Like every carbon and silicon based life form I'll look to buy a breakout (say a move over S&P 1186+) - this has not worked so well lately for some reason as there often have been short term reversals (within a day) below the breakout level (causing me to stop out). Instead buying the minor dips has been the better play in Sept/Oct. (rubber band theory) In latter 2009 and early 2010 buying the breakout on the indexes was a way to make money with your eyes closed - I bought so many "double top breakouts" my fingers were numb. Despite the melt up of the QE2 rally, this has been a different sort of animal.
Speaking of speculation the hottest part of the market the past week has been rare earth metal stocks; I looked at a few of these over the past few days and most have zero revenue as they are mines in development. No matter - many of the stocks are up 100%+ in a few days. This is a carbon copy of fall 2007 - banks struggling, everything else going ballistic, and the Fed will save us from everything.
EDIT 9:51 AM - just one stock out of many, but watching Caterpillar (CAT) closely to see how it acted on "surprise good" news and it has sold off it's gain thus far this morning. Let's keep an eye on such things, because when stocks stop reacting to good news that means something. We are looking for a period when the good news is priced in along with the QE2 meme - could be a one off however....
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