Had a yummy day with my calls ... Got out of all postions today - INTC - .735 sold at 1.59 (2.16) After seeing some weakness in the market near the end of day I decided it was time to sell. I almost reached my target of 26.5 and from my experience when it comes to targets - it does no good to fight over such a small move for the extra .1 NVDA .3575 sold at 1.10 (3) 53 was my target and we didnt take off after the initial push so I was a bit concerned. I decided to sell this position also. I thought perhaps we might go higher but I thought it best to sell to stick to my target goal. AAPL .3575 sold at 1.25 (3.5) I tried to split the bid/ask a few times and I didnt get hit. So instead of getting out at 1.4 I got out at 1.25 ... no biggie - live and learn. I still feel we could hit 148 - I could of stayed in but I wanted a clean slate here. ie all positions out. After this large up day. Some initial thoughts ... I still need to work on my trading plan - even thou I did real well with these trades. I was flying more by the seat of my pants then by sticking to set rules. I need to make set rules and work on improving upon those that I set up.
I messaged someone earlier about day trading ES options and asked his opinion on doing that. Actually I was wondering if there are any other futures option that would be possible to day trade and not get hit too bad by the spread. I like the idea of trading the indexs and would like to swing trade them. But I couldnt hold overnite atm. So using options as a vehicle might be a viable option - pun intended. Whats your opinion on index options (futures). YM spread look kind of big. Hows the ER2? -I should point out that atm I will only be able to watch the market part time-
YM 15 min analysis - Obviously the market can take us in any direction - the more I draw my 'prediction' lines the more I feel like theres just too many possabilities to try to draw. Some things to note - 1. We are in a channel here so this is the first thing that will have to break down if we pullback. 2. The candles are suggesting we still might pull back a little bit to the h&s neckline - imo this would be a good place to 'rethikn' things. From there - who knows 3. I'm pointing out the inv. h&s pattern here because in most chart pattern books etc this pattern is not talked about - as a matter of fact its said you cant have this. But I have seen this more and more throughout the years. All the old TA books drill into your head that you can only have reverse h&s patterns at the end of a downtrend. Id like to ask them "Well what the $%^& is this then". Times change and so do chart patterns and peoples reactions to them.
I had a good amount of time to watch the market yesterday - was a good learning experience. Observations - Market had some indecision in the begging and I thought wed head lower and make a h&s on the 15. But we headed higher - and then I still thought wed make a h&s and head lower - but we didnt. T/F (thoughts feelings) - When I watched the market; I almsot felt affected by every move it made. Everymove felt like a turning point at times. I often had to take a step back and look at the 15 and 60 min chart to recenter myself. My goal is to find inner peace when I trade - sure I want to be successful at trading but my goal is to be at peace. When the YM was at the breakout point of the h&s I felt the above feelings again that each move would determine success or failure for me. I felt as if I was letting the market (the chart) dictate how I should feel. A true chartist wont let a chart dictate to them how he/she should feel. A chartist will mearly react to the chart as if its a turn in the road - nothing more. Not to say a chartist doesnt have feelings - but the feelings will come from other things - such as being able to follow your plan, being able to see your trading plan work, seeing the beauty of the chart, being at peace when you trade etc ... more later
ER2 60 min pre open 9-5-07 revised lines ... ie I looks now that we stalled at the breakout; so we still could today or base for a bit then break ... check the lines let the chart tell you what we will do
Psych comments - I can see the open 15 mins on most days then I work for about 4 hours and come back. I felt 'pressure' to trade even in that 15 mins and when I got back like as if I was missing something. I did some paper trades today and some real ones. A couple I wouldnt consider smart. I definately need to work on a plan because I could invoke some heavy losses if I decided to really throw the money on the line. I did 'play' around with some ES options today - didnt feel too bad trading them since I knew they were options and I didnt have to worry about exiting on certain stop points. Was more for a 15 min chart play.
BA sept 100 call paid .65 bought when the stock was at 65.6 underlying in the opening 15 mins Target is 103 but I may exit earlier depending on how the options do. Might go for a short play ... DD sept 50 call paid .44 - I like the chart alot and am playing it off a large sym triangle - but in all honesty I'd almost rather wish I didnt take this trade. ie spread too large. Almost a 10cent spread. I'll consider it a learning experience and chalk this one up and hold onto it for a few days. Waiting for the sym tri breakout on the 60 min. target is 53 I had these 2 plays picked out a couple days ago ... was just waiting to get in at the proper time. I feel 80% confident with my BA play and only about a 40% with my DD play.
I saw a post in another thread and the title of the thread was "Why do you trade" I listed out the reasons but deleated my post A couple of the reasons were: 1. I am addicted (in a way) 2. I like to gamble (when I think I can win) I attribute my DD play as my addictive gambling nature taking over.
I have been posting a few trades on a chat room I've visited. Some comments: 1. I'm not going to try to rush a trade just so I can post in this chat room. I felt it took away from my trading ability because I wanted to have my trade in the chat room in such a timely manner. This is for me to learn not for other people to judge me and how I am trading. - So what I will do is take my time with the precise set up and picking out precise stop/targets. And then post. I wont care if its 5-10 mins late in posting. 2. What I will do is post the same trade (copy and paste) to my journal - (not necessarily here - offline) and proceed to analysis the trade afterward. And learn from it. 3. I feel so far it has been a good learning experience; even thou I've only done it for 1-2 days. 4. I'm looking at studying the ER2 and the ES contract; I'm actually starting to like the ES contract. My stops dont get as easily taken out. Although my charts dont look at pretty. 5. I feel this process of posting trades (paper or real) is helping me develope a trading plan in a more 'fun' way then just writing something out. For some reason I find the task of writing a trading plan daunting - I've worked on one before in the past. I feel I am 70% of the way on entry but only 35% on exiting. 6. I've noticed alot of people use keyed in stops when they trade - I dont normally do this. I want to evalute and decide if I should do this or not - perhaps take a study of 100 trades ie set a mechanical and then a mental ... I'm looking for another avanue to trade in the off hours. I thought perhaps forex or the dax or the metals. Some of the common ones I have seen. I am working overseas atm and have wierd hours at my job so generally I can see part of the US trading day but want to 'fool' around with another market and study it. Just something to throw a few $ at nothing major and even paper trade some.
9-6-07 So ... interesting trading day. Lets talk about my gold trade ... So before the market opened I felt anxious to get some real money into something. I thought "hey why not gold I remember reading about someone playing gold" So I looked at a YG chart that was very rudementary (meaning I couldnt see that much since the volume was so lite) - but I thought there was a wedge; so I decided I would play the bounce from the top. And then well ... instead of doing YG I did ZG since the spread was a bit more in the YG. I set a stop and a target. To make a long story short. I let the issue go past my stop and sold for -2 and lost some $. I felt the sting of the loss; because I took 30 mins to lose that money which basically cancelled out one of my good option trades earlier this week. And all because I decided I was going to throw the dice ... I did many of these trades in the past and I would think I would of learned by now; meaning ... I never did much good in something that I cant see it on a chart; or that I havnt studied a little bit. I could call it a learning experience but I have been through this before. So instead it was a butt kicking and I deserved it; I deserved from the person on the other side of the trade to take my money. So to summ it up: 1. If I cant chart the issue then dont trade it 2. Figure out how you will handle stops; because you just dbled your loss because of it. 3. The #1 key for a successul trader is to preserve capital.