average monthly prices posted by oil producers.
In other Nymex trading, heating oil retreated 1.06 cents to $2.8350 a gallon while gasoline futures fell 2.02 cents to $2.4755 a gallon. Natural gas futures were down 1.3 cents to $9.430 per 1,000 cubic feet.

john knee asked:


anyone know good broker on commodities?

bmovies60 asked:


Barack Obama’s Cap and Trade is a Tax on the working class

Who Pays for Cap and Trade? Hint: They were promised a tax cut during the Obama campaign.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB123655590609066021.html

-snip

Politicians love cap and trade because they can claim to be taxing “polluters,” not workers. Hardly. Once the government creates a scarce new commodity — in this case the right to emit carbon — and then mandates that businesses buy it, the costs would inevitably be passed on to all consumers in the form of higher prices. Stating the obvious, Peter Orszag — now Mr. Obama’s budget director — told Congress last year that “Those price increases are essential to the success of a cap-and-trade program.”

Hit hardest would be the “95% of working families” Mr. Obama keeps mentioning, usually omitting that his no-new-taxes pledge comes with the caveat “unless you use energy.” Putting a price on carbon is regressive by definition because poor and middle-income households spend more of their paychecks on things like gas to drive to work, groceries or home heating.

The Congressional Budget Office — Mr. Orszag’s former roost — estimates that the price hikes from a 15% cut in emissions would cost the average household in the bottom-income quintile about 3.3% of its after-tax income every year. That’s about $680, not including the costs of reduced employment and output. The three middle quintiles would see their paychecks cut between $880 and $1,500, or 2.9% to 2.7% of income. The rich would pay 1.7%. Cap and trade is the ideal policy for every Beltway analyst who thinks the tax code is too progressive (all five of them).

But the greatest inequities are geographic and would be imposed on the parts of the U.S. that rely most on manufacturing or fossil fuels — particularly coal, which generates most power in the Midwest, Southern and Plains states. It’s no coincidence that the liberals most invested in cap and trade — Barbara Boxer, Henry Waxman, Ed Markey — come from California or the Northeast.

Coal provides more than half of U.S. electricity, and 25 states get more than 50% of their electricity from conventional coal-fired generation. In Ohio, it totals 86%, according to the Energy Information Administration. Ratepayers in Indiana (94%), Missouri (85%), New Mexico (80%), Pennsylvania (56%), West Virginia (98%) and Wyoming (95%) are going to get soaked.

-snip

Led by Michigan’s Debbie Stabenow, 15 Senate Democrats have already formed a “gang” demanding that “consumers and workers in all regions of the U.S. are protected from undue hardship.” In practice, this would mean corporate welfare for carbon-heavy businesses.

And of course Congress is its own “stakeholder.” An economy-wide tax under the cover of saving the environment is the best political moneymaker since the income tax. Obama officials are already telling the press, sotto voce, that climate revenues might fund universal health care and other new social spending. No doubt they would, and when they did Mr. Obama’s cap-and-trade rebates would become even smaller.

Cap and trade, in other words, is a scheme to redistribute income and wealth — but in a very curious way. It takes from the working class and gives to the affluent; takes from Miami, Ohio, and gives to Miami, Florida; and takes from an industrial America that is already struggling and gives to rich Silicon Valley and Wall Street “green tech” investors who know how to leverage the political class.
“Did you know that Sen. McCain proposed the same plan?”

Yes, I am and was fully aware of that

“I wonder if the Right would be ranting and raving over it.”

We would and did.

“Rather than overwrought and unsupported claims why don’t the Right propose ALTERNATIVE SOLUTIONS?”

We are. You should be dealing with what the article tells you instead of pointing fingers at McCain and Republicans. What McCain once proposed and the Republicans actions are irrelevant. What Obama is doing or planning to do, since he is in the White house right now, is relevant. Try to deal with something thats relevant.
“You people wanted a free market solution that made the businesses in control. They are.”

Thats news. Seems that government has its hand in everything now.
“However, we can avoid this tax by making our carbon footprint smaller – which somehow the questioner didn’t take in to account.”

I didnt take it into account because I dont want to make it smaller. Making it smaller entails changing my behavior and/or the products I buy. I like the freedom of doing as I please without being forced to change via cap and trade taxes.

“And, the same people who either pay the “tax” or cut their carbon use, also benefit: cleaner air,”

Cleaner air isnt going to happen.

http://www.businessgreen.com/business-green/news/2213702/europe-cap-trade-scheme-hand

http://www.financialpost.com/story.html?id=96dc23c8-33e2-45c4-bf6a-14aba852d764

“slowing of global warming”

Global warming is a fraud. We humans do not have any control over it.

“lower prices on low-carbon energy”

No, HIGHER prices on low carbon energy.
“And, with a federal mandate existing, capitalists will have the political and economic groundwork to invest in carbon neutral (or better) manufacturing and power generation.”

