If you’ve been paying attention to the crisis in Greece, you’re probably curious like I am what’s going to happen there. I’m not sure however that you need a strong opinion in order to make money on it.

The Crisis

Ultimately the crisis in Greece boils down to two things:

• The Greeks spent too much and lied about it.
• The other Euro states don’t want them to default, but don’t really want to bail them out.

Germany, the Euro country in the best position to bail them out wants to see serious improvements in their fiscal policy and serious cuts before they extend help.  In fact they’re hoping that just hinting around about giving aid will be enough to calm the bond market down.  It’s not clear however that their populace will put up with the idea of bailing out Greece so that Greeks can retire 10 years before them.  This of course highlights some of the conundrums the EU faces.

The Likely Outcome

Most people think some kind of bail-out will be worked out.  Greece will agree to spending cuts and other criteria and the most fiscally fit EU countries will help them out.  Order will be restored and faith in the EU will be revived.  In fact this is almost assured, because if they don’t bail out Greece, Portugal will probably default right behind them and several countries after that.  The EU can’t afford that kind of crisis so they will help, even though they won’t like it.

If you’re confident in this outcome, you could simply buy calls on the FXE.  Once order is restored in the European Union, the currency rebound and you’ll rake in the easy money.  Of course that’s assuming a lot of things.

The Black Swan

In his book The Black Swan, the author argues (I’m poorly summarizing here), that people by their nature underestimate the likelihood of the improbable.  Because of this you should always bet on the improbable because you’re getting better value for your money.  This is of course a painful strategy to accept, since most of your bets will be losers.  Of course your winners will be magnificent.

In the case of Greece, there is an interesting opportunity to just assume something interesting is going to happen.  Simply buy slightly out of the money calls and slightly out of the money puts.  If order is restored and the FXE rises, the gains should offset your losses on the puts.  If something unforeseen happens, then you will make a fortune on your puts, more than offsetting your losses in the long position.  The only situation in which you lose heavily is if the EU manages to punt the issue down the line and keep the FXE where it is.  So if you think this is a possibility then you probably wouldn’t want to make this trade.

Photo Credit: alaskapine

2009 has gotten me this way a couple of times. The problem is that I genuinely believe we’re in circumstances unlike any we’ve seen before.  This causes me to “rethink” things far too often for my own good.  Here’s a typical example of what I’ve done a couple of times.  I decided at one point to go long TLT (Long Term Treasuries) as a hedge against some other positions.  I sold a call off the position as well to limit my downside.  The plan was if the trade moved the other way I would double up the position to increase my exposure and even out the hedge.

So of course TLT has a huge downward move, much larger than I expected.  I start thinking about the economy and I get worried and I decide just to let my current position ride instead of doubling up.  Of course TLT recovers part of the way.  Had I doubled up my position as I had planned when I entered the position, that trade would have become a neutral one.  Instead it was quite a loser and offset the gain in the position it was hedging.

I committed similar folly with a position in energy stocks.  Basically I keep convincing myself that the unprecedented market conditions overcome my plan.  Don’t get me wrong, it’s fine to decide that unanticipated news has affected your plan. But when this happens, you need to close out your position, take a step back and decide what makes sense. Instead I tookthe “middle ground” and start improvising and making it up as I go.  This is completely self destructive.  Once you have a plan, you stick with it.

Read more about psychology in my Trading Psychology feature.

Photo Credit: George E. Norkus

Natural gas is a tricky trade.  While market psychology plays a huge role even in commodity trades, the price is in the throes of some serious fundamental impacts.  The price skyrocketed to reach spectacular highs in 2008 and has plummeted since.  Even as it has declined, it’s been a popular buy by some as evidenced by the fact that the UNG ETF has run out of shares until regulators approve more.

When it comes to natural gas, the ETF can provide an easy way to trade the underlying commodity.  I’m not interested in getting a futures trading account, so the fund works well enough for me.  More importantly however, looking at the trailing 12 months or so in this fund can provide a couple of excellent lessons.  First let’s watch some analysis:

Now if you watched that video the first thing I think you can see is this:  Don’t trade against the monthly trend. You don’t have to trade with the monthly trend, but you definitely don’t want to trade against it.  The other lesson, which is just as important, is: Money management is more important than being right.

If you look at the examples in question, the Trade Triangle system produced 9 trades in that time period, 5 were winners and 4 were losers.  So that’s right around 50% results.  The difference is, the losers were tiny and the winners were huge.  That’s your goal as a trader.  You need to accept right now that you are going to be wrong. Trading is about probabilities and putting them all in your favor.  That’s why I wrote about setting a “stop” point for any trade you enter.  If your losers are small and your winners are big then you will make a fortune.  You don’t even have to be right half the time, if you can make your wins big enough.

As for right now, my interpretation is that the overall trend is still downward, but that the moderate term has turned up.  I would basically say this means “hands off.”  I’d wait for some real signs of an up-side breakout before I went long in this fund.  Of course that’s strictly on a technical basis, for all we know the government may mandate CNG cars soon and UNG will go to 100.  If you want to keep up with UNG, you can get a free trend analysis here, which will give you an idea of whether it’s turned or not.

Free Trend Analysis of UNG ETF

Photo Credit: EnergyTomorrow