SEP 16 - holding

So, my trade at HFC is very volatile, but technically, on the weekly chart is seems like a sure thing, since I bought right at support. So I will just keep an eye on it and let it run its course until it's at above 35.50 and I can make my money back.... we'll see, it's still early to say if this technical setup will work out for me.

Huge catastrophe! SEP - 15

So, just as I saw the terrible economic news, some banks decide to flood the market with dollars before the open and I had to cover my short about 2 dollars above my initial position. this has been devasting to my portfolio, since I trade on margin. I waited for the market to go down again and got long into the stock, I am gaining some money back but it doesn't even start to cover my big loss.

I am upset about this, and this teaches me again to not hold things over night. If I don't discipline myself I will lose it all. So the lessons are: Do not hold a stock overnight, unless you are a the start of a proven reversal and do not trade early in the morning any more, wait until 10:30am , at least.

Let's see how this trade goes and I will let you know later.

Update (3:58pm): Well, I was able to mitigate the pain a little bit, I am still down big time, but at least I am on the mend, I day-trade TWI for some profit, and at the end of the day I found a nice chart for HFC, which is right at support, so I decided to go for it. So far, so good. According to this chart, this is supposed to go up at least 2.5 points from my buy point (33.85). I will let this trade go for a few days to see if it develops as expected.

Should I trade? - SEP 14

Today the pre-market is up, despite bad news at home and relatively good news in europe. Pre-market seems to be going down from earlier highs though. I am thinking big investors know that the good news from Europe are mostly smoke and mirrors and will sell into strength, since today is day-3 of the upward move.

I can't day-trade today, so I am not very sure about getting a trade in today, but if I do, it will surely be a short, maybe I will wait for a peak to form and then short something that follows the major indexes's movements. the problems is that on thursday we got some economic news coming at 8:30 am... given the recent news I think they will not be great (one of them is jobless claims), but you never know. anyways, tough decisions, hopefully won't get burned today.

Gold is still on a downward move, will wait for it to get to it's 20 week moving average and then load up in EGO, but that seems to be a couple of months in the future, so I will let it go for now.

UPDATE (10:30am): So I couldn't help it. The news from europe were not enough to keeps the horrible economic data from sinking the major indexes, the problem is that I am such a chicken that I started shorting TWI almost at the low of the day, I will need to learn a lot more patience. Still, I am not to worried, I have a feeling this will keep going down for the rest of the week and I will make some decent dough.

UPDATE (4:42pm): I traded at the wrong time yet again, I am underwater by a bit more than a dollar!, this is horrible, but I know things will get better for me tomorrow. Today's rally was purely technical: the S&P got to the top of it's short term trading box (around 1,200) and then a selloff begun at the last 20 minutes of the day, leaving the S&P at the high 1,180s, so this makes me believe that the turn around has started and I will possibly be profitable tomorrow. New europe and USA economic news will probably drive the market lower for these last two trading days, I think.

Another day, another mistake to learn from - SEP-13

So, today, as I suggested by the technical setup of yesterday, the market went up in the morning, howerver I suspected the raise would be short-lived, due to all the problems going on in the world economy. So, I decided to wait for my stock to go up some and then sell... so the stock goes up and as soon as it starts going down I decide to sell, but instead of using a limit order, I used a market order and my profits went to the trash, I staill gained some, but it was not great (Mistake #1: Selling at market price during the first market hour), then as I saw the stock go down, I decided to short the thing, without waiting to see if that was just a temporaty pull back (Mistake #2: Shorting on an "up" day, Mistake #3: not waiting long enough to see if the pullback was short term). So, there you go folks, I am officially the biggest dumb ass in the stock market. Now I am waiting for the market to go down again so I can cover my short.... should happen soon, but I don't think it will today.... maybe my luck turns and I will be able to give some feed back.

UPDATE (11:06am): I waited and my patience was rewarded, I was able to get out of my bad trade witout losing any money!.... I am just bummed that I messed up a nice oppportunity to make cash if I had enough patience, oh well, I guess I will live to trade another day. now I will wait for the afternoon to see if I can get a good entry point, short or long, depending on how the market behaves for the rest of the day.

UPDATE (3:10pm): It seems like the market is going to close green today, that would be day 2 of buying, I expect some more upside tomorrow and possibly a turn around to end in red, I will keep my eyes peeled for a reversal and get a short in, although I could risk it and trade overnight, since I am out of day-trades until thursday... we got jobless claims, consumer price index and industrial production coming up on thursday morning, so I might probably just wait.

SEP-12-11 - Unsuccesful trading

So, after a lower open in the market I was going to make a good profit, but the greedy side of me took over, and decided to wait.... bad idea, the indexes started jumping, and the price of CMI jumped up accordingly, before I know it, I was underwater. I could have sold for a small profit, had plenty of time to do it, but no, I had to wait, then the stock kept jumping I freaked out and covered, losing about .90 cents per share in the trade.... grrrrr, and now the price is back down again and would have gotten a bit of profit if I had kept the stupid thing!!!

Stupid market, In this volatile market the best thing is to sell close to the open if you have a nice profit. Anyways, I can't do much until tomorrow, when I am enabled to do a day-trade, I am a bit freaked out in this market to try another overnight trade, so that's it for me today, unless I get a case of the "can't help its" later.

Last Minute note: 15 minutes before the market closed I could clearly see that there is a reversal going on, so I decided to get into TWI very near to the close at 19.59. and the thing closed at 19.77!!, almost made back all the losses of the day. I am pretty confident that tomorrow will open in the green, so this is a great opportunity to reap a nice profit. see you tomorrow!

Pre-market 12-SEP-11

Looks like my instincts were right. The greek crisis and no positive news during the weekend have spurred another selloff. The stock i shorted on friday is already 2% below its closing price. Even though there are no positive news in sight, i am wary of a snap back buy rally when the SPX reaches 1125 or less, so i will keep and eye and probably cover today.

September 10 - Not sure what to expect from the market on monday

Hi all,

This week has been a total roller coaster, which gives you great opportunities to make a good amount of money if you are into day trading, I was able to make a bit of money myself this week. Having already done the 3 day-trades I can this week, I decided (unwisely) to temp fate and short a stock and hold it until monday, under the theory that the major indices would keep going down on monday. So, with that in mind, I waited for CMI to go up and bounce off the 20 period moving average in the 15-minute chart and shorted it at 87.25, which at the beginning seem like a good idea, since the stock hit the 86.90's not too long after, but then jumped up bit, following a small reversal of the indices.

I still think that we have at least a bit of downside on monday, but the waiting makes me nervous, and I think that it would be in my best interest to not let an investment go overnight, unless there is a strong trend going on. So I guess we'll see, I will be glued to my screen at 9:30 tomorrow and see what happens.

Will write some more then to let you know how it went.

On my trading style

Before I start commenting on the market, I would like to tell you a bit about my trading style, so you can understand better my take on the market. I am mainly a technical trading person, I mostly rely on bollinger bands, moving averages, and these technical indicators: Volume, momentum, ultimate oscillator, and ichimoku clouds. Since the market tends to be so volatile and unpredictable from day to day, especially these days, I do mostly day trading, once a day three times a week, although sometimes I will hold a position if the trend is strong. I have tried trading on longer terms, and it doesn't do it for me. Anyways, I won't bore you with more details, on now, on to my take on the market (in the next post).

First post!

Hello everyone,

Welcome to my new blog. I decided to start this little blog to record my trading experiences as an average joe who is trying to make a buck in the big scary stock market. I have already been trading for a few years with mixed results, it has taken me a long time to refine my trading style, and now I think I can finally say that I have somewhat grasped the basic tactics to not get burned (again!).

I don't think I am in the position to teach anybody about trading or the stock market, I just want to share my experiences and my views on what is going on without all the drama and complicated mumbo-jumbo that you read in the news and financial blogs, without making wild theories or trying to predict how the market will behave in the long term. Just straight, simple, average joe trading tactics to survive in this unforgiving market. I also hope to hear your comments and ideas, if you feel like sharing.

I will be posting most days, so keep checking this site often and thanks for reading!

Martin