A quiet Fed-day tape that still paid patience
With the rate decision hours away, our desk worked a short list of levels rather than hunting for action, and the two cleanest ideas, a semiconductor long into VWAP and a space name held for a measured move, were taken off at planned targets. Tesla was attempted twice at a full-ATR extension: the first entry stopped under the lows, the second was re-entered at identified support with partials booked into the move.
The morning in figures
Net points are per share. Apply your own size to get your own number: at 1,000 shares, 12.61 points is $12,610.00. At 100 shares it is $1,261.00. At one share it is $12.61. The desk publishes the move, not a dollar result, because the dollars depend entirely on how you size, and that is your decision rather than ours.
The 1h 08m session is on the other side of this.
Everything above is the write-up. This is the morning itself, with the names on every call and the room talking through it.
The morning's best trade was also its least dramatic. MU was flagged premarket with a trigger level well below the open, and when price came in, the long was taken with VWAP and the 100 SMA named as the target before the position was on. It paid into that confluence and was closed in full, and the stock dropped sharply right after. That is what a pre-defined exit buys you: no debate at the moment it matters.
Tesla took two goes. The level was set early, a full-ATR extension from the prior close, and the first fill came with a stop placed just under a nearby low. It got clipped, and the reaction in the room was simply that it was a good stop. Rather than chase, the name was left alone until it returned to a support shelf identified on the thirty-minute chart, and the re-entry was taken there by more than one trader, stops under the lows, first partials booked quickly on half the size. Different traders ran different targets on the remainder, one trailing the stop up under a recent wick, and the plan was stated out loud before each adjustment.
Elsewhere, RKLB was held with patience after a news-driven flush and closed for a measured move, and a short was taken in MRNA at a daily level that had been identified before the entry rather than after. HOOD was discussed at length around the 200-day and then stood down, with the view that the level only mattered if price arrived there quickly. Several ideas got scanner attention and no capital, which on a day with a rate decision at two o'clock is a result in itself.
Every trade called that morning
Losers included. Rows with more than one leg were scaled out; open any row to see each exit.