Any successful single stock traders?

Discussion in 'Trading' started by listedguru, May 12, 2004.

  1. Anyone here trade just one stock each and everyday successfully? I'm not asking you to name your stock just curious if it's nyse or nasdaq? I know a couple of traders who used to trade this way but no longer do.

    -Guru
     

  2. Good question... but its almost impossible to do this anymore. David Floyd used to preach that all u needed is 3 stocks to watch and u can make a living. Recently he gave up this idea.

    Given the poor volatility, problem with fills, loss of bullets, crappy range, poor follow through... there really is no edge most of the time. The only time u can actually play stocks is when they are news plays.. but that means u will have to find a new list everyday.

    If u are going to only trade one instrument in relation to the stock market.. in the long run u are much better off mastering futures.... ES, NQ, YM, ER2.


    --MIKE
     
  3. volente_00

    volente_00

    I do


    used to concentrate on PMCS

    but now trade WMT


    It can be done if you know how to read the stock and are patient.
     
  4. Thanks for the replies so far. If someone were to focus on just one stock I would think you would want a nice combo of good volume and good ATR. Ideally something you could comfortably get in and out of 5K shares of (WMT might be interesting)....
     
  5. It can still be done, but I don't think it is the dominant trading style for a lot of people anymore because of the reasons Trendfader mentioned. Although I do think it is possible to just trade one stock all day long, but not like a few years ago where the same name moved everyday. Now you probably have to jump around more, but if a stock is moving based on news it might be a good trader for 1-5 days and then it would probably be time to find another candidate. Another idea might be to find candidates near major inflection points and look for them to start moving well and as others recognize this it should bring volume and volitatility to that stock for several days.
     
  6. volente_00

    volente_00

    you have to have strong discipline to wait for the set up if you want to just focus on 1 stock to trade, but yea you need volume to do size. Never have had a problem filling size on WMT or PMCS. I have a buddy who traded with a guy who only traded CSCO every single day and he was damn good at it because of all of the institutional activity. Many stocks exhibit certain patterns and it is up to you to develop a trading plan that will allow you to see the pattern and profit from it.
     
  7. Mecro

    Mecro


    Ok, once again you do not know what you are talking about.

    If you got the skill and experience, you can make a good living trading even one stock like IBM, MMM or DNA. There are many others.

    I have 3 stocks I trade almost everyday, several others I watch and play often. Sometimes I lose on them, take hits but on average these are like bread and butter low risk profits.
     
  8. Snowman

    Snowman

    Yes it can be done. In fact if I was going to teach some one how to trade that is how I would do it. Before Supermontage I used to do 5 to 10% of the daily Volume in LLTC. I also traded QCOM and a few other names but day in and day out LLTC. Most of the guys that I know still trading have never traded "news" stocks they stick with two or three of there favorites and learn how to trade them. If I am trading a stock everyday listed or otc and it has news and everyone comes and plays that stock that day or for a few days who is going to have the advantage ME! Because I know how it moves or how the specialist trades it so you will have the edge.
     
  9. I guess you are talking about day trading or even scalping, no ?

    Because if you are swing trading, it really doesn't make sense to watch just one stock. If you are day trading, you simply don't have the time to watch too many stocks at the same time... The more stocks/instruments you watch, the more quality opportunities you will see and the more money you will make, that's the principle. You need to spot where the activity is because that's where the easy money is.
     
  10. What do you use to spot activity ?
    hombre
     
    #10     May 13, 2004