These irrational markets offer some exciting intra-day trading opportunities but it requires nerves of steel or a devil-may-care attitude, neither of which I possess (but I'm working on it).
Take my favourite, BHP: it opened at $35.80, went as high as $36.04 by mid-morning before dropping to $35.08 just before lunch. It recovered to $35.65 for much of the afternoon, before the day's close at $35.64.
Daytrading is based on the premise that no one ever went broke taking a profit, and while no one ever bought in at the very bottom and sold out at the very top, even a trade from $35.80 down to $35.10 and then back again to $35.60 would have netted a cool $12,000 (before brokerage) on 10,000 shares, $24,000 on 20,000 shares, $60,000 on 50,000 shares, etc.
And it isn't just BHP; the banks, too, have huge intra-day trading ranges: CBA, from $68.29 to $69.66; NAB, from $18.42 to $18.90; WBC, from $17.88 to $18.39. Even good ol' WOW ranged from $35.97 to $36.95.
Of course, all this is with wonderful hindsight, and these are the sort of charts they are spruiking at those daytrading seminars which I've never attended and never will. If I ever made that sort of money in just one day, I may well be the very first daytrader in history who'd ever done so.
"What a day for a daydream; Custom made for a daydreamin' boy; And now I'm lost in a daydream; Dreamin 'bout my bundle of joy."
