The market is hot! Everything seems to be moving. After almost four years of a pretty non-volatile market, the recent volatility in the market has taken the interest of all traders. In a more volatile market one has to remember that a looser stop is absolutely necessary to avoid being shaken out of positions. While the risk is greater, in a volatile market return potential increases as well.

Several of my recent ideas remain around the opening price while others have been doing very well. However, I have to attribute some of these quick gains to general optimism from the market today. Because I have been very bullish on a variety of momentum names, these shoot up quickly on days like Wednesday. But it's a double-sided sword -- when the market gets hit, these things get hit harder. I believe that if proper risk controls are in place, most importantly a stop-loss, then trading these names is a much more lucrative game than gaming normal stocks.

Most of my ideas these days are technically-oriented and there's a pretty simple explanation for this: the market isn't cheap enough to turn up tons of value investments -- my primary fundamental-based investments. While I've managed turn to up a couple value ideas, most notably Earthlink (NASDAQ: ELNK) here, I've also managed to turn up several growth-based fundamental ideas such as American Science & Engineering (NASDAQ: ASEI) (which reported great earnings the other day) here.Here are three more trading ideas that I'm looking at these days:

Everyone knows Coca Cola (NYSE: KO) is an incredible company. Loaded with valuable brands, paying a steady and strong dividend, reacclerating growth, etc. But this doesn't necessarily mean purchasing the stock makes sense -- case in point: General Electric (NYSE: GE) or Home Depot (NYSE: HD) during the bubble.

As you can see from the chart to the right, the stock has been in a solid uptrend for almost two years as it consistently makes higher highs and higher lows.

Just Wednesday, the stock broke out above prior resistance yet again. While I'd advise waiting for a pullback to become involved in this stock, I think that longer-term traders should definitely keep this one on their watchlist.


National Information Consortium (NASDAQ: EGOV), a $470 million eGovernmental service provider is significantly more eclectic than Coca Cola but they have something common -- they are both breaking out. As you can see from the chart to the left, the stock has broken out from a twice-tested resistance level.

I added this stock to my watchlist upon a fresh 52 week high on Tuesday but I've waited until now to mention the stock because I was looking for a high volume confirmation. Wednesday gave us just that -- the stock had another solid day (up almost 4%) but this time it was on much more significant volume -- a sign that institutional buyers have stepped up to the plate on this one. For what it's worth, this stock is also breaking out on a longer-term weekly chart.

Although larger than National Information Consortium at a $1.5 billion market cap, medical device manufacturer ArthoCare Corp. (NASDAQ: ARTC) still remains an off-the-radar idea to many traders and investors.

This stock first came up on my screens when it made a strong breakout towards the $50 per share level on high volume. I've had the stock on my watchlist ever since, waiting for the stock to pullback to the $48 range. However, the stock hasn't closed below $50 per share since this breakout and I think the stock isn't going to go back there anytime soon.

As a result, when I saw the stock off more than 4% today when the market was up nicely I became interested. In my research, I've found no indications of news to cause this sell-off and, as a result, I consider it to simply be a minor correction. While a $52.50 entry price would make more sense, because it'd be a pullback to the 2nd leg of the stock's recent breakout, I think entering a position here could make sense because a 'true' pullback might not come.

Investors and traders need to remember that these good times won't last forever and consequently bearish positions do make sense. I've highlighted several negative ideas in recent weeks, most notably CNET (NASDAQ: CNET) here and UnderArmour (NYSE: UA) here. While many will be quick to say my UnderArmour call was way off, I warned readers to hedge the quarter via calls because a short squeeze could occur -- which it did.

The markets are becoming riskier places to put your money due to a variety of fundamental factors but ideas are still available. Be careful and good luck!