GOOG, Google Inc., is hiring thousands of new employees around the world? This sign of aggressive growth comes a few days ahead of their quarterly earnings. I am excited to see how they performed last quarter. Keep an eye on GOOG stock this week.

From Yahoo News:

Set to launch on July 18, InstantBull lets investors sift through the most popular stock message boards at Yahoo Finance, Raging Bull, and SiliconInvestor, to name a few.

InstantBull also aggregates news, blogs, and vital financial stats for publicly traded companies. You need to click just once or scroll over an item to make it appear on the screen. The site is lightning fast, and there's no software to download to get started. Oh yeah, it's free.

I just wanted to point out this service that I use. I use Instantbull daily when I need to research a stock REALLY fast, so take a look at InstantBull.

Frank at Technicator has released Charter 3.0, a popular update to his stock charting platform software. It is a stock trader's dream.

I have been using it for a few days and it is awesome. The annotation feature is fixed and he has also integrated Voodoo charts. There is even a Bloomberg TV feed built into the stock chart software. 

Go download Charter 3.0 because I guarantee you will be happy with it. 

I am in the middle of a site migration this weekend as I upgrade the web hosting on this site. I am working closely with the new webhost to make the process seamless, so there SHOULDN'T be any downtime. 

UPDATE: I encountered a big problem with the migration that I'll need to research. I'll probably postpone the server move for a few weeks. 

There have been rumors by AMD, Advanced Micro Devices, to acquire ATYT, ATI Technologies Inc. Trading volume and volatility has also been irregularly high in ATYT lately. 

"Two companies are hardly compatible and a chap confirmed that if anyone is out to get ATI it is definitely not an AMD. You have to think more blue I think as Intel has the money for it. They are not in talks either but Intel could pull out the cash."

The Inquirer reports that AMD won't buy ATI, according to unnamed sources. However, a Chinese publication called Sinatech is reporting that the AMD and ATI deal is true.

I have been studying the stock market for about 1.5 years now, and this month marks the 1 year anniversary of The Bull Trader.

Everything began at my first blog, Future Young Millionaires, in July 2005. I spent a month on that blog, and then in August 2005, I closed down Future Young Millionaires and created The Bull Trader to pursue more ambitious goals.

I had no idea that things would lead to the success that The Bull Trader is enjoying today. I couldn't be more pleased with the rapid, consistent, growth of this site. 

As you can see, technical analysis isn't limited to stocks alone. The traffic figures for The Bull Trader are in a strong, bullish, uptrend. 

The Feedburner subscriptions have also been growing lately after breaking out of a 5 month long consolidation period. Hopefully, this recent breakout will lay the groundwork for a new explosive uptrend.

During this last year, I've also enlisted the help of some talented contributing authors to keep up the growth.

I hope this new year will be as good as the last. Thank you for supporting this blog! Please tell all your friends about thebulltrader.com!

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Federal Reserve on Thursday raised a key interest rate for the 17th consecutive time and signaled that further rate hikes may still be needed to fight inflation.

The central bank boosted the federal funds rate, the interest that banks charge each other, by a quarter-point to 5.25 percent, the highest level in more than five years.

In the statement explaining the decision, Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke and his colleagues said that "some further policy firming may yet be needed to address inflation risks."

GOOG rolls out a huge project today called Google Checkout. 

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Watch this video about selling with Google Checkout. I have a feeling that this business model is gonna fly on Wall Street today!

Sorry for the 2 hour site downtime this morning, and thanks to those who contacted me about it. There was an outage on the Telia backbone network. Everything is fine now.

The team at High Chart Patterns, which offers stock newsletters, wrote in with some tips on breakout / breakdown trading. Also be sure to read their tips on stock trading psychology.

"There are two parts that have to come together before a trade is entered. The first one is simply to have a certain pivot price that seems to represent an important point — be it a new high or a break of an established base.

Here are three examples of breakouts whose charts we have saved over the years:

(more…)

Finally, someone seems to have figured out what GOOG, Google Inc., intends to do with all that dark fiber they've been buying up.

Bonanza C., a member of The Bull Trader Forums, and the blogger at the Yale Short-Term Trading Group, wrote in with his thoughts on market sentiment. He points out a lot of good concepts you should employ to improve your trading system.

"As an investor, you should always be looking to minimize your risk and maximize your returns. For a short-term trader, one way of reducing risk is determining the overall market sentiment in the short-run and trading with the crowd. Three out of every four stocks will be up when the indices are up, and three out of every four will be down when the indices are down (don't ask me where I got these numbers, it's just a saying I've heard). Even if the numbers aren't right, you can't argue with the fact that the majority of stocks will be up when the indices are up, and vice versa. Therefore, determining the overall market sentiment will drastically reduce your risk and increase your chances of entering a successful trade.

