Mon Sep 16, 2013 3:31pm ESTComments Off on Lots of Hand Sitting
I couldn’t pull the trigger on anything today, not to sell existing shares, not to buy new shares, and I have SKF already which feel like a bit much in this tape.
I stalked CREE today, it is setting up perhaps. I wanted to buy shares much lower, so if this setup does trigger I may just trade a piece and go back into my core size (3/4).
Current longs, by size: RBCN, SKF, RVLT, AIXG, CREE, FB, LO, EXK, F, IMMR, MJNA, and O.
Cash around 25 percent.
The O was very strong at the open. That is a nasty little fade right there.
I lost some money in the futures today when I was shaken out of my short by the clown show in my brain. I called the head and shoulders this AM to the tick. But instead of capitalizing on it, I sat in traffic listening to Traffic. The clown ring leader is Gary Busey.
I’m holding out for my favorite setups before I put any more cash to work.
Thu Sep 12, 2013 4:26pm ESTComments Off on Speaking of Reality Checks
My apologies for being a bit light on the pen today and yesterday, I have simply not had the time to properly address you, kind people of the interwebs.
You may be familiar with the Sold Too Soon club and its proud members, but I’ve become a certified member of the Bought Too Soon club.
Dips, I’ve been buying them too soon. The problem with buying too soon, good people, is YOU HAVE TO TAKE HEAT, lots and lots of heat.
Then, you pay quite a bit of money to see your trade through. Such is the case with my new stud picks SKF, RBCN, and EXK.
These are all trades to me, nothing more. I literally have a few cents more patience in all three. You know what that means right? I risk getting a larger loss via an overnight gap. It’s hard for me to overly concern myself with such things though. It seems silly to live a life of worry at such a tender age. I still like these trades.
LED is working this week and I want a fund of LED firms. So far, I have it owning CREE, AIXG, and RVLT. I want more of all of them and a side of LYTS and OESX.
Stocks were mixed today, but overall down. The same goes with my swing portfolio.
But your boy RAUL did work today, regaining all of the Bossram losses from last week. As you may have noticed, the /ES has been a snoozer. Seeing in advance the need to recoup my losses and suspecting the /ES may offer insufficient opportunities to do so, I pegged out the i7s all weekend to build a high probability trading picture in the /6e aka the Euro dollar. I used to trade this instrument three years ago and I remember why—it’s a wiry SOB. Chalk it up as beginners luck if you’d like, but I pulled another 0.0040 out of the /6e today, putting me back on track to increase my position size by the end of October.
This very much pleases me. I’m not taking excessive risk either. The gains have come faster because the /6e is on the move and setting up more often.
In summary, the /ES rolled over a bit today after taking out a trend line I drew on my chart. That’s some advanced analysis. Value migrated higher, we printed a neutral day which tends to show up near inflection points and tomorrow is Friday the 13th. Hide your wife.
Wed Sep 11, 2013 3:50pm ESTComments Off on Trade Recap and Top Picks Into Tomorrow
I sold out of CLF and TRLA today, booking two solid wins.
I added to my RBCN long which has come under fire since I purchased the iPhone sapphire news spike yesterday. Today felt like it was designed specifically to extinguish the weak hands that tagged onto the name during the AAPL WWDC. By 10am I was already -5.5% on the trade. Should the tide wash in, pressing the stock higher, the huge short interest in RBCN will enjoy the bloodiest squeeze yet. This short bus is crowded and the stock is trending higher (Read: combustion).
I bought the indecision in EXK because I see it as a low risk entry into a very violent market. Should we see strength in metals, EXK will beat shorts back into their holes. If it trades lower, it’s an easy trade to cut.
I still like SKF as I mentioned earlier. But it won’t take much more to shake me out.
I’m quite enjoying my $25 dollar cost basis in the finger banging bandit $FB. Well done Mark. The Facebook traded to all time highs today.
LED technology is alive and well, flexing its muscles a bit via LYTS which is up over 10 percent on strong forward looking statements. Their canopy lighting is crushing. You know, gas station lights. Petro stations are a huge beneficiary from LEDs because they keep their lights on nearly 24/7 and the LED gives a cleaner and safer glow.
Trading futures went well today. I’ve been giving more focus to the Euro dollar via the /6e because chessNwine and I have aligned vision on the trend. That has given me confidence, and using Bossram Alpha I managed to extract 0.0022 from the /6E today. I took another 1.50 out of the S&P manually. Elroi took a 1.75 handle winner on the long side when I least expected it, and as I write is slightly underwater on a short. It looks like a victory for the humans today.
Top picks into tomorrow? Why they are my two largest positions, of course: SKF and RBCN
I was not actively trading the /ES today, but my algo was able to take two trades. One earned 1.75 handles and the other was breakeven.
My portfolio had a very strong day today, up nearly three percent and putting me back near my high watermark of the year. I’ve been trading my butt off to finance these investments in RVLT and CREE. As a result, when RVLT and CREE go up, I have big days.
