FTSE100 went up some 50 points earlier on and I am kicking myself for not having gone Long as I planned to do so before the market opened - what put me off from opening a position was at the time the US futures were going down slightly and as well as that the FTSE itself opened a few good points below its Friday's close of 6419.

Important release of PCE inflation firgures for the US is due to be released an hour before the market opens and the estimation is for a .1% rise compared with a bigger rise of .3% last time. I will not commit myself to opening any positions until I have a good reason to do so! Plus as PCE figures are a market mover, it would be best to stay away until later.

MSFT vs GDP

MSFT announced great results for the quarter yesterday after the close - its EPS was better by 4c than what was estimated (46c) - and its shares naturally have been marked up pre-market and it has received the usual euphoric reactions from the Investment Houses by having been upgraded to something like $36.

On the other hand the US GDP for the first quarter has just been declared and at 1.3% it's .5% below the expectations - the futures temporarily reacted negatively but the open is going to be hard to read for me - it's going to be Microsoft against the GDP result - but for me, I am staying out of the market and will not open any CFD positions till things get much clearer -- having said that a correction will soon be around the corner - we shall see...

A sweet bite of the Apple!

Going on from the previous post APPLE did me a great favour today or should I say my Broker did, as I managed to hit a Sell Order at 103.00 pre-market and had no hesitation in closing my short position with a profit of 275 points at 100.25 - with hindsight I could have let the position run for a bit longer as the share price ended the session at 98.84 eventually - but hey let's not get too greedy and I must be extremely pleased with myself instead - only if trading was always that easy, I could be named the wizard of the stock market and doing it with CFD gives me a special feeling even after many years of trading!

Now, let's not get too carried away as tomorrow is another day or to be precise another daytrading day!!

A Short bite of the Apple!

I am sure by now you are aware that Apple-aapl has had a superb quarter going by the results they released yesterday. But for those who read between the lines; going forward their numbers will be short of the consensus. Namely, their estimates for the EPS will be short by 1c and the revenue will fall short by 0.35 Billion - so there may be a good opportunity for CFD traders who may like to play it shrewdly by biding their time and allowing the mug punters to buy into the stock first and when they think the stock is overbought they could start their foray by opening short positions on the stock.




Again, I like to stress when trading CFDs it is extremely important to time your enteries as precisely as possible unless you have an unlimited amount of margin in your account.

Increase Blog Traffic With Z-List - Misc Item

This has got nothing to do with trading CFDs, just a one-off post for all bloggers who want to increase their readers:

The Z-List is a concept started in December 2006 by Mack Collier from A Viral Garden as a meme. A meme is a "unit of cultural information" which can propagate from one mind to another in a manner analogous to genes. The Z list is a blog meme, which has bloggers creating and sharing a list of many links to blogs in a single post.

If you wish to participate you should copy and paste a list of blogs in a post and include those blogs that you think should get more exposure. It is called the Z-list because it is a list of blogs not having much traffic in contrast to the A-list blogs. By publishing this list you will increase your Technorati Rank, Google Page Rank, get more traffic and more friends.

After you post this list in a post this will get reflected in Technorati and blog owners who check up on who is linking to them will find out about it and will come over to visit your blog and perhaps become interested enough (depending on your blog content) to leave a comment or even subscribe to your feed.

Here are the steps to follow in order to add the list :

1. Create a new post.
2. Copy and Paste the entire list of blog links below
3. Add any blogs that you want to include near the top of the list.
4. Include the blog where you first got the list from, on the list in your post.
5. Make sure that all links point to each blog’s homepage.
6. Publish the Post.

You can join the list at any time. There are no fees. It is free. Copy and paste the list below. Add any other blogs you wish:

