Mid Day Thoughts 1/15/2009

I just hate it when you are right on the trade but your stop was one tick too close and you did not have the guts to gut in again. Details later.

Friday Midday Thoughts 4/18/2008

I am so bored I am listening to a traders tax seminar over the net - zzzzzzzzzzz.
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It is amazing so many things are moving so slow,

Wednesday Midday Thoughts 3/26/2008

This is a really sucky trading day for my way of trading. I am up $23 in stocks and $15 in futures. I have a doctors appointment this afternoon and a bunch of things to do after. My results may not be posted until very late or tomorrow.

Tuesday Mid Day Thoughts 2/26/2008

I hate Taxes and Teenagers.
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I have always done my own taxes. The last couple of years I have used Turbo Tax. I think it is a good and simply product to use. Last year I bought a very simple product to slice and dice my broker statements to produce my Sched D. Last year it worked great. I had about 700 lines of transactions meaning if I bought and sold in pieces of 1000 shares or AKS it might be broken down into pieces of 100 or 200 shares. The software would put it back together as one transaction so the result was 175 trades. This whole process took me about 2 hours.
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This year I had 2200 transactions. The software would not work. I called them and they said they stopped supporting the product. I played with it and played. After my fourth attempt and about 20 hours, I finally got it to work. Only problem it gave me a bunch of errors from the way IB does Currency transactions. Once I got a mock Sched D, I compared it to the one that you can get from IB. Over a million dollars in total transaction differences between the two reports. I wanted to cry. A couple of days later, I find a note on IBs website that they needed to reprocess their Sched Ds. The difference is now one penny.
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Now I produce the file to go into Turbo Tax. I was expecting the 2200 transactions to melt down to 300 or 400 - instead 775. Turbo Tax was not happy. I had to go through something like 60 transaction to make sure they were not dups. Also the stock I transferred into my IB account was all screwed up. After many more hours of work and having to add in the Currency transaction by hand it was finally done. I had never gone through such Tax Hell before.
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Now teenagers - last year I told you guys how a 13 year old nearly killing me in two matches. I won the first match 2 games to 1 but lost the second 1 game to 2. Last night a 15 year old, did not only beat me but only took two games to do 15-11 and 15-5. He was not even tired. It sucks getting old.

Monday Midday Thoughts 2/4/2008

I am tired. If I hear or read one more person has a Super Bowl Hangover I will scream. As with so many others, I got home really late too and I am not functioning well. I missed three really good trades and f-ed another one up. I am not in a good mode. I am also in the process of fighting a BS traffic ticket. I just need to figure out how much the process is going to cost me - PITA.

Wednesday Mid Day Thoughts 12/19/2007

Market is killing me softly - down $130 on a couple of trades.

Monday Mid Thoughts 12/17/2007

Market is going no way fast. Made a couple of trades and got stopped for small losses. The market looks like it wants to go higher today but I can't seem to game it right. The trin has been dropping all day and the issues has improved since the open.

Big Mouth Stock today 12/13/2007

My Big Mouth stock f-up today. Notes on charts.

Tuesday Mid Day Thoughts 12/11/2007

Fed day is boring for me. Very Frustrating. No pops in the big Mouth stocks. One of his stocks was GTS - an new IPO. I use the reverse idea with those. I spent the premarket trying to get in at 16.50 when I should have paid up and took shares at 16.75. With his IPO calls, it is very hard to short so it is easier to get them going up. A move of 16.75 to 17.50 would have been nice.
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Missed a couple of minor setups in the YM's.
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Waiting on the Fed.

Mid Day Thoughts 12/06/2007

Some fast thoughts - no time for charts. I am reviewing and tweaking my new system a little to gain more confidence with it. There was two trades in it this premarket - one while I was a sleep and the other I was dealing with the wife. During the regular market, there was also two trades. Both I chickened out too soon but still made money.
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I did caught one Big Mouth short for all of you who think I am crazy for always looking at them and never getting in. I made a little.
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Got to run.

Mid Day Thoughts 12/05/2007

This is a big chart so click on it to see the details. It is a chart of the YM's with my buy/sell signals on it. There was a great one just before the Open and the rest of them would have been difficult to play. You still could have made good money if you were fast. Since I downloaded this chart - there has been two sell signals. Both of them should have netted +15 points each but it is very hard to short this strong market. I did take the break out trade for +21 YM points.
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On other notes - my first swing currency trade was a loser (-200) and my only stock day trade was too (-50). My stop was 25 cents and if it was my original idea of 40 cents, I would still be in it. I also sold my XLF swing in my retirement account like a dummy. At the beginning of the day, it was dropping too fast so I put in a stop not to give all the profits away.
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Remember, if we close on better volume, the IBD nuts will be screaming about a follow thru day.

Mid Day Thoughts 12/03/2007

Market is very sleepy. I am still hoping for some small pull back to buy some swing longs. I have made one futures trade and lost 9 ticks in YM. Stupidly, I placed the order and it went against me quickly by 10 ticks but did not hit my stop area. I panicked and sold. A course it rallied from that point where I could have closed it at my target. Again I need to sit on my hands.
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One great frustration today it the ECBOT is acting flaking today and was down at one point.

Wednesday Midday Thoughts 11/28/2007

This market is so frustrating. I like to try to buy things calmly but this is a one way market. I am assuming we will continue to rally today and start out with a rally tomorrow.
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Once we get to Friday and next week we will have to reassess the market action. This could be just month end window dressing.

What happens in Vegas...... 11/21/2007

I wish what happens in Vegas would stay in Vegas. I guess I proved that one wrong. By the end of my Vegas stay, I started coming down with a good cold. I am back now and I am shot. I wish I left my cold in Vegas. The convention was good over all. I do not know if I have become a more informed trader but the show seemed to have more sale presentations instead of learning sessions. Also the Expo is turning more and more to the currencies. Don't get me wrong. I like the currencies but there is already a Forex Expo.
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All is all; my annual trip was worth it. I feel I picked up a couple of new ideas to try to use to solve my trading demons.
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I do not know if I will be doing much posting until Monday. I feel like crap.

Same Miss Different Day 11/13/2007

Another day, another Big Mouth Stock, another miss. I am going to learn how to game these trades if it kills me.

Frustrating Day 11/08/2007

I lost power for a few moments yesterday and I guess it screwed up my computers. I have spent the last 3 hours rebuilding and reloading things. I think I am back up again. I have not trading today.

Tuesday Mid Day Thought 11/06/2007

The Big Mouth stocks today- I should have made a lot more. If I was showing my full size and I did not freak when I got a gift from the Trading Gods, I should have been up over $1000 instead of only $250. Add to that, I should have been just a little more aggressive with EK to add to the total. I also had a trade in YGE were I should have made $150 to $200 and walk away with only $13. I should just be happy to be up today.

Monday Mid Day Thoughts 11/05/2007

The market is moving up slowly but I can not find anything to trade - no follow through at all. The Big Mouth Stocks were a dud and I feel if I keep trading I will just grind myself up.
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After my little mental melt down on Friday, I spent the weekend catching up on missed sleep, eating good food, working out a lot and having plenty of ... while never mind.
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I was all fired up this morning and just have not seen much to speak of. The few things that could have made money - I was just not watching them.
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I need to figure out how to declare myself tax-wise for next year and got a book on the subject to start getting some knowledge on the subject.

Tuesday Midday Thoughts 10/30/2007

Three Big Mouth stocks from last night. None of them popped at the open and with the Dow and Market looking down, one should have shorted them as soon as the main exchange was opened for them. Trade 500 shares in each - take down about $800-1000 and go do something else for the day. Damn - I looked at them and walked away without doing anything.

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The rest of the day has been super boring.

Tuesday Mid Day Thoughts 10/23/2007

I do not trust this market. It is amazing that everyone went from being too bullish to too bearish and now is quickly going to bullish again. A lot of traders are missing in action today and I do not know why. I have had many charting, quote and computer issues today.
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I forgot how many of my accounts had XHB in it. I was lucky and able to sell a little higher than yesterday. I have made one trade today but again I got out too early. Story of my trading life. Outside of trading, I seem to stay in bad trades way too long (aka - first marriage, and a job or two).