Major indices ended the day in red, although S&P 500 momentarily popped into green. But that didn't deter financials, and particularly those financials whose share prices have been reduced to bit sizes in the past year. If you owned any of these stocks, congratulations! (I hope you bought them in the past 4 months, though.)

Those of you who held on to FRE (and FNM to an extent) despite a dump on Friday, congratulations again.FRE (Freddie Mac) had the most violent 5 trading-days since it was virtually nationalized in September last year. Monday's jump was due to the earning report AH on Friday last week (FRE made profit, for a change), but the stock kept going up AH Monday and ended at $1.81, 200% up (or triple) from Tuesday last week.Freddie and sister Fannie are practically bankrupt. And yes, there's an encouraging (I suppose) talk of setting up an entity to absorb Freddie and Fannie's bad assets. But this is just a talk at this point. I have no idea where FRE or FNM will go from here. Their longer-term charts don't mean much, because, as I have just said, they are practically bankrupt and technical analysis means nothing.Retail investors who are holding FRE and/or FNM are irrationally and extremely bullish, saying their stocks will go to $5. That sounds wild, but FRE was indeed $5 one year ago

The Baltic Dry Index, which tracks shipping costs and is viewed as leading indicator for commodity prices, has had its worst week since the peak of the financial crisis last October, as Chinese demand slowed."The index fell from 3,350 to 2,772 this week – a fall of 17.2pc - as imports of iron ore and coal slowed down. The index is now 35pc lower than its 2009 high, hit on June 3."Earlier this week Ian Ashby, head of iron ore at miner BHP Billiton, said at the Diggers & Dealers conference in Australia that Chinese restocking of iron ore was at an end."Mr Ashby said that supplies at the country's ports were enough to sustain a month of consumption."However, some believe that imports have slowed down as Chinese steel mills are still locked in talks over the pricing of iron ore imports over the next 12 months."Hmmm.. I still have MTL, a Russian iron ore company, which seems to be stalling at $12. It passed that point in June, only to head back down, and back up again and headed back again in early August. I still don't see anything technical wrong with the stock, but with the macro information like Baltic Dry Index and Chinese hoarding to end, I'd better be careful, and not be too greedy.