The CFD Traders
Dummies Guide to Google Blogger Beta
Make Money Online With Dosh Dosh
A Viral Garden
Connected Internet
Blog-Op
Can I Make Big Money Online
Blogtrepreneur
Blogging to Fame
Million Dollar Experiment heads Down Under
Kumiko’s Cash Quest
Calico Monkey
Internet Bazaar
Shotgun Marketing Blog
BrandSizzle
bizsolutionsplus
Customers Rock!
Being Peter Kim
Pow! Right Between The Eyes!
Billions With Zero Knowledge
Working at Home on the Internet
MapleLeaf 2.0
Two Hat Marketing
darrenbarefoot.com
The Emerging Brand
One Reader at a Time
One blogger’s experiment in building and engaging with online communities.
Ruminate this site
Reviews blogs and sites so that we don’t have to.
SMogger Social Media Blog
The ethical use of social media for bloggers and other web users.
SuccessCREEations
Blog Consultant bringing the twin passions of business and blogging together.
Successful Blog
The legendary Liz Strauss, blogger extraordinaire and creator of the SOB award.
Troy Worman's Blog
Focus on writing, ideas and connections
Copywriter's Crucible
The importance of copy in corporate blogging
Copywriting Tuneups
How to measure reading effectiveness and why it is important in the blogosphere
Dipping into the Blogpond
Blogging about starting an Internet company in the Sutherland Shire.
BrandSizzle
Broad and deep insight into the branding process.
Own Your Brand!
Blog to help businesses re-imagine their brands.
The Emerging Brand
Corporate branding blog focused on leadership.
The Engaging Brand
Using technology and marketing knowledge to improve business communications.
What is Brand?
Japanese readers/speakers? Anyone?
Presentation Zen
(Site in English) Tips for great presentations, marketing, and business communications.
Dummies Guide to Google Blogger Beta
Complete help on the new blogger. Blogger Hacks, Blogger templates. Adsense. Search engine Optimization.
Bob Sutton
Discussions of “jerks” in business.
Perspective
Health, wealth and the freedom to choose. Archived blog. New one is jugaad (http://www.nitibhan.com/jugaad).
Ramblings from a Glass Half Full
Views on business life.
Simplicity Mary’s Blog
Business development, marketing troubleshooting
Funny Business
Wide ranging discussion on business with a funny and pictorial approach.
Creative Think
Fun Ideas to stimulate your creativity.
The Copywriting Maven
Marketing and SEO copywriting tips.
Brain Based Biz
Tips for stirring creativity in business.
Experienceology
How to create great customer experiences on the web and in the “real” world.
Creating Passionate Users
raving lunacy
Anne 2.0
Emily Chang - eHub
Darren Barefoot - Vancouver Technologist, Writer, Raconteur, Miscellanist
Liz Strauss at Successful Blog - Thinking, writing, business ideas ...
ALLIED by Jeneane Sessum
Presentation Zen
good to know
Logic+Emotion
gillianic tendencies
Steve's 2 Cents
Listics - Frank Paynter's Voice and Vision
Escape from Cubicle Nation
Blog Sisters: Where men can link, but they can't touch
Designers who Blog
E-Commerce Blog by Solid Cactus
Brand Autopsy
Unconventional Thinking
The Boomer Chronicles
Renovate Your Life with Craig
I Dream of Kimchee
The Moronosphere
SYLVIA HUBBARD'S STORIES
Paula Mooney
Inspiration Lane
me,myself & me
A Gota de Ran Tan Plan
How Can I do That
Bonnie Writes
Flee the CubeStarting up a small business in web design.
Community Guy
Online and offline community building tips and tricks.
A Free and Decent Blog Host
Technology news focusing on blogs and blog software
Billions With Zero Knowledge
Changing the world with little bits of knowledge
Connected Internet
All things to do with technology, mobile phones and gaming.
darrenbarefoot.com
Tech news, writing and marketing
Deepak
Focuses on the technology of the Internet and loves Google.
MapleLeaf 2.0
Tech news stories relating to Canada
Scott Burkett's Pothole on the Infobahn
Musings on technology, IT management, and online community.
Small Surfaces
Interaction design, user interface design, user experience, usability and social trends related to mobile devices.
TechBuzz
Tech new and reviews written by 17 year old in India. Awesome.
Masey.com
Design and photography blog.
Through the Lenses
Travel/photography blog includes stunning shots and photography tips.
Travel And Vacation On Blog
Lightweight travel guide/destination information on selected cities. Needs more.
The Best Guides to eCommerce with Favor
Viral marketing tools, memes and SEO tips.
Web Metrics Guru
Web analytics, in particular for blogs
The Future of the Web
Use of new technologies for the web.
Social Media on the fly

IMPORTANT

If you wish to copy the above list go to View----->Page Source (Ctrl+U) in Firefox and View----->Source in Internet Explorer and scroll down until you come to the list of links and copy and paste it in the Edit Html tab of your post editor and then publish. This will save you time from putting in each link separately.

