It happened by chance, four months ago. An unspoken promise; to be liberated from the chains of limitation. The specifics are irrelevant; suffice to say my curiosity was piqued. Trepidation and skepticism were my allies as I began my journey, stealing onto paths unexplored, tiptoeing in the shadows of giants. Little did I realize what I had embarked upon. My background is in neither finance nor mathematics. Life and death is my fortress, the quiet cacophony of the ER. When the grim reaper loses his mystique and is consigned to the realm of the commonplace, a stark detachment has been born. Stone-cold discipline, emotionless logic, unfaltering action. Before I saw the limitations. Now I see the possibilities. As I venture into this brave new world, I dare to dream.
Human psychology and human emotion. You cannot quantify the unquantifiable, nor chain the illogical with shackles of reason. You cannot model for the vacillations of the fickle. But recurring patterns occur everywhere. The pattern recognition ability of the human brain is staggering. More powerful than the most sophisticated supercomputer. A glance at an ECG (EKG) will give me far more information than a machine-generated analysis. Every patient is a unique combination of signs and symptoms. But they present a familiar pattern. Sometimes, it takes seconds to recognize these patterns, and endless hours seeking confirmation with investigations of escalating complexity. In my industry, we practice the art of medicine, and defend ourselves with the science. The art consisting of judgement, decision and intuition. After all, what is intuition but subconscious knowledge coming to conscious awareness. The mind is a repository and network of the highest order. Unerring precision. Limitless interconnections. Incalculable depth.
letmeguest, you stumbled into Trader P/L thread and seeing members posted some monster numbers. And you said to yourself, I think I can...
London. And the National Health Service isn't the most generous employer... Thank you. Thank you. I suspect you may have noticed the main impetus for liberating my time. This was only a recent find. I stumbled into a trader, exuding passion for his art after thirty years in the industry. Had I realised then that the passion was infectious...
Every single trade will be profitable. Thatâs right, every single trade. How is that possible? Simple. In my mind, thereâs no such thing as failure. Profit is not merely confined to the fiscal and every mistake offers a valuable lesson. It is our duty to search these out unforgivingly and implement them decisively. Then may we call ourselves progressive. It is only when lessons are unheeded that a mistake becomes a failure. And it is the foolish man who replays his mistakes. This forum was a rare find; Iâm receiving an education nonpareil. Constructive criticism is a powerful catalyst for change.
Miss NHS is an insatiable mistress. The supple seductress with the wicked wiles. Her charms are enticing, her perfume intoxicating. Smiling as she leads us blindly down the primrose path. Luring us ever deeper into an institution from which there is no escape. To stream amidst the fallen and revive, to nurture the greatest gift, whispering a message to humanity. The promise of a gilded life⦠Intellectual supremacy. Earnest self-importance. Disconnected camaraderie. This is her reality. She begets a life of sacrifice and offers little in return. Taking a thing of beauty and splendour and magnificence, and tainting it with the poison of deception. Beguiled by Eve to taste of the forbidden fruit. Sweet transmuting to sour, innocence to decadence. Attraction to repulsion. Many reach this realization after theyâve crossed the threshold, completely submerged in her underwater world. Given too much to possibly renege. To break free and breathe the freshest air. To let the spirit soar.
Iâm swing-trading equity options and placed my first trade on 7th December. My current account size is 7K. My mean hold period has been 9 days. Overall, Iâm -2%. Iâve been keeping it simple, speculating on direction with puts and calls. Iâm trading with the trend. I experimented a little, but now my basic strategy is to look for stocks in a firmly established uptrend, preferably having hit a recent 52 week high. I then look for bullish signals after pullbacks to a significant support level. Essentially, Iâm looking to ride momentum, and Iâm happy to miss the very start of a move. I use TC2000, which in my estimation is an outstanding product. Iâm using price, 50 day and 200 day simple moving averages, volume bars, and candlesticks. Iâve set up stock scans on telechart for stock that have posted a 52 week high over the past week, and another scan for bullish engulfing patterns in uptrending stock. Iâm narrowing the search by looking at stock with a price of $5-$45, and (very recently) institutional ownership > 75%. I want to be following the smart money. Iâm a very visual person and I believe firmly in gestalt. Seeing the bigger picture. I initially set the screen to daily charts over a two year period, rapidly skim through the charts (usually a hundred or so), flag the ones that show promise and copy these to a watchlist. I then go through them more slowly, looking at weekly charts, daily charts and then zoom right in to the last few weeks. Iâve also begun plotting industry comparisons, and will most probably stick to bullish stock in bullish industries. I end up with a watchlist consisting of approximately ten stock. The entire process takes but a matter of minutes. I then further eliminate stock based on my risk management rules. For every trade, there is an estimated position risk of ≤ 1.5% total equity, which equates to an estimated risk of ~$1 (including slippage). I would have preferred to stay with 1% but found it too restrictive at this account size. I am aiming for a risk:reward ≥ 1:2. I place GTC conditional market sell orders for every trade, based on the underlying hitting my stop level, which Iâve placed 20 cents or so below most recent support. The majority of my initial small losses came courtesy of vega. I was buying ATM/OTM options, and getting burnt, even though the underlying often proceeded to make a nice move in my direction (after Iâd taken my 1% loss and closed the position). So Iâve decided to stick to 75-80 delta ITM calls, expiring at least a month after the expected move. In this way, Iâm planning to minimize vega, theta and gamma, while I get a firm handle on the basics of technical analysis, order execution, stops, money/time management etc. These are my current open positions, with dates of inception â 27th Dec AEIS April 12.5 call FCS May 17.5 put 5th Jan ADPT Apr 2.5 call CNET Feb 12.5 call IVIL Apr 7.5 call ZIGO Feb 12.5 call BIOS Apr 5 call 6th Jan HYSL Feb 33.375 call LZ Mar 40 call GOLD Mar 15 call (Some of these positions were established before I clarified my process or rules.) Currently, 50% of my total equity is tied up. However, because of my ≤ 1.5% max loss, if I get stopped out of every single trade, 85-90% of my equity will be preserved. These are on my main watchlist for Monday: HIBB RBAK POOL CPTS TLAB Hopefully, Iâll get home from work by 1800 GMT (1300 EST).
What is my short-term goal? To gain a firm understanding of the mechanics, to ingrain my rules, and to have 15K in my trading account by the second week of March. I donât expect to win 8K trading. I simply aim to have 15K in my trading account. The majority of that will come via savings and freelance work in my free time. Any profit will be a bonus. After all, Iâm still learning. Admittedly, it would be nice to not work every single weekend over the next two months. So thatâs my incentive to be profitable. What is my ultimate goal? Absolute financial freedom. Never place a limitation on ambition. Reach for the stars⦠to touch the skies.