Spreadbetting

Now spreadbetting is a subject I haven't written about yet, but is something I do a bit of on the indices.

It makes me laugh that if you play poker or bet on the horses then you're a gambler, if you invest or spreadbet on the markets then you're an investor - codswollop!!!!!! You're still a gambler :o).

Now I have no idea when exactly I became a gambler as it were but I remember having great fun sitting in a little local pub that I used to go to in my early twenties for lunch on a Saturday and picking out horses with a very hearty auld fella (old man) by colour of horse, colour the jockey was wearing or by the name of the horse and then we would both put on a 10p each way Yankee but with his horses picked by form. If he said once, he said a hundred times...............

"you just can't keep winning by picking horses that way" in a bellowing voice.

Just beginners luck I reckon but it got me hooked LOL.

So back to spreadbetting. Yes it's pure gambling, even if you're a chartist (which I'm a bit carp at) but try to read them, but even the charts get it wrong a lot of the time too anyway because world events play a big part in where the indices go on a day to day basis.

eg The Ftse started going down as the worries about interest rates rising again started and the dollar/pound reached the $2 mark. For some reason though the DOW, which the US also has the same interest rate worries with because of the state of subprime lending (over 40 lenders gone bankrupt so far this year) and escalating costs of keeping the troops in Iraq is charging towards 13000.

Now I reckon thats more to do with the sentiment of the Americans who want to see the 13000 mark breached. There is also the fact that with the pound so strong it's now cheaper for us (outside the US) to buy US stocks. It's a target and for the last few days the DOW has been bobbing up and down trying to breach the mark, but it tried before and failed so according to a chartist friend of mine who can actually read these things much better than I, if it can't breach it this time then it will be a double top and the 13000 will remain a blue sky dream and sentiment will see the DOW fall quite a bit.

Ok so here's the gamble, do you bet on it breaching 13000 and go long on the Dow just now or do you bet on it not getting there and short it - that's for you to decide - Hey, no advice is given on here remember!!

For those of you interested in spreadbetting but not tried it yet - Don't unless you have some cash you can afford to lose. The market turns very quickly and you can lose a lot, but hey on the other hand if you get it right you can win a lot too.

Me being me and liking to dabble but not with the crown jewels, I like the Finspreads site, available through Interative Inverstor (iii) www.iii.co.uk you can place bets as low as 25p on some things there. On the indices it's 50p per point minimum, but it gives you a shouting chance. Interactive Investor also run an 8 week spreadbetting course when you sign up for an account through them so if you're new to it, then that's worth a try.

I also use IGIndex www.igindex.co.uk for their live charting, but their minimum bet is £2 per point and if the Dow moves sharply in the wrong direction then £2 pr point can soon mount up.

You can protect your bets with stop losses and limits. A stop loss does what it says on the tin. Stops your losses at a point you are comfortable with and a Limit can be set to take profits when you have reached a level you are happy with or if you're not available to sit and watch the screen.

Anyway....that'll do on that just now, but I'm sure I'll revisit this at some point. And by the way - I've shorted the Dow, so that's a guarantee that it'll go up more....:o)

Happy betting!