Consider "Arbing" a possibility

For those of you who have not tried Arbing before as a relatively safe way of beating the market, I would like to draw your attention to this unique method of making money:

I personally have a CFD trading account with more than one Stock Broker - this gives me the chance of getting the best odds from the market - one of the instances which this provides is when two Brokers offer different prices for the same instrument - for instance last night I noticed IGINDEX were offering 6437-6443 for the FTSE100 and CMCMARKETS 6445-6449 for the same instrument. So I grabbed the opportunity and sold the FTSE with CMCMARKETS at 6445 and bought the same instrument with IGINDEX at 6443 - this morning to my delight both sets of prices came close to each other, in fact, IGINDEX were showing better prices, so I closed both positions by buying from CMCMARKETS at 6457 [-12] and selling to IGINDEX at 6460 [+17] - hence making a profit of +5 points in aggregate. I hope you got the gist of what arbing could do.

Well, as I mentioned in my earlier post I managed to short the Dow at 12985 and got out at 12950 for a 35 plus which is good going by any day-trading standards! And I must admit my wishes for the Amazon.com to beat their estimates did happen and they surpassed the market expectation of 16c a share by a wide margin as they earned 26c per share - so this may encourage the bulls further to push the prices higher when the market reopens tomorrow, which would be good for those like myself who would like to open short positions at higher levels.

UK main index is down nearly 50 points as I am typing with the US futures are showing more or less on the level par despit TI - TXN results announced yesterday after the bell which were better than forecasts.

In UK the results from Yell and the giant BP weren't that brilliant and that together with yet again the fear of the interest rates rises were to blame for the UK stocks' downside movements.

In US later on at 10:00 am (E.T.), figures for the "Consumers Confidence" (105) and "Existing Home Sales" (6.45 m) are to be published.

If the Crude prices stay as high as they are at the moment, near $66 and the Dow revisits its high of 12980's, I should be tempted to open a short position and will be taking profits as soon as it materialises.

How not to beat the market as a day trader!

For those of you who thought there was an error in the title, "no, wrong .... there was not"! -- It was just a way of grabbing extra attention to highlight how easy it can be to shrink your capital when day trading using CFDs ... and these are some ways, which you can use to achieve it:

1- Trade the indices as casually as possible with no stop-losses at all.
2- Place a trade using maximum stake so that you barely leave yourself any margin in your trading account.
3- Enter & exit trades without having a pre-planned system.
4- Open as many positions as you want.
5- Switch off your monitor in a volatile market and go and play golf with your mates.
6- Stay on the phone to your mother during a triple witching hour!

24 hours later!

It was only 24 hours ago when evreryone was panicking to off-load their stocks as there was going to be no tomorrow on sight. Could it be that the "Shanghai boys" were trying it on the rest of us so that they could buy themselves some cheap stocks? But, seriously it is really amazing how investors seem to forget about the bad news in matters of hours with no good reason either - I wish that human beings forgot about their differences in exactly the same manner as well. If they had, our planet would have been a pleasant place to live on with enough stocks to go round for all!!

Just to stress, the Shanghai stocks recovered all the previous day's losses while the West was resting and that together with some great results from the US companies have given good incentives for the major world markets to progress further - as things stand the US stocks are set to have another record beating day today and let's hope for the benefit of the Bulls   Ahmadinejad's men will not come into contact with some loose sailors trying to fish in the Persian Gulf waters!!

Within the last few minutes Merrill Lynch and Merk & Co have both come up with consensus beating results and that should go somewhere to support the market, although Merk's 2007 outlook seems to be a shade below TF's estimates.

China the Culprit again!

For the second time in a matter of weeks the fall in Chinese Stock Market has wiped out Billions .. off the major global stock markets across the world - in a few hours after the US Dow and S&P had pulled themselves to their peaks, the Chinese stocks sold off due to yet another possibility of interest rate hike by the Chinese authorities. On Thursday the news of a 3.3% rise in CPI was another indicator that another rate rise may be in the pipeline sooner than later.

As a result, the stocks futures have been marked down considerably at the moment and as things stand, the US is heading for a shaky open. Ebay may be one of the few stocks which could defy the market forces due to better than expected results that was published after the bell yesterday. I expect once the panic is settled down the market overall should start to recover the lost ground. We shall see ...

