Market poised for a fall?

This chart is pretty scary. The S&P 500 has been in a trading zone for all of December (~127.8 to 125.8) and it doesn't seem like I seen patterns like this go on to make new highs. The market was down pretty hard today--we will see if that continues...

Good advice on common trading mistakes

Pretty good article on avoiding trading mistakes. One of his comments is about dumping stocks that have turned into dogs. It is really hard to admit mistakes, but I would have been much better off dumping these dogs (CMTN, INTC, EMC) and just earning standard bank interest on them, rather than wait for them to come back.

http://www.decisionpoint.com/TAcourse/TradeMistakes.html

Are Apple's recent downgrades "fluffy news"

In my highly academic analysis I have been categorizing business news as "F" (Fluffy) or “NF“ (Non-Fluffy). When Google quadruples its profit that counts as non-fluffy news, when Google buys 5% of AOL in a deal that has been telegraphed for weeks that probably counts as Fluffy news. Downgrades feel like they are somewhere in between. They can really knock down a stock, but how substantial are they? By law these analysts can't really know what is going on within the company, so they are reduced to sifting through tea leaves in hopes of actually being right once in a while.