Up today: Gold, dollar, yen, VIX, TRIN

And look what was up today ... interesting travel companions (although some more than others). Today makes a good example of a remark I've made a couple of times - don't expect certain asset classes always to move together (or inversely) all the time. Dollar weakness may mean gold strength at some times. But today, equities AND bond weakness apparently go hand in hand with investors and traders going into gold and (to a lesser extent) dollar and yen.
[*update note, 2/2/09: see article at Seeking Alpha, Why Are Gold and the Dollar Running Together? by Adrian Ash - on this topic]

The lesson for traders actually, in my opinion, is to be aware of what's going on but don't overthink the trade. The charts will speak to what's moving, where and when, how strongly. Don't let preconceived notions keep you stuck in a trade that isn't working, or keep you from entering into an investment that would work.

Here are the charts for these items I'm mentioning were up today (and by the way, I'm not going to talk about oil ... saw a headline last night asking whether oil is going up, down or sideways - I'd say isn't it obvious it's been going sideways?! and if I can stand looking at it tomorrow or over the weekend, will see what the charts say on that):

VIX -



TRIN - here's the 15-min chart and the daily chart -




The yen (although it closed just under the 111.49 pivot) -

The U.S. dollar -


And gold - up smartly enough that it suggest it may go higher (but let's take it one day at a time, because GLD closed just above the .786 retrace to the last swing high - can be a pivot to vault higher, but need to watch if it loses this level) -