Don't gamble on results

When you are using CFD's you cannot really afford to take wild chances - leaving your cfd positions open before a company reports is nothing short of a 50-50 gamble which is something professional and wise traders would normally be very reluctant to do. To emphasise this point further let's take Yahoo which published its results last night as an expample:

Yahoo's share price closed at $32.09 last night - a few minutes after the close Yahoo announced that its quarterly profit fell by 11% - as a result in the after-hours trading its share price lost roughly $2.70 - now imagine you were Long 1000 CFDs on this stock - this not only would have not pleased your bank manager, it would have also got you lots of naggings and blames from your other half for having departed with a cool $2700 in a short space of time! --- So if I were you I would avoid all temptations as a CFD trader; and I would always try to employ a very rigid self-control mechanism.

The major stock markets in Europe have given back some of their gains today after having climbed up to record levels yesterday. The UK sotcks were shaken by the news that the Bank of England may yet again be forced to raise the interest rates in order to tame the inflation levels.

The Pound broke through the $2 barrier for the first time in 15 years.

The US Futures have pulled back before the Consumers Prices being announced within the next hour. And let's not forget the big heavyweights reporting this evening after the US close. My advice is to run your open CFD positions with tight STOP LOSSES if you feel obliged to keep any of them open in the first place.

Today eventually, the FTSE100, hit a new high after nearly three months, and it's showing a healthy gain as I am typing. Later on today before the US market opens the Retail Sales will be out and an Ex-Auto figure of 0.7% is expected compared with -0.1% the previous month.

Tomorrow, after the close of the US market, some heavyweight companies will be releasing their 1st quarter results, namely Intel, IBM and Yahoo. So I would make sure that I would not be running big CFD postions on these stocks unless I was pretty sure of the outcome!!

All the major world markets made good gains overnight, with the Nikkei being the top gainer - ASX200 once again topped its previous high. The US futures are showing up at the present.

Going on from my previous post when I mentioned "trading the indices using CFDs should be left to absolute professionals", this was further reiterated by losses overnight in two major world markets; the Tokyo market (Nikkei) lost nearly 200 points and the ASX200 of Australia fell despite the fact that the USA stocks performed well yesterday with all its major indices gained across the board.

When you are using CFDs, you just cannot afford to make too many mistakes because of the risks involved in losing far more than your intitial investment. In fact if you allow apathy to creep in and you are not on your toes at all times, you can easily lose all your capital or even more at times! Effectively, a CFD trader can never sit back and relax unlike a normal investor who is really not too bothered by the daily ups and downs in his/her equities or portfolio.

Later on today an hour before the US stock market opens, the Producers Prices Index firgures will be released. The figure to look for is the core PPI which is expected to be .2%, anything above that will affect the market negatively and a figure below that will have the reverse effect - NOTE: "the PPI is a real market mover specially the CORE FIGURE".

Sector Trading

I know lots of people trade the Forex market, some as amateures and some traders make a good living out of it doing it full-time as professional traders - at the same time there are a huge number of traders who only concentrate on trading the main Sotcks Indices, like the Dow Jones, SP500 of the USA, UK FTSE100, the German DAX30 and so on ... but if you have been watching the markets for a number of years, you may prefer to trade the SECTORS .....

In my experience trading a certain sector using CFDs is far more managable and rewarding than trading the FOREX market or the indices - some indices are very difficult instruments to trade; NIKKEI225 of Japan for instance has very wide trading ranges and it has been known to have fluctuated many 100's of points on the same day and if you happen not to play it professionally by not having used the correct STOP LOSSES or had a bad "Entry Point" to start with or did not apply a good "money mangement system", specifically if you are only a small trader, you could soon find yourself withdrawing more money out of your bank account to respond to your Broker's MARGIN CALLs; Whereas if you happen to pick a group of companies with the same nature of businesses like the BANKS (banking sector), the MINERS (mining sector), the RETAILERS (retailing sector) and so on ... and have done your financial studies correctly on them i.e. you know the PE ratios of the sector, dividend yeilds, the PEG factor or other fundamental factors which you normally use, and ... in addition to that you are also aware of the highs and lows of that particular sector, then as a trader you have made life a lot easier for yourself ... and the likelyhood that your CFD postion will give you a handsome profit is a lot higher.

Another attraction of trading the sectors on CFDs is that most brokers require only 1% margin for opening a new position, whereas if you just traded the stocks on their own you could be required to outlay a margin of anything from 3% to 20% depending on the broker's requirements.

