Bernard Madoff, Trust in Markets, and More

* Investor Trust - I recently did a short segment for First Business TV and was asked if Bernard Madoff's confession and jailing would help restore investor confidence. My reply was that confidence has not only been broken with respect to regulation and enforcement, but with the entire notion of buy-and-hold. Professional money managers are fleeing to lower risk strategies, less leverage, and more liquid markets. That is not a trend that will turn on a dime.

* Setups - I've been posting quite a bit on recognizing the structure of market days. Getting that call right on whether we're trending or range bound is half the day trading battle. After that, it's a matter of mastering execution on three basic setups. I'll be focusing on that in future posts.

* Mentorship - In case you missed my Twitter link, here's the post on the mentorship program that Charles Kirk is offering. Great opportunity, IMO.

* Sentiment Data - My recent post took a look at Data Explorers and their unique measure of stock and sector sentiment. Here's a paper that investigates the results of a trading strategy that utilizes those data.

* Big Themes - This is a very worthwhile article touching upon earnings weakness, problems in Japan, and competitive devaluation from Switzerland.
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