They already have the “political and economic groundwork to invest in carbon neutral (or better) manufacturing and power generation”. Its called freedom. A government mandate forcing them to do so is costly and disasterous.
Still waiting for any Obama liberals to deal with the information contained within the article.

***crickets***

Oh come on, liberals. You all hold yourselves up as the big protecters of the little guy, the poor, the working class. Yet here is a piece of legislation that will cost them big time, Obama will hurt them big time, and you’re absolutely silent.

***crickets***

Bueller? Bueller? Bueller?

***crickets***

[O]peration [I]raqi [L]iberation asked:


All I hear on YA about this issue is “oh no, cap n trade! our utility bills! oh noes!!!” Setting aside for a moment the fact that cap n trade is a rather demented solution which turns pollution into a tradeable commodity, I’m sure our grandchildren and great grandchildren will understand when they are experiencing global crop failures and desertification, ocean stagnation, increasing problems with pests and insects, coastal flooding, no wildlife to share the planet with that evolution took millions of years to produce (besides who needs wildlife anyways, less room for strip malls), and so on that we really really wanted to save some money on our utility bills so we decided it was best that we didn’t do anything about climate change

Silver is a commodity that is attractive to many investors because of its unique qualities. It is much like gold and some other commodities because private investors can actually take delivery. However, it is unlike gold in two respects. One, the price of silver is feasible and within reach. Two, physical storage can be obtained without much of a problem and security can be simplified. Often a bank safe deposit box is sufficient.

The ability to take delivery of a commodity increases the choices in trading strategies. There is room for hedging by using a combination of spot and futures contract trades. Pure spot trading with local merchants is also more of a possibility. Spot trading is a term that means the buying and selling of the actual commodity. This is different from the trading of futures contracts because the delivery of the commodity is generally rare.

Silver also has the advantage of bearing a relatively low price per ounce. For many years, silver has traded for anywhere from $5 to $15. These lower prices make silver easier to acquire and more accessible to the average investor. Investors can obtain quantities that are large enough to show desirable returns due to this low amount.

For someone who is accustomed to trading stocks on a regular basis and who may have reached the occasional astronomically high returns, this may not sound like such a great deal. However, when inflation is factored in, even the high return stock prices may not look so appealing. Silver is much like gold in that is provides an accurate measure of real market prices.

The Commodity Exchange of New York (COMEX), a division of the New York Mercantile Exchange and in other exchanges, the standard contract size for futures in silver is 5,000 troy ounces. To put this in perspective, a troy ounce is 1.1 times the common avoirdupois ounce that is commonly used in standard measurements like cooking and packaging.

The minimum price fluctuation, known as a tick, is $0.005 per troy ounce. One tick that is the minimum of 5,000 troy ounces, is worth $25. When compared to mainstream stock prices that range from $0.10 to $0.20 per share, it presents a drastically different landscape. However when those same shares are multiplied one hundred fold to represent 100 shares, it brings the investment into a more “typical” range. While some are larger and some are smaller, this does, indeed, represent a normal amount in commodities trading.

A standard price quote may appear as:

Contract Date Last Change Open High

Jun ’06 (SIM06) 1014.8 -3.7 1013.8 1014.8

Low Date/Time

1012.8 12:29

To break down the price quote, the contract date indicates the contract’s month and year. The precise date is set by the exchange. The characters that are in parentheses represent a standard abbreviation for a futures contract. The abbreviation “SI” is silver, “M” represents the month of June and 06 indicates the year of 2006. The other figures show familiar price quote columns.

The prices of the silver are broken down to cents per troy ounce. This means that 1014.8 is the equivalent of $10.148 per ounce. This means that one contract that is $10 per ounce for 5,000 ounces bears an investment value of $50,000. This may be a little steep for the casual or average investor. This is one of the primary reasons that futures and options that allow investments of approximately 5% of that amount are so popular.

One drawback to silver investments is that the prices, like nearly any other commodity, are volatile. May 2006 saw some rather significant fluctuations, peaking at more than $15 per ounce, the dropping back to $10 per ounce. Bottom line, though, with any type of trading, the absolute price is not what is important. In fact, it is not even the trend alone that has magnitude in the market. The profits on investments are measured by the difference between the buying price and the selling price. This is what makes timing so crucial.



By: Amar Mahallati

About the Author:

commodity trading

Xyz Pdq asked:


I asked this many times over before, but I have rethought and revised my next 100 years predictions:

here is how I see it now:

-we break our unconditional embargo with Cuba and relations between US and South America improve (within next few years)

-Kim Jong Il suffers fatal stroke in say, 8 years, and his successor will be slightly less insane and isolationalist. N. Korea will begin to cooperate with UN sanctions and slowly, relations between North and South Korea and Japan will get better. They will still be nuts, mind you, but the threat of N.Korea and their nuclear program to the world, especially Japan, will be reduced. Without that threat, Japan’s interest in the US will slightly diminish as part of our relationship with Japan is based on their defense from Dear Leader.