Another way of decreasing risk is determing the trend of an industry. You'll increase your odds even more by getting into a company in an industry that has been performing extremely well in a bull market. A good example of this are the commodities that were on an incredible rise in the beginning of the year. If you were able to notice the sharp rise of industries such as gold, silver, and steel, you're probably a very rich man right now (unless of course you held on through the commodities drop in the last month).

Finally, you can decrease your risk even further by finding the leading stocks in hot industries in a bull market. These are stocks that are hitting 52-week highs and are in strong upward trends. There is always the chance of the stock finding a top and reversing, but as many swing traders say, you should "buy high and sell higher". If you look at Apple in the last 5 years, you'll notice that its upward trend was largely undisturbed for the last two years, with just a small hiccup in early 2005.

If you follow these steps, you'll drastically reduce your risk while increasing your return. Currently, I'm largely short in this bear market. Personally, I see no reason to go long on stocks with the Fed hike looming, even if the stock looks promising. If you can trade with the crowd, you'll be able to protect your hard-earned gains, perhaps even build on them."

 -Bonanza

My homie Hao-Hsiu Chiu, a doctoral student at the Design School of Harvard University, has created a cool program called Ticker Garden. It is a cool looking way to keep track of your stock portfolio. 

Flock is finally out with a public release. It is a great browser based on the Mozilla architecture (same as Firefox). However, Flock is very Web 2.0 friendly. I'm currently using the IE7 beta from MSFT, and man, Flock is way ahead of the game. Just try it.

A couple weeks ago stevepuri and I noticed the head and shoulders top formation on Boeing Co. (BA). The bearish head and shoulders top pattern has now been confirmed, since BA has closed below the neckline.

On a day where almost every stock on the market hemorrhaged cash, I noticed that America's favorite defense stocks, Northrop Grumman Corp (NOC), Lockheed Martin Corp. (LMT), and  General Dynamics Corp. (GD) were all relatively flat.

This divergence from the market signals "relative strength", a concept inspired by Nasdaq Trader. It means that smart money is out buying on a day that everyone else is selling.

With all the impending conflict in the Middle East, like today's threat from Iran to create trouble in the Strait of Hormuz, I'm sure that military action is right around the corner.

I watched a very well-produced documentary called If the Oil Runs Out on BBC. Everyone HAS to watch this documentary. You can also snatch the movie off the net if you know where to look.

Oil production in almost every non-middle eastern country has peaked. Worldwide production is projected to peak within the next few decades. Rapidly growing demand from China and India is only making things worse. Crude oil contracts are getting incredible support at the $70 support. And the United States hasn't even invaded Iran yet! Any geopolitical conflicts will easily send crude over the $75 resistance and up toward $100.

I can't believe everyone is so chill about $3+ gasoline. This is a CATASTROPHIC issue. If crude runs over $100/barrel, which really isn't that unlikely considering the growing demands, Americans are going to get a rude awakening. Businesses will be forced to shut down, people will lose their jobs, and families won't be able to afford heating energy. And that's only on the individual level. On the global scale, I would expect massive geopolitical conflicts over oil.

So watch the documentary, tell your friends about it, and STOP DRIVING SUVs.

MB wrote in to inform me about CUP. Here is what he wrote:

"Today I initiated a long position in CUP, Peru Copper Inc, (Amex). Based on today’s price & volume action (gap down at the open and closing at nearly the high of the day on the highest volume in one month), I am looking for a re-test of the 5.25 - 5.50 area sometime early next week.  If that can be broken, $6.50 is the next level.

The chart is just picture perfect. The stock is above 10-day, 20-day, 30-day and 50-day moving averages. The MACD and the Stochastics just turned up/positive and are not overbought.

In case you are not aware, CUP will most likely have major news announced around June 7.   Southern Copper (symbol PCU) is expected to present an offer to buy or jointly develop Peru's Toromocho copper deposit by June 7. Southern Copper had said previously that it's considering a joint venture with the deposits' owner, CUP. Also, Reuters had reported previously that CUP is open to selling a stake in the Toromocho project.

Some are even saying that PCU will make out outright bid for CUP anywhere from $8-$10 per share. No matter if this happens or not, what prompted me to enter CUP is the strong volume on the upside, and extremely bullish chart action.    

Please do your own research and due diligence."

I haven't done any research on CUP, but I thought I'd pass this along. Enjoy the weekend!

Danny wrote in to tell me about a cup and handle formation on AEOS: "52 week cup and handle closing up with retailer AEOS. Operating margin extensively improved in last 24 months; Company has sealed solid, revenue enhancing deal with MTV; and summer/beach gear seasonality may bode well for quarter."

I personally think that AEOS will look very technically bullish if it can breakout above $34.50. Stockcharts is down right now, so see you guys later.

BigBen's Investing has the latest information on the Mastercard IPO.