TradeMaster Daily Stock Alerts Blog

Stock prices have a one-way ticket lower it seems. Even today, when oil prices were lower in the morning, stocks couldn’t hold their gains. As much as I like TRIGRs non-oil long stocks, the real opportunity is clearly on the short side.

TRIGRs Top 5 Shorts has been dominated by financials and homebuilders, with an occaisonal bio-tech or car rental company thrown in. Hovnanian (NYSE:HOV), Beazer (NYSE:BZH) and WCI (NYSE:WCI) were all there last Tuesday July 1. Those stocks have dropped 12%, 17% and 4%, resepctively, since Tuesday. These results are based on opening prices. The homebuilders rallied last Tuesday, so a well-timed entry ( say around 10:30 am, July 1) would have improved these results.

Tuesday’s Top 5 Shorts also included FirstFederal (NYSE:FED) and First Marblehead (NYSE:FMD). They’ve dropped 19% and and 10% since.

CompuCredit (Nasdaq:CCRT) made the list Wednesday July 2 and is down 13% since. Taylor Capital Group (Nasdaq:TAYC) also from July 2 is essentially flat. The final two from July 2, Circuit City (NYSE:CC) and Radian Group (NYSE:RDN) have made gains, with Radian up significantly on a managemnet change. I don’t know how new management is going to fix the company, which makes me think today’s 40% gain is a good opportunity to get short. We’ll see what TRIGR has to say tomorrow.

Dollar Thrifty Automotive Group (NYSE:DTG) showed up on the Top 5 Short list Thursday July 3. It’s down 10% so far. But considering that it has a mandatory purchase contract with Chrysler, there are probably more losses to come for the stock. And more gains for anyone short that same stock.

Ian

For important information and a disclaimer, click here.