Great game today hitman. After three losses in a row you played it cool and conservatively and stopped the bleeding. Tomorrow should be fun. Good Luck.
Super light volume as everything felt like thin ice today. There was a HUGE opportunity to make money this morning as positive economic numbers triggered some buying. The problem was, there was no real volume, and that made it very very difficult to take serious positions. I missed a couple of key fills and ended up barely in the black. It was essentially a massive short covering, because the volume was so thin stocks moved up a LOT in price. Have to admire Mrs. D. who was short DRG and BTK and DID NOT cover during that squeeze, those two sectors were weak and fell along with HMO which I watched but did not short. 3400 shares on 3 of 5 shooting, +281 before commissions, +142.11 after, 1 bullet. Finished the month with McDonald like performance +$1300, but thankfully, the summer is finally over. Averaged 4K a month June-August, I played too many sub-par games to blame the market for my incompetence, but next summer, I will know exactly what adjustment I must make in my game. For the pay period I am down $170 . . . not a substantial loss by any stretch of the imagination, but it is disheartening to go through a pay period without a check . . . Pre-Market: Super light news 9:30: On my charting program it seemed like a decent channel, but if I zoom out a little so that it includes yesterday's trading, it was easy to see that the futures actually stucked in a super tight channel. Took ADI on a bounce in futures and lost 12 cents as the futures hacked and chopped and seemed leaning toward the downside. Took some MO on TOB strength and got out flat. 10:01: All of a sudden, futures went through the roof, despite of the fact that there were no volume prints anywhere prices moved up on 300, 500 share blocks. Took IRF for a 30 cents move as I was really nervous without seeing volume prints nor BID/ASK . . . It went up another half a point. Couldn't get the fill on anything else in time as I refused to chase in a low volume environment, when the move is over, there is no BID, and it is not a good feeling to hold the bags on top . . . Brokers rallying, took super lagger WDR for a 20 cents scalp as I missed everything else. 10:22: BTK selling off, put up a bullet in CRA and got filled 15 cents lower than I intended. It was awful watching BTK tanking but there was no seller in CRA to drive it down, just 1x1's, 5x6's . . . Got a quarter scalp and covered in disgust when it was obvious that the stock had no seller left . . . Afternoon was total garbage and I had no trades . . . Stay tuned for September preview . . .
Congrats, Hitman, on coming through one of the most difficult summer trading periods that I have seen, with a profit. When things get better, you will look back on this performance and feel very satisfied. Your discipline is there and you are, literally on a day-by-day basis, getting at one with the market. You remind me of myself a few years ago. I had started this game with around $20k and was barely surviving for a year. During that period, I would have made more $ sweeping the floor for a McDonald's burger flipper. But I just stuck at it through thick and thin. Gradually, things became somewhat more automatic and less pressured. When that happened, I have never looked back. I evolved through taking consistent profits of $200 daily to $500, to $1000 ... and I was regularly making $10k at the height of the bull market (less skill involved there though!). You have the courage to post the evolution of your daily performance on this forum, and to receive critical appraisal from others. Your $ monetary performance is not too important at this stage. ANYONE WHO THINKS THAT YOU NEED TO MAKE IT BIG AFTER ONLY A FEW MONTHS IS LIKELY TO LOSE THEIR CAPITAL THROUGH SHEER RECKLESSNESS. What counts is where your development as a trader is. The more developed you become, it simply then becomes of stepping up your share size and the larger $ monetary rewards will come. You are developing as a trader in a superb manner, and I wish you the very best in reaching the next level.