Let’s discuss RVLT a bit. If we consider the sentiment chart idea, we find ourselves within the panic bounce. To me this means any rally we see over the next few days/weeks is likely to fail. How do you like that? I’m telling you right now that my largest position is involved in a failed rally. And that’s okay because my timeframe on this position is multi-year. Let’s hope I’m correct so we can have better opportunities to buy even more shares. Another anecdotal piece of evidence calling this rally into question is one of its origins: a {cringe} Seeking Alpha report. The bozos at SA (as the hipsters call them) were greased to help somebody get out of a seriously underwater position. This is just a theory, but their track record is eroding though the diligent work of iBankCoin Chief Market Strategist “The Fly”. It puts a foul stink on the whole move. If it wasn’t a pleasant twenty percent pressure release valve I would be even more ornery.
However, CREE reported they have retrofitted the NASA headquarters and done so quite successfully. Hmm, Cree really knows how to land the big fish, yes? Wrong! The biggest fish tend to be the wisest fish—having survived years of fishing and boat propellers. If/when these gigantic fish encounter a situation where their lighting is called into question, the data will unequivocally point them in the direction of LEDs. Any entity that weighs the financial impact of any business decision will see the cost benefit of retrofitting their existing light structure with LEDs. And CREE, RVLT, OESX, AIXG, RBCN, and GTAT will benefit. Look at GTAT…shorts better pray to their demon lords that sadistic seven holds as resistance. Otherwise the light, the good, shall prevail.
Other big winners today were TRLA, CLF, and END. Readers, I’ve been clear with my calls. It’s up to you to wrap risk around them. I scaled a small piece of TRLA off because I take profit when the markets giveth.
My SKF has gone red by about three percent. Tomorrow it comes to an interesting fork in the road where I’ll either buy more, do nothing, or scratch the trade. I was hesitant to add to the position today when the SPY absolutely refused to roll over. Checking back in just now, it appears it did manage to roll, BARELY. Until I see more confirmation, I’m not loving this trade.
END needs to rip, I mean, come’on now, we’ve been flirting with the idea of going all the way for weeks. Why not get past this game of just the tip as @chessNwine often references? I think we do, hence why I haven’t scaled any off yet.
CLF is tricky. It has been dead money for so long and now it shows signs of life. Do we trust it? Or do we take our six percent and dump this cheap trick? TBD
In closing, I kicked my cash up to 25 percent and could like to see some market weakness to buy my favorite stocks sitting on my wish list—names like Z, SFM, GOGO, AMBA, ADHD, and VPCO.
Into the weekend I would like to very briefly run down my portfolio holdings and the reasoning behind each. This information is coming off the rip after a long week. Thus any thing with a flimsy justification may need to go.
Here we go, from largest to smallest holding:
Cash – I have 20 percent of my book sitting cash. I’m eager to deploy it on the long side
SKF – I’m using a three year volume profile chart to view BRK/B, WFC, GS, C, etc. and I see a great volume pocket below prices. Plus they’ve broken down off their respective highs and are printing tight bear flags. The overall market is on unstable footing and I want some levered short exposure.
RVLT – Yes, it’s my largest long holding and currently the bane of my stock existence. It earned largest ranking when I blew out my YGE and YELP shares this week. They were my prior biggies. The stock is trading worse than a bag of dicks at a hot dog eating contest. There are no buyers and presumably a few large sellers cashing in on the 600% plus move that took place up unto the day I bought the stock. The business model is stronger than ever, the shift in focus from consumer products to large scale retrofits is brilliant, and the investor population is still very shortsighted on the opportunity in lighting. I still love this name, and I plan to cost average in through several quarters.
AIXG – My German LED company. I love LED technology and I see this company as a beneficiary in Europe due to their energy awareness. The stock has been dead money for months and I continue to hold. Nothing has changed here, but this consolidation has excellent potential energy.
END – Huge short interest, oil exploration, and a hot chart.
CREE – Same as RVLT and AIXG, I want these names until incandescent and HID bulbs die. I’ve been in since January, why exit now?
TRLA – I love their app and use it constantly, the chart looks great, Zillow has been a beast, value added to realty pros, and Le Fly is in the name.
CLF – Tight consolidation, looks like it wants to rip and if it doesn’t the risk is really low. OA went YOLO on it this week too, although it never moved so that may have been a small loss.
FB – Marky Mark and the poke crew are getting it done. Holding
LO – Blu eCigs and menthol cigarrets won’t actually get banned. Interest rates need to stop rising, it’s making the coupon less attractive.
F – Still a strong chart and a nice product line. This is a patriot long still kicking around my port since the 4th of July
IMMR – haptics are way underutilized by porn. I think the porn industry will drive growth here 😉 Also, a Le Fly favorite.
USO – I should still be large but I took a bunch of scales on the way up. I almost sold it all. Look, that would have been really dumb.
O – it too pays a large coupon which is losing allure with bond rates rising. I traded my favorite reversal pattern really well in here with a large position. The locked in gains dipped my cost basis way down here. So I’m basically break even on the idea, waiting to collect some coupon.
That’s my holdings. I’m interested in a few other names, like SFM and GOGO, but will wait until next week to act (obviously).
