Ignoring the Hysteria and Noise...

One thing that I have learned over the past few years is that intra-day market action is full of hopes, fears, and loud, meaningless noise. The market may pop up to positive territory or slip down to negative ground multiple times today. How does this allow one to accurately gauge the markets strength or weakness? The truth is, it doesn't. The only thing that matters is what price level the markets close at 4pm Eastern time. All the intra- day price action is meaningless up until the actual close. The close is where the finishers and closers come in. These are the institutions and big money players that many stock bloggers mumble and ramble on about. These are the market makers and destroyers. It's their actions that determine what price a stock will close at on its final tick. Therefore, I don't care what price a stock or particular index opens at. All I care about is the price level that it closes at.