General securities trading and discussion

Re: Matt's Daytrading experiment and journal

Then trend these days is "guidance." During the earnings announcement did the company guide lower or higher for the future. Often a company with bad earnings guides higher and the stock rises, and sometimes earnings are good, but they guid lower, and it sells off.

It is hard to know how wall street will take these things.

 

Re: Matt's Daytrading experiment and journal

I made a few changes that I think might help.
First of all, I am going to trade primarily listed (AMEX and NYSE) stocks instead of Nasdaq.

They seem to make more deliberate moves rather than bounce around randomly.

Today was going to be the first day back, but I had system problems and I missed the majority of the morning activity (which is when I make 80% of my trades) so I am just going ot wait until tommorrow.

 

Re: Matt's Daytrading experiment and journal

Well, I continue to have mixed results. I have switched back to using a demo account until I can consistantly be profitable.

There is no reason to throw good money after bad, and I will remain in demo mode indefinitly.

I am giving my strategy a little more time b/4 I ditch it.

Part of the problem is that no stocks are following through once they set up to my liking. My strategy works the best with stocsk that are moving on high volume and with alot of force, either up or down. The reason is I am looking for high probability entries once a stock is temporarily "resting".

In this market it seems these resting points are harder to evaluate and turn into reversal points.

 

Re: Matt's Daytrading experiment and journal

I normally dont trade overnights, and usually hold my longterm investments in a 401K and dont touch it.

If you look at a daily chart MSFT, I think the XBOX "play" has run its course, at least for the short term. It is impossible to pick exact tops and bottoms but the stock has just made a relatively large run this month, and looks "extended" which means overbought.

This isnt to say it wont keep rising, but for the reasons you cite for getting in (XBOX), I think it is late. It looks priced into the recent runup.

I am not trying to tell you what to do, but perhaps waiting for a pullback or some sideways days b/4 getting back in?

 

Re: Matt's Daytrading experiment and journal

Same here. It is tough and I am currently trying to refine an idea that I had that has promise, but wasn't working out the way I had planned.

I wasnt really losing, but was barely breaking even after commissions and my software fees. I am not going to commit larger amount of $$$ unti I can/if ever become more consistant.

I am baically trading with a relativly small amount of $$ that I can afford to lose without really feeling any heat. Ino ther words, I walked into this assumming I would lose it, and being pleasantly surprised if it worked.

I listened to a free webcast froma hedge fund manager last thursday and he had a similar style as mine. His insight helped (hopefully) clear up some of my problems with picking entry and exit points in my trades.

we will see.

 

Re: Matt's Daytrading experiment and journal

I think Sachin might be out of town, but I think I can vouch for him. You simply told what you did, u arent trying to convince someone else what to do.

Big difference.

 

Re: Matt's Daytrading experiment and journal

of course.

 

Re: Matt's Daytrading experiment and journal

sometimes you end up having a bad week and up like feeling like this:

http://www.elitetrader.com/vb/attachment.php?s=&postid=870680

I getting back on the saddle soon. I decided the program that I had developed, although promising, got me into risky trades (specific technical pattern) that wastn safe over the long term.

For now on, I am going to look for that pattern, then a slight weak selloff followed by a beginning move in the orginial trend.


I learned this technique from a hedgefund manager that was nice enough to walk people through his reasoning and strategies.. It make sense, and seems to work.
But I also said that about my last idea....

For some reason, Bigsoccer istn allowing me to upload my file. I will try again tomm...

 

Re: Matt's Daytrading experiment and journal

okay it let me. The file was too large to I had to shrink it down. Hence the ant size font.

 

Re: Matt's Daytrading experiment and journal

Sure. I am down roughly 500 hundred bucks. My trading decisions haven't been that bad, and I am net profitable on them, but inconsistant.

It is just I have spent a few hundred in commisisons, combined with my software fees, overall all I am down.

Being inconsistant, I realized my plan was flawed, so I changed a few things and took a little break.. Once I am consistant (if possible) I will up the share size and this will allow me to easily overcome my costs..

Definitely not easy. I am glad I have a plan to fall back on, so its helps me not to feel the pressure.

 

Re: Matt's Daytrading experiment and journal

Still trading the demo account b/c I havent been able to get consistant. I really havent had much to write about.

Posting the pictures the way I do puts a bit of a load on the BS site I was told, so I try to do so sparingly..

And yes, about the draw, I am getting butterflies as we speak..

 

Okay, I changed the name of the thread to open it up a bit more for general discussion, b/c I am quitting my trading for awhile.

I tried various methods after mine didnt work out so hot with not much success. I kept my losses very small, and the demo account helped me save alot more while trying different things.


It was all in all, it was a bit frustuating, but I am glad that I tried it and can focus now on interviewing full time without distraction.

SO I will keep the thread open for anyone to chime in with questions or comments.

 

Stops are tricky, yet necessary. I dont know about end of day stops, as I never have heard of them.

One thing to remember, is that if you trade NYSE stocks, the specialists can see the stop orders in their books, and often try to swing the stock to trigger them only to take the contraside of the trade and let it run...

So for very liquid issues with tight spreads, I use an ECN (ARCA, etc) so the specialist cant see them and screw me. This works a little bit better.

that is the frustuating part of trading. It Is knowing how much pain to take b/4 you get out and not get yourself hurt.