Also, it is worth bearing in mind that sometimes when you trade a stock like for instance Vodafone or Sage Grp in the UK market, you may not have the necessary fluctuation in that stock to either day-trade the stock or scalp it often enough to give you a profit on the day, whereas in trading the sectors you will find, it will offer you more movements to enable you to take a profit at the end of your trading day. Hence, no need to roll over your position to the next trading day, which will in effect, save you additional costs and will eliminate the risk of your transaction.

The US market wasn't all that lively yesterday as TRADERS were not prepared to commit themselves to take a position either way due to the FED's minutes being published later on today. The Futures hovering above the flat line at the moment and the UK FTSE100 and the DAX30 of Frankfurt are expected to open slightly above their closing prices of yesterday.

Last night Alcoa the Aluminum maker was the first company to release their first quarter results which were above the market estimates.

UK stock market opens today after the long weekend. For those who may fancy opening a LONG position on the main index, the FTSE 100, it's worth bearing in mind that the index is only about 50 points away from its high of many years. So for my money I would only DAY TRADE it as things are at the moment. While we are on this subject, I would say in my experience the FTSE 100 is one of the better indices to trade and I personally think it is far easier to read the direction of this instrument than for instance the DAX30 or the Dow where "day trading" is concerned.

Lucky-7 for the Dow but only just - as the US 30 index finished in the black for the 7th day on the trot. With the FOMC Minutes due on Wednesday and the PPI figures out on Friday, traders were reluctant to bid the prices much higher today, although the Dow was showing a gain of +30 at one stage.

The "sell off" in the Crude Oil which was expected last week when Iran freed the British Sailors happened today when the price of each barrel fell below $62.00, more than $2.00 below its closing prices last Thursday.

Stock Markets recovery

It now seems that the major stock markets across the world have got their confidence back and 2 major markets have particularly performed better than others. For instance the DAX30 of Germany not only has recovered from the major losses we had a few weeks ago, it has even hit a new all-time high of 7100 and those who opened a Long CFD POSITION when it went below 6500 in mid March are showing a healthy profit now. In my experience, with the DAX you would be far better GOING LONG than shorting it when the TREND is up.

ASX200, of Australia, has had very much a similar story to the DAX30. Its strength has also been supported by the gains of the heavyweight mining companies Rio Tinto and BILLITON which exist within its index. As we know the metal prices have been very strong lately.

Asian markets gain

The major Asian markets had healthy gains overnight with the Nikkei 225 scoring more than 200 points by the closing time. This was mainly a response to the above expection of the US Nonfarm Payroll numebrs which came in as 180k.

The US Futures' prices for the major indices, Dow Jones, S&P500 and the Nasdaq have all entered well inside the positive territories at the moment - markets across Europe will not open until tomorrow.

With today being the Good Friday, the major world stock markets are closed. Overnight the Nikkei finished just in the red.

The hightlight of the day is going to be the release of the figures for the US Nonfarm Payrolls, which is estimated to be around 140k - a much lower figure will obviously effect the stock markets negatively when they open next week and a much higher figure could still bring the stock markets down on the assumption that the FED may yet again hike the interest rates in order to prevent the inflation.

As expected the UK interest rates were kept unchanged at 5.25% and that allowed the shares to rally a bit - at this very moment the UK FTSE100 is up by (+10) points recovering from earlier (-15). Most banking stocks are showing black patches for the moment - in about half an hour the US weeky "Initial Claims" numbers will be out - the market has a forecast of 320k - this normally has not have a huge impact on the market - I expect the US market will move within a limited range today UNLESS the price of the Crude Oil changes a great deal in either direction.

UK interest rates are to be announced in a few hours time - the market is generally expecting the Bank of England to keep the rates as they are at 5.25% - if there's any shock news and it has happened before, the  market will  definitely react   negatively even   if it  only lasts until the US market opens later on.

With the British sailors flew home yesterday, not on a Persian carpet by the way as there's none big enough to seat 15 people, the stock markets around the world can now get on with their business with no excuse. Having said that some traders are reluctant to take serious POSITIONS because of the Easter Bank holidays ahead. On a more important front, the news of the Monthly Nonfarm Payrolls in the US, scheduled to be announced tomorrow which has coincided with the Easter holidays - TRADERS ought to practice more caution. This news item is a real market mover - so watch your bets you CFD traders out there.

