I feel your pain... The past 2 weeks have been rough for me as well We just have to survive to the better days. Sometimes it can be tough to just NOT TRADE... But it's easier said then done
Yea it's tough out there. I had a great week a week ago, but last week was tough mostly because I was out of sync and a bit undisciplined. I didn't realize I was so undisciplined until I looked at the numbers. Most of my losing day today was from loading the boat in SPY post-market...really not a trade that I generally take, but I was trying to force things and it cost me. I took small losers with big size so it didn't cost me that much...but it still sucked.
I have a lot more BP than I need. I had about $1.4mm in SPY today (which isn't that much in the big scheme of SPY) and I was no where near close to tying up very much of my BP --- that said, I'm sure many prop traders here would tell you that BP is plentiful as a prop trader. Hopefully someday I'll grow large enough nuts to put a large portion of my BP to work on a daily basis. How do I select stocks? My two primary strategies are: (1) RTM types of trades (can't really go into more detail on that) (2) Breakout/Breakdown momentum trades -- in these trades I look for: stocks in leading sectors (prefer the strongest stocks in the sector) stocks need to have a strong daily chart (vice versa for shorts) stock needs to be trading above avg. volume intraday for me to consider trading it for the day I have no problem sharing the criteria for momentum types of trades b/c all of this information is in the public domain and these trades are generally very liquid. I also trade news plays from time-to-time with so-so results and other types of plays which are only available at certain times of the day. But generally the two above plays are my primary strategies. I hope that answers your question.
Well partly b/c losing is part of the game and I just made some dumb decisions today. The best traders in my office make money on 56% of their trades....so losing is generally something that happens in this business. Just had a rough past 6 days. Over my 5 year career I've probably had 6 losing days in a row once or twice. Happens. It doesn't really matter how often you lose so long as when you're making money, you make a lot more than when you lose and those winning trades more than make up for your losers. With my discretionary and automated trading for the month, I'll still be up around 15k or so for the month. Not a bad month for me, and with last week the way it was I'll take it. But there's still three days left, so we'll see what happens....it could get better since its the end of Q1 and maybe some vol will come into the market.
I`d love to follow his method, but don`t have an advantage in speed.I mean i trade nearly from the North Pole and my IP have 126kb connection at max.I just need some decent intraday method when i move from here. Now i basically trade mid term real time and only demo intraday.I tried also with the prop company to trade intraday, but not successfully. So my mid term trading is good so far.I need something for intraday either. So i`m looking through the threads and gather the information on that matter. Not sure why everybody is criticizing JH`s method.It`s just pretty decent tape reading method, in my opinion.
I expected you to answer some like that Now i thin i know why. But thanks and good trading to you anyway.
Trading i definitely an up and down game, between mid feb and mid march I was on fire. Then, two weeks ago my up days were great but i also had a few down days, and then last week everything went to shit. 2 barely positive days followed by 3 down days. Still net positive for the month but i took this week off to clear my head, sometimes thats all you can do.