Nanophase Technologies (NANX)

Company

"Nanophase Technologies is an industry-leading nanocrystalline materials innovator and manufacturer with an integrated family of nanomaterial technologies. The entire focus of Nanophase is nanotechnology, with two distinct and patented processes for the preparation and commercial manufacturing of nanopowder metal oxides i.e. Aluminum Oxide, Zinc Oxide, Cerium Oxide, Titanium Dioxide, and several others. Nanophase Technologies Corporation has developed a process, Discrete Particle Encapsulation, to coat the surface of its nanoparticles with a thin polymeric shell that enables compatibility of the particles with a wide variety of fluids, resins and polymers. Also, Nanophase has developed technology to permit the dispersion of its nanoparticles in water and a variety of polar and non-polar organic fluids. This allows Nanophase to supply concentrated, ready-to-use nanoparticle dispersions, eliminating the need for customers to disperse the nanoparticles themselves. Nanophase’s family of integrated technologies economically produces nanocrystalline materials, and then nanoengineers those materials to fit a customer need." (company website)

Buy

3-Apr-06. I decided to buy back in to NANX and put in a buy order to trigger if NANX traded at 7.6 or above. The order trigger yesterday, but NANX went on to close much, much lower, giving me quite a fright when I saw what had happened. This is always the problem with automated trades: stuff happens. Today, however, NANX is back up again, so maybe it's not a bad thing after all.

• Price momentum (PPO) — dipping
• Trend (ADX) — above the threshhold (20) but weakening
• Money flow (CMF) — ouch!
• Relative strength (RSI) — neutral, but the stochastic RSI is pointed up
• Volume — more or less stable

The conventional wisdom is that when a stock trades up to the Bollinger band, without breaking through, it tends to then swing back to the other one in a cyclical fashion. I hope it's true in this case!

Sell

28-Apr-06. Nanophase announced record first quarter earnings yesterday. Today NANX was slapped down because the loss was greater than Expectations by a couple of cents. NANX's choppy chart always made me nervous, and today's session convinced me it was time to walk away. The few dollars that I made will just cover the trading costs.