The Crude prices temporarily dropped after it was announced the British sailors were to be released but that news was offset by disappointing data on oil stockpiles in the US, the world's biggest consumer of energy - the price of US Crude has been oscillating between 64 and 65 for the past 24 hours - I would suspect, if there is no more hanky-panky by the sailors around the world the prices should eventually come down!!

The Dow managed another day of gains yesterday, it finished 20 points in the black - the Nikkei225 lost half a centuary overnight, with the Australian ASX200 finished in the red by a deficit of 20 points - as a result the out of hours US markets have been marked down slightly - the FTSE100 of UK and the Dax30 of Germany are mostly expected to start trading unchanged from yesterday's closings.

Crude Oil prices are gradually losing momentum partly due to the sailors dispute should be resolved through diplomacy soon - so for those who play the oil companies like BP & Shell from the UK index, I would make sure not to take any CFD positions unless you can tell the direction of the crude prices - BP carries a lot of weight in FTSE100.

Stock Markets across the world have been pulling each other up - overnight the Nikkei went up by another 300 points - as I said watch your CFD bets with this monster - those who went short yesterday would not be smiling this morning.

The Australian ASX200 hit the record high of 6097, partly due to that metal prices have been in a bullish mood of the late and the Australian Index includes some havyweight miners as its main components.

In another few minutes the UK market will open and the expectation is for further gain in FTSE100, although there are some bad news in the papers about the drug comapnies Glaxosmithkline and Astrazeneca - Glaxo is a heavyweight company in the UK index.

40 minutes into the US trading and the DOW is showing a healthy gain of 100 points - the oil has fallen below 65 and it is partly to blame for the gain - FTSE surprisingly is not following the DOW on this occasion - in fact traders seem to be shorting it slightly - I guess that is because they expect the DOW to lose its gain any minute as has been the case recently - but care has to be taken into account as at this particular time there's no reason why the US market should not hold on to its gain - UNLESS the Crude takes another leap upwards, the bulls should be in charge even if it's only for a few hours!!

The US market will open in 30 minutes and all the main indices, the Dow Jones Industrials, S&P500 and Nasdaq industrials are set to start much higher than where they finished yesterday. Later on in the evening after the bell there will be the figures for the Auot Sales released which is expected to be around 5.1M -

The trading has been very choppy lately so the way to play your CFD bets would be to set logical profit goals and take them as soon as your goals have been reached - it's best if you set "limit orders" to do this so that would even cover the instances when the wife or your girlfriend bothers you for some reason as they normally having a habit of doing!!

FTSE100 and the German Dax are heading for a good start today as the Nikkei and other Asian markets had a good day overnight. Nikkei regained most of its losses from yesterday and traders who did not close their LONG POSITIONS yesterday were patting themselves on the back this morning. Those who are still asleep could wake up to a nice surprise!!

We've mentioned Nikkei a few times in the last couple of posts, my advice is try not to trade this index if you are not quite an experienced trader. Its fluctuations are very wild and sudden and if you happen not to have too much Margin you could blow away most of your capital. Even if you think you have the required experience in trading CFD's, I would still recommend that you ought to use the minimum stakes when trading this instrument.

It's nearly 15 minutes before the US opens and the Dow have been marked up by 15 points or so. The Crude is showing below 66 and the main European indices are all in the gain and the Scalpers have been in and out like crazy as normal!

The market in UK opened a bit shakey on the grounds that Tokyo overnight dropped a few hundreds while the Anglo-saxons were fast asleep. I bet the guys who were running CFD LONG postions on the Nikkei weren't all that pleased when they woke up and checked their screens - also, hope that they did not spill their hot drinks on the hot spots of their body while in a shock!!

The Uk market gradually got its confidence back and at on stage it went up by 30 or so points - the Crude oil prices dropped a few 10's of cents for a while which allowed the Cruel and the uncompromising Dow future to go up by 20 or so points but it did not last for long when the guys in funny trousers and zebra jackets started taking long positions in the Crude again - I think these guys must have been on the phone to the President Ahmadinejad and He must have said to them "Ve Vill still entertain the British sailors for a few more days!!

The fact that the insurers and the heavyweight Vodafone were upgraded did help the Uk index as well. So naturally, Prudential , Aviva and Legal & General all got on the blue side of the carpet. BTW - this was not the same carpet as the one Ahmadinejad was sitting on earlier on ...!