As far as top 20 commissions generated, I am not even close, I think I am just average in term of fees. The guy with 1 monitor generates about twice as much commission as me, the problem was that his space was stuck between two other traders and there really isn't any space for another monitor, he is in her group and they are moving to a nice new building (even if I really prefer the nice private office) so I think the MIS guys are just going to wait until they switch-over. As I said, I DID NOT ask for a fifth monitor nor a computer system, I asked for First Alert, I thought it was a software install, and I really didn't appreciate what she said to me. I mean, the guy with one monitor is putting up numbers far superior to her own too, it wasn't a good example. As far as fair/unfair is concerned, the firm erased that guy's 8000 deficit a few months back, and 8000 can buy a lot of monitors. I don't break face with people until I know I am better than them, if in my heart I know I am not as good I have a lot of endurance. I am very confident I won't get the boot because this firm will never ever fire a profitable trader, I am like a little ATM machine and regardless of how much I take home they will get commissions from me on a daily basis, I need them just as much as they need me.
Just out of curiosity, does Worldco do options? And do you think your trading will get better if you get away from your arch nemesis?
Pssssst, tradeRX, shortnfool, Bucky Lee, Buck Naked or Doogie Hoser Here are some links for you my dear friend(s): http://www.mental-health-matters.com/ http://www.lightship.org/ I hope they can help with the multiple personality issue. Cheers, Bill
Magna: âWithout giving away any proprietary secrets, would you please discuss your style a bit more.â Iâll take this off of Hitmanâs journal since it is his forum and not mine. http://www.elitetrader.com/vb/showthread.php?s=&postid=22932#post22932
Another option is to switch firms, there are so many of them. With your experience you shouldn't have any problems. Another thing, you can generate more commissions later when you are more confident. You will trade size in some point in the future (market permitable hopefully) so don't think about generating extra commissions...... Best of luck
Whew, last night I had my first conversation with Tony Oz and I spend about 2 hours reading his trading journals in his first book. This morning I opened the day thinking it must had some positive impact in my trading and at 10:30AM I looked on my blotter and I didn't have a single winning trade after commissions, I wasn't down much, just $550, but you can imagine I wasn't happy about it (especially when I bought the wrong stock when I tried to cover something). The truth is at any time you try to do something different, even just a little bit different in trading, it is going to cost you and I almost thought I was going to be blown out. Fortunately Mrs F on my team called a oil bottom and I was able to hit the lay-up. I know exactly what I did wrong and I am going to fix it next week. This is not meant to be a full review for his books which will come a few weeks from today, more like a first impression. 1) If a stock trends and broke support/resistance (yesterday's high/low), I gotta milk it all day. Keep 100-200 shares in it just so I will watch it, buy pullbacks, sell squeezes, so many times I make half a point or three quarter of a point, so happy, got out at the top, it pulls back a quarter, I stopped watching it, it breaks out again and I miss a point or two. If the stock is working, milk it, pare in and out all day. I will be watching it all day too and I will be familiar with the movement, support/resistance levels, and I should really be able to cash in. 2) Support and resistance levels, it is funny how I knew every single concept in Tony's first book, but his book really tied a lot of loose ends together. I can't even explain it, I have always been an in and out type of guy and most of my trades I don't even look at daily's, I always thought S/R is meant to be broken and I guess after he told me that he is for the most part an intraday trader with a little overnight every now and then, I was convinced. Namely, with my own eyes I saw the beauty of S/R levels with the OSX index today, and I was amazed how important high/low of previous day is. 3) There is absolutely no way I can trade size in and out quickly and I absolutely must learn to hold on to things without any excuses. I have seen in Tony's first book how he gets