Year-to-date, I’m up 5.2%. I am very satisfied with my results so far.
This log contains only trades that were initiated in 2008. I had quite a few big winners that I started in late December 2007 and closed out in early January and during Week-of-the-Crash-that-Wasn’t.
As you can see, most of my trades were shorts.
Two of my losers, the January 23rd trades of [[SKF]] and [[SRS]], violated my rules as I did not plan to enter them the night before. Had I not violated my rules, I would have saved myself 300 bones, and my results would have been impeccable, in my opinion. As it stands, I think I’ve worked through last year’s slump and am ready to start trading larger positions.
If you have any questions or comments about my calculations, please leave a comment.
Good job. What are your rules? I am new to your blog…. thanks!
Woody,
Care to share your tracking template?
Nice goin’ woody! Good to see somebody making some money! Just treddin’ water here.
Good start. I know its not easy for you to intra trade anymore at work but I found the fast moving double (2X) ETFs like SRS and SKF (as well as the ones like QLD,QID,DXD,DDM,etc.) to be tough to hold overnight and the easier money is to do intra day scalps. They just move so fast and losses (and gains) can come and go quickly. It’s almost like trading futures.
http://spreadsheets.google.com/pub?key=pRjGV0bK0xkJwPtDBp6lpFA
B-rad, I published it at the above link, although I don’t know if you can edit it and get the formulas. Give it a try and let me know.
Pedro- my rules are to place trades based on setups from a variety of technical patterns. I’m primarily a swing trader. I’ve been trading small positions for the last 2 months due to having a poor 2007, where I lost 3% for the year. Go to the left sidebar, and check out “2008 Trading Plan” and that will give you more info. Let me know if you have any more questions. I’ll be glad to help in any way.
Nice shit over here shed. congrats.
Wood –
I signed into the spreadsheet and was able to edit the numbers. You have to have a Google account though. Good year for you so far and keep doing the updates every few months.
@TraderCaddy,
When those ETFs move fast, the spreads get ridiculous, don’t they? Somebody’s having a laugh riot fading the crowd in those things.
Thanks folks.
NewE- where’ve you been lately? Anyway, I plan to post the log each month.
It would be fun if you made enough money to buy your firm and then fire everyone you don’t like.
Thanks for the template Woood.
Why do some closed positions not have a closing commission and vice versa?
now u can get that fancy shower curtain – just stay away from Kozlowski’s of TYCO fame $6000 shower drape, that was an IRS magnet
Considering how bad the market was in the first month of ’08, I say great job!
Jake, lets say I shorted 100 shares, and then later, shorted another 100 of the same stock. Then the position would have 2 opening commissions. If I covered all 200 in the same order, I have only 1 closing commission.
I have several other templates that are much more fancy, calculating all kinds of neat things. I’ll post them when I get some time.
I use this one because it is simple, and it allows for the position to be opened and closed on the same line, rather than having to hunt down the spreadsheet for when it gets closed.
Nice job Shed, well done in this market.
@wood –
I have been losing money. Only down a few percent but the month has been a bad one.
Shed – mucho gracias for SXE … covered this am for a 7.50 gain … schweeet !
hanging w/ the ABAX short … I think its leaking & if the market comes off, she’ll plop
juice/shed – nice short SXE.
Long and wrong in oil calls. Short in homies and banks, also wrong. XLY did fine for me as a hedge. I think MOO is interesting. I think homies roll over. Not sure about banks.