-Iraq settles down in terms of insurgency in next year or two, but will still flare up occasionally, much like, say, Lebanon now.

-Afghanistan becomes tough struggle for next 5-10 years but eventually Taliban and Al Qaida will be permanently diminished. US will have reclaimed some international credibility and respect and there will be a small decrease in anti-americanism in Europe and Mid-East.

-Japan and China compete economically, but China has internal issues. The difference in the economies of the poor, central chinese and the chinese of the industrialized cities will render China not as powerful in the global scheme as predicted by some analysts. Japan’s economy expands unchecked, at the forefrunt of the the technological industry. I say this in the next 10 to 20 years.

-At the same time, I predict that the next developing power will in fact be Mexico.

-Relations between Russia and United States becomes more strained over issues of Iran and on nuclear proliferation. (5-10 years)

-Iran covertly tries to develop nuclear (warhead) capabilities, not just civilian nuclear power. (big surprise there). This happens in next 5-10 years.

- In 5-10 years or so years, Israel does what it did to Saddam and to Syria: precision (conventional) air strike on nuclear facilities, i.e enriching, processing, etc. Iran’s nuclear program back to square 1. Iran vows revenge, condemns their actions, but is unable to do anything about it. Russia condemns Israel’s actions, as does UN and NATO. US also condemns Israel’s “rash” actions but still unconditionally supports Israel. Relations b/t Iran and Israel, degrade further, and US and Russian relationship is further strained.

-In next 5 years, global economic crisis will slowly return to normal. I predict a second crisis in about 25-30 years.

-Pakistan helps Iran rebuild nuclear capabilities covertly. We figure this out through our intelligence agencies and impose sanctions to no avail. (10-25 years from now.)

-India also condemns Pakistan and Iran. Slowly, from 20 to 30 years from now, there is an emergence of two main powers (alliances.)
1. B/t US, Israel, UK, France (but so what about the French), India, and China (b/c of its economic interests in US).
2. Iran, Pakistan, Russia, Mexico.

Cuba has become a non issue, as has North Korea, which no longer are pursuing nuclear warheads.

We will end up having a smaller cold war that will last for about 15-20 years. Very scary time when it seems like Iran and Israel will commence nuclear exchange (seems inevitable). Same issue b/t US and Russia.

Globe will at same time undergo a second economic crisis. Russia will be hit hard, and so will its trade partners, especially those interested in commodities, such as Japan. US will ride through and survive. The countries that survive economic crash will win the second cold war.

Russian Federation will dissolve into three or four separate states. Trying to not make the same mistake twice, NATO and UN will immediately step in and help protect against further nuclear proliferation. Efforts prove to be a success. Russia becomes far less powerful.

Without any real backing from Russia, whose power has greatly diminished, Iran will make a desperate move. Isolated with no real allies or supporters, Iran, if still caught up in a radical Islamic mindset like that of the Ayatollah and Ahmedinejad, will try to drop their entire, though meager,nuclear arsenal on Israeli cities such as Tel Aviv. Israel will, before the detonations, retaliate by unloading their entire arsenal on Iran, wiping it off the map, practically. Syria and Egypt and many neighboring countries of Israel will invade Israel in retaliation as of about 2075, and US will step in on their behalf. This will be Wold War III. US and Israel will fight off invaders, however, fallout and after effects of the Iranian nuke render much of Israel uninhabitable and there will be a mass exodus from Israel to the US, England, Australia, etc. Russia and Mexico will then intervene against US for helping Israel and there will be an all out war between US and Russia.
The Russian front will be fought in the air and in space, probably not by nuclear weapons as the theory of Mutually assured Destruction is still applicable. Throughout 21st century, I predict that space will be the new frontier for the military. Whoever has control of the immediate outer space will prevail. i predict this to be America and the russians will lose this frontier as they are already too weak from the second cold war and 2nd economic downturn.

War with Mexico will be by land and by air, a much more conventional style of warfare. The Mexicans will invade the US through Arizona and Texas and through a bitter struggle, eventually recapture a portion of the Southwestern United States. Although Mexico will have developed a space program, they will not be technologically advanced enough to fight a war in space like US and Russia. This advantage if the US will prove to end the 2nd Mex-Am War. The lines will be redrawn, with Mexico extending somewhat into Texas and Arizona.
Relations will be strained for a good 10-15 years between US and Mexico, but eventually they will improve. That will be the last great war for a while.

On a side note, By 2100, I predict climate change and environmental issues will be greatly reduced but not wholly cured by moving towards alternative energies: for power plants: nuclear power, and for cars: electricity.