Bookkeeping: Bought BHP Billiton (BHP)

As I am reviewing trading history for the week, I missed a limit buy order that went off late Friday.  On Monday, we had sold just about all our BHP Billiton (BHP) [Oct 26, 2009: Bookkeeping - Sold Most of BHP Billiton (BHP) - Looking to Rebuy Soon] in the mid $72s anticipating some dollar strength to knock these commodity stocks down.

However, since we are SO overdue for at least a few day rally in the pig (with lipstick on) that is the US dollar I'll take almost all the rest off here, and see if we can get our cost basis lowered.  Commodity based stocks, in particular, would get trashed if the dollar rallies.

Specific to BHP there is a flagrant gap at $69ish where we'll get back part of our stake... and yet another at $65 which would be a nicer place to re-engage.  Caveat: BHP is a very 'gappy' stock, since it is Australian based and tends to gap open (up or down) often - so the gaps mean less in this chart than most.

The chart on Monday looked like this...

The stock literally moved the rest of the week as we called it on Monday; both gaps filled in succession so we bought per our playbook, first a smaller tranche and then a larger one.

Wednesday, as the market was in freefall we simply bought back our original stake in the $68s quickly lowering our cost basis, but we were still aiming for the gap at $65

Bought back the BHP Billiton (BHP) we sold earlier this week in the $72s for $68s - not a large purchase but just got us back what we sold, at a lower cost basis.  Placing a larger buy order at $65, just scaling in slowly.

That hit late Friday.  Doesn't mean BHP cannot continue going down.... if the dollar keeps running all commodities will be trashed but we were able to lock in gains, and swing around a position to rebuild it at a lower cost basis.  If it falls too much farther from here, we'll exit but from a lower cost basis and hence a smaller loss.   Like so many of the stocks in our watch lists and in our holdings, the 50 day moving average has been broken so potential for much larger drops in the stock price await.  We'll give this one a leash up to somewhere near $62; with a potential "double top" and Asia (BHP is Autralian based) surely to open ugly Monday, we might be out of this position quite quickly.. 

Position size after both purchases went from 0.1% to about a 1.4% exposure.

The chart now...

Long BHP Billiton in fund; no personal position