At first I liked the name, it jumped out at me! An Accountant's Journal. That's the best name for a journal on a trading site! Now for the bad news... Being an accountant doesn't make one a trader anymore than being a bus-driver, doctor, janitor or lawyer does. The markets eat everyone the same. That's market Law. Advice. You deal in numbers and money, no? So just change your direction a little bit and trade currencies (money). If you know about money management, you should trade money, dude. You can paper trade a few demo accounts, get the feel of the Australian dollar, British pound, Japenese yen, the euro, even the USD (I presume you're in the USA). The money pit (forex) is where the big boys meet up. Even Buffett is trying his hand trading money. sKaLpZ
Great questions, here's some answers: 1.) I narrow my selection of 30 by calculating pivot points and I look for 5-10 of the stocks with the lowest spread between pivot point and previous close. $.05 is more the range I prefer. So if a stock closes at $30, I would look for its next day pivot point of 29.95 or 30.05 or anywhere between that range. Once that is accomplished I factor in some discretion, i.e. are they trading too high, or are they too low compared to their competitors. I felt AA was too low at 27.45 so I bought it, knowing well that it should move higher. Turns out it did, and I just took my profits too soon. Market direction is important as well, last week was a great week for my trading strategy, this week should be good as well, but I'm sure the bears will ruin the market rally sometime soon. 2.) I don't have a set time restraint on the hold of my trades. It usually will depend on where the market is going and is the stock I am holding following that direction, if not, its time to get out. Today for example, Alcoa was bouncing around 27.44 and 27.60 for most of the day and seemed like it was going no where so I got out, thinking that it will continue to hover around that range and that tomorrow I will find better use of my money. So this part is very discretionary. 3.) Only one trade at a time, only one trade each "trading" day. Just starting out I want to keep disciplined and I am learning so this is the best way to do it I feel. I feel it would get sloppy for me to make too many trades in one trading day, maybe sometime in the future I can try this approach. If my position is on the rise and the dow is as well I will put a tight trailing stop on my position once it hits the 1% target. This is one way to try to etch out more than just 1% on a trade. Any other thoughts on how to handle this are welcome, but this is my only solution right now for riding winners. 4.) Only trade once a day, once profit is taken, that's it. It's opportunity cost and some days it can be big if I take my profits early, but its still profits and not a loss, that's important to me. Thanks,
Thanks, I thought it was a good name too. It's true an accountant has no better chance in the market than anyone else, and I never said it was an advantage, just simply stated my profession. As for trading currencies - I know nothing about it, so why trade it? It took me 8 years of watching and learning the stock market to try my hand in trading equities, so I don't assume I will enter currencies anytime soon. In a few years if I have positive results with trading equities I will broaden my trading strategy to options/currecies, etc... but as of now I have no clue how to trade these, nor do I care right now. Thanks
I, who am a high school drop-out, find it of benefit to be able to speak with (or rather post to) an accountant. Every accountant I've met has been a pleasure knowing and a very nice person. I presume you're the same type of individual. My learning curve went from zero to having a really good understanding of forex within 4 to 8 weeks. So much so that I entered a global forex-trading competition and gained over 45,000% profit in two-weeks trading. I just think your presumptions about trading global currencies being too complex for you to understand and learn are unfounded. In addition, I teach currency trading for free, and I guarantee your results to the level of being able to open and close forex trades like a professional, within a day. After two-years, due to the liquidity in EUR/USD, I can scalp off 1000-points in a single 8-to-12 hour trading session when that pair typically moves 75 to 100 points. Try doing that with a stock. The Coin
May I ask which online broker your using and/or how much your paying in commissions buying 100 shares?...How much of a role does the commission you pay play when your looking for a profit of just 1% on a 100 shares? You sound like you have put in a number of years studying the market and have given considerable amount of your time to come up with your trading plan....Seems your starting off the right way for yourself....Hope your successful with it....Thanks for sharing your strategy and goals and actual trades..Very Interesting read....Will be looking forward to new postings..
yeah, see, that's another nice thing about forex, no commission charges. I calced out what making a similar amount of trades in stocks would be, and in a year's time, like 40% of my port would be used just on commission fees. granted, I didn't start with a million dollar account, nevertheless, the account balance I had to learn to trade stocks with would have gotten completely eaten by those huge round trip commission fees. I went to forex instead and typically make 100s of trades for free, i.e. no commission fees. yes, the broker takes the spread, around 1 to 2 tics, but, when you can scalp off even in excess of 8 or more points, over time you don't even notice the spread charge. had it not been for this factor, I would not even have been able to begin trading, much less progress. s
Thanks for the kind words for my colleagues and I. We get a bad rap sometimes. I think its great that you were able to learn so quickly, and be successful. I just don't feel confident in my ability to learn as quick as you did. It is definately on the backburner though. Thanks
Here is my first mistake - small but nonetheless. A bunch of guys at the office use Scottrade and said nothing but nice things about it as a trading platform and broker. I thought my choices were scottrade, ameritrade, e*trade, shwabb, or TD waterhouse. I had no idea there were other non commercialized brokerages out there. So among those 5, commissionswise my best choice was scottrade, not to mention the great referals from the people I work with. I think long run (when I start trading more weight), my choice is still good as I do love scottrade. For now though, I would have been better off with Interactive Brokers because their $.01/share commissions would put me at a $2 roundtrip as opposed to the $14 I spend with Scottrade. Once I start trading 1000+ shares that's when It will pay off by still paying a fixed $7/trade. But yes, only trading 100 shares with a $14 commission means I need the stock to move at least 14 cents to break even. Today's picks are narrowed down to 3: 1.) MCD: Prior Close (PC): 31.32 Pivot Point (PP): 31.22 Why: I am taking the large ($.10) pivot/close spread because MCD is trading at a much lower P/E than WEN and in the past 3-4 weeks it has slowly (thats good) been catching up (investors are realizing it should be on par or better than WEN). I liked MCD before it was $30, but I still like it at 31.32, it's still cheap. 2.) HON: PC: 37.26 PP: 37.21 Why: Low ($.05) pivot/close spread and a good high/low range yesterday (not too big of a swing (3%+) and not too little (<1.2%). Generally, a stock with a big prior day swing won't have the momentum to keep it up and will have a pullback, and stocks that have no momentum are too risky to bet that they will the next day. 3.) GE: PC: 37.18 PP: 37.12 Why: Same reasons as honeywell. Plus GE has been trading up for the past couple weeks and looking good to investors. I'll let you know what I actually picked at noon/lunch time. For now, back to work. Good Luck today!
Just remember, bro, you don't have to risk a cent. There are demo accounts that trade identical to the real live forex platforms. Identical in every way. Just download one. You guys, accountants?? You'd all figure out how to open/close trades in a snap. In fact, I found stock trading to be 10-times more difficult than forex. Just remember, you risk zero of your own money trading a demo and you can trade them (with the right broker) without limit. Good luck. And if you have any fx questions, pls don't hesitate to email me. Gamal Saham Ruach... THE Gamal Saham Ruach.