TIM $14,988, Down $150, Holding A Potential Spiker Overnight
The most volatile segments of the trading day are at the market open and the market close. Sure, there’s a lot of time in between, but most price moves don’t occur then, so it’s best to focus on the first and last hour every day. I already wrote about how pathetic this morning was, but this afternoon, there were 2 low priced stocks I considered buying into the market close for probable gap ups tomorrow morning.
Just before 3pm, $200mil+ Smith & Wesson Holding Corp (SWHC), a stock that has gotten absolutely crushed over the past year, was already up 13% from $4.60 to $5.20, threatening to take out the day high at that price. The question was whether it could continue breaking out into the close because it’d already taken out 3 day highs, each one just a few pennies above the prior highs.
I kept it on my watch list, but it was CTI Industries Corp. (CTIB) that really caught my eye. With only a $13 mil marketcap and a proven history of ridiculously quick spiking, it was up nearly 25% to $5.35 on strong volume, also breaking out above the morning highs and more importantly, the highs set just last week when it spiked to $5.27 before fading back to $4.80. I figured it’d run into the close but I patiently waited until the last few minutes because the spread between the bid and ask was so great and a strong close not assured. Insiders bought a ton at $4.87 last wee, so that would get people excited too. But the stock dropped 20 cents and took nearly 30 minutes to get back to $5.35. With 25 minutes before the close, I could wait no longer—the stock printed $5.38 and looked to go to $5.50and beyond—so I bought 700 shares at $5.35.
Unfortunately right after I bought, volume fell off a cliff and the stock gradually downtrended to close at $5.15. I thought about sucking up the $150ish loss, but decided to give it a chance overnight, considering the stock moves in spikes, not gradual uptrends and there’s a pretty good chance it’ll spike at the market open, if not be able to breakout to new highs. After-hours buying in the $5.20-$5.35 range gives me a solid chance.
Unluckily, SWHC was the one I coulda woulda shoulda bought, besting all previous intraday breakouts by spiking 30 cents in the last 15 minutes. Looks good for a gap up, but it’s already come very far very fast. Too bad, simply chose the wrong horse, but based on the variables I had to work with, a good choice.
Posted in Patterns To Buy