Was working on coding over the weekend, tweaking and tidying up. While doing so another major puzzle unraveled which had again to do with failed stock breakouts. So have coded that in with the end result being quite a number of previous contenders now no longer make the grade for buying or holding. The climate on the ASX is just not conducive for longer term trading atm, day after day are red days. Last week BUBs was a shocker. Today Carbon Revolution CBR had a shocker, down 28% at one stage and finally finished the day down 19%. When I bought CBR I should not have been bought (on hindsight) because back then it didn’t make the new grade, however Friday past it went into buy contender mode but at that point it reached a 23 cents resistance level, so today it had a nasty pullback from resistance which by rights took it into a sell signal for the stock. So I’m sitting on the fence wondering should I sell or hold? CBR had a very strong month this month, can it repeat that again next month? I think possibly not so I’ve decided to place a limit order and sell. Price needs to clear above 23c to be considered a buy. Today sold IG6, it is another stock which doesn’t make the grade for holding onto in my algo, so I dumped for a loss. It looks like a cot case, no point hoping and praying for a miracle. So right at the moment I’m not traveling too well. If I place XMM and XSO on my algo, they indicate they are not a buy either, so I’m attempting to trade in a negative/bearish ASX environment atm according to my conditions. I may consider next month (from tomorrow) another strategy, same algo, but short term opportunities but using a different technique that I have.
The ASX mkt is very tough atm, the gains are small, as soon as stocks begin to run, they get slammed, the winnings are meager. I think much of it has to do with the Fed continually jawboning on and on about interest rates week after week. So a handful of stocks may rise, usually the larger caps which artificially pushes the index up, but the very small caps are going nowhere. This is how I feel at the moment. I’m on a journey and the shoes I’m currently wearing are wearing out and I’m uncomfortable with them. So I’m shopping for a new pair of shoes but the more I shop the more educated I get on new shoes which then sends me off looking further for that perfect shoe fit. I’ve been trading many years but the last two, the volatility has thrown all my previous methods into the not suitable basket. So I’m attempting to change my trading style, but the more I dig into a new style the more I discover new stuff which then sends me off onto another search. So I create a new algo but it’s not perfect. Well perfection will never be found, but the trading style associated with the present algo, I’m not happy with the results and writing and rewriting algos is time consuming. Kind of feeling frustrated at the moment. So atm I’ll just back off a bit on trading perhaps until I sort out the current coding where it sits comfortable with me. Today I managed to unload LRS Latin Resources. I’m attempting to sell stocks to reset my current holding positions after discovering many don’t meet the grade to be holding. Even though the current profit seemed small on Latin, I’d previously bought Latin to this experiment at 12.5 cents and sold at 31c. I thought it may run again, but I’m being too optimistic, so decided to give the idea away, there’s a limit to how much blood you can squeeze out of a stone and the way things are going, a massive sudden dump on Latin if it happened, would be super annoying and I’m not in the mood atm to tempt more fate after the recent CBR and BUB fiascos.
Hey Mick any reason you only trade small caps? Limits your options to only going long and that part of the market can be easily manipulated. What about something like ISO etf that covers it only one thing to look at.
You sorta missed the point. I was getting at trading one thing and that thing being able to go long and short. I'll post the chart of ISO and give you a look first before showing where some $ can possible be made on it.
Yea na can't short ISO. I was referring to something like the SPI "trading one thing and that thing being able to go long and short" I mentioned ISO cause it's like half way there trading just one thing but can't go short. Imho the issue I have with trading a basket of stocks is that you may have a system that has a 70% success rate but you maybe unlucky enough to hit all the different stocks when that 30% losing rate comes up. Trading one instrument with the same success rate and so long as your wins are equal to or greater than your loses in $ terms you will make money.
The issue I have is not wanting to day trade nor trade futures. Atm, the volatility has gone through the roof on stocks, everyone is suffering my fate, money disappearing faster than coming in, stocks just aren't holding up, I think everyone is short term trading atm.
The last several months I've been experimenting with a different way of approaching the markets using a number of timed stops for getting in and out of positions. Alas I'm finding myself becoming lost in a quagmire of volatility. Your post was interesting, and made me think of NDQ.AX which is probably the strongest least volatile ETF / instrument on the ASX. Below is a chart comparing it with the QQQ. I seriously think I'll consider your advice, it's easier to track & trade one position, it should be safe enough to pile on a large position for NDQ.AX. I'm going to also dump my current experimental algo, it is not ideal, it's not working out for me, a little too volatile, too complicated, the algo is very large. Back to the drawing board, however I have a simpler concept in mind, it's not like I don't know what to do, but must admit yesterday I was scratching my head in frustration - lost in self doubt.