I was dangerously close to having my first negative month since June and my third in 18 months of daytrading.  My trade in XMSR finally bailed me out.  I’m happy November is behind us!  It looks like I’m not alone in the November being sub par.  I’m a little worried that December might be just as bad, however.  With all the holidays coming up there will no doubt be fewer trades taken than average which like November could lead to under performance.

I’m taking an optimistic approach and hoping that Santa brings a nice present!

Here’s my November trading which was a far cry from October.

Here’s the trade I took in XMSR and a losing trade that I shouldn’t have taken in DELL.  See you in December!

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I had high hopes for the day, but it didn’t turn out that well.  SHLD was front and center on my radar, but no entry materialized.  There were a couple long candidates on my radar, but I was mostly looking short.

The market just chopped for most of the day, so I’m lucky that more candidates didn’t yield entries.

I traded MW, which stopped me out for -1R.  One more day in the month - hopefully it will be a good one.

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I’ve just noticed that you can get a fully licensed copy of Snagit - the software I use (and most people) to mark up image files.  I use it to capture image files of my charts and draw arrows for the entries and comments on the charts and then post them to the blog.  I still rely mainly on the charts that StockTickr creates for me automatically, but I like to be able to go back and review the actual charts that I trade off of every day.

Here’s a good example of a chart that I created using Snagit back in August:

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The QQQQ gapped up big at the open yesterday and from reviewing my trading results I know to be highly skeptical of any setups that come along on days like this.  I reverted to my old ways and took a small bet that the large gap in the Qs would fade.  I see Mike (interview) had similar thoughts.

Much to my surprise I went short just a penny off the low of the day and was stopped out in short order.  That’s a pretty impressive run by the bulls.  Perhaps my gap fade singlehandedly caused the market rally yesterday. 

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Rough day today.  I lost 2R.  ATVI (Activision) wasn’t very kind to me today.  I entered it once off the 10 minute bars and it went about 2R in my favor right away and then stopped me out for -1R soon after that:

I then re-entered it off the 15 minute bars a few minutes later and it went in my favor yet again only to stop me out just below breakeven.  Of course it then ran to new highs and closed near the high of the day. 

Somewhere in between I also went long SPLS which stopped me out almost as quickly as my first trade in ATVI.

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Nice day today, 4.1R off of two trades.  I took one long trade and one short trade and judging by the looks of this chart of the Qs, I’ll bet you can guess which one contributed the most to the bottom line. 

First was NG short which start retracing during the middle of the day, but turned out quite well by the end of the day.

Next was HOKU which looked like it was going to turn into a great trade, but ended up stopping out just above breakeven.

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For the next interview in the StockTickr Interview Series (RSS feed), I spoke with Adrienne Toghraie, a well known trading coach and founder of Trading on Target.

I sat in on part of Adrienne’s session at the Traders’ Expo on ways that traders sabotage their own success. It was quite good and refreshing to see sessions on how traders can help themselves rather than highlighting another fancy indicator.

Read on for more about what Adrienne likes about coaching and what questions you should ask yourself at the end of each trading day.

Read the rest of this entry »

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I got back from the Traders’ Expo and took a couple trades today.  It looks like the market reversed pretty hard, so my longs didn’t work out that well.  I traded JWN and MDT.  Both were stopped out for just under breakeven for the day.

This month is shaping up to be pretty crappy - basically flat so far.  This is because I’ve had so few opportunities to trade.  There have been plenty of days this month with just nothing to choose from.

Here are today’s trades:

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I’ve just arrived at the Traders’ Expo in Las Vegas and the first session I’m attending is the CyberTrader/Schwab session about the transition.

Like many CyberTrader users, I’m somewhat concerned about the impending transition to Street Smart Pro and am eager to see some details of the new platform.

This session at the expo is the first opportunity that I’m aware of to really get a glimpse of the new platform and see its capabilities.

If you have a specific question you’d like me to pass on, let me know. Here are the things I’m eager to learn more details about:

• Short inventory - I’ve heard conflicting reports on whether this will improve or not after the transition
• New features in Alert Templates - I use these extensively and have long been clamoring for some enhancements to this already very good feature.
• Shorting through ECNs - this will not be available right way I believe, but at some later date it is supposed to be.

If you have anything to add, please let me know. I’m sure they’ll be around through Sunday, so if you think of something before then, let me know.

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I resisted the urge to make a trade today. I know from looking at various reports in StockTickr that my system doesn’t have that great of an edge when the market gaps up really big at the open. I still watch the markets on days like this but each candidate really has to be perfect. There were none that came close to fitting this description today.

I’ll be back to the trading desk on Monday - I’ll be at the Traders’ Expo for the next couple days.

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