What a day! -5% on MELI, -1% SKF. Both at 1/3 positions than usual. I think I’m done day-trading for the month… The Vix is too flat. I’ll wait for higher probability setups. I’ve been waiting for 2 losses in a row to quit this game. Finally!! Notice the correlation… Vix flat, I suck. Lol. I knew this going into today, hence, the much smaller positions (trying to trick myself).
Okay, so how did I lose?…
Notice how fading the rally only worked for most of the day. I was able to catch the breakdown in this strategy and I posted it in the comments section. Basically, the first sign was that the Vix was a bad indicator today. Hence, I turned to price/volume action + momentum. Here’s the chart that is very very difficult to short. Notice too, that 5 minutes later the market began its sprint to day highs!:
Wicked! Moments later I caught the next leg up almost to the minute! Okay, it wasn’t just me, I must admit it’s good to have a guy like Danny around to confirm it…
… i know what you’ll probably say: “if you saw it coming, why didn’t you flip it.” I just see things in probabilities, and enter or exit accordingly. My strategy was to enter today fading this rally, and to exit it when it turned against me. I had no strategy to play today long, therefore I didn’t. Even getting long was dicey, therefore I didn’t want to make too many trades since I wasn’t fully prepared for it. I was up most of the day on SKF (never on MELI), but saw the point to exit when needed. Loses are all part of the game! I try not to see them as losses, but as a “business expenses.” Therefore, keep those business expenses small. Actually, the expense paid was the cost to switch from day-trading to swing-trading (thank goodness! I hate these early morning stuff). I haven’t entered a swing trade for weeks, and my holding period for swing trading has been less than 4 days.
Hope you can learn from my mistakes!
If you enjoy the content at iBankCoin, please follow us on Twitter
i have no choice but to swing… my battered account is below the minimum to day-trade. maybe going long F would have been the way to go.
it wasnt very smart of me to sell my SKF put when i entered a long position on SKF. Sold out my insurance, while i stupidly held on to my Jan call on FXP.
SO, hopefully i did learn…
Thanks for the hat tip. Twitter won’t let me respond. Good stuff. Watch out reading too much into the VIX in the next couple week’s, it will get artificially low ahead of the holiday’s.
VIX sucks. I can’t rely on it much.
Yes, do not use the Vix right now… it is stuck in a channel. Plus barely moved today. Switch back to price/volume action! Vix works best in volatile markets and at extreme levels. It’s my favorite market timing tool, but even I know when it’s not good to use it.
Gio
I know you are a huge Lakers fan but the Celtics are on FIRE!!!!!
Damn they’re good.
I had a good day with my longs but trimmed almost all of them at the close. I had too much profit not to take if off the table. The only trade that f’d me was my GMXR short. They lowered guidance this am and cut production but the stock (of course) went up almost 2 bucks. Should I cover this fucker tomorrow or do you think it pulls back again in the near term?
Good day.
Ray Allen’s been the man … marriage must be agreeing with him or he has finally settled into his confort zone after last year’s finals.
Question for anyone that uses stockcharts.com. Whats the indicator for momentum that Gio is using?
Szaman, I do not think Stockcharts has that one, but I could be wrong.
Those charts come from ScottradeElite trading platform. I think that is their (Scottrade’s) own proprietary indicator.
GMXR will get a 52-low again, but not in the near future. What are you looking for? what’s your goal? You held it going into earnings, so whatever you planned before that, you should stick to it. Know what I mean? It’s really dangerous to be shorting energy right now. jus sayin. Oh yeah, Celtics are good, but I’ll bet you a beer they lose this Christmas to Lakers. My pinky is out buddy.
Oh yeah, those momentum charts are from Scottrade. Works very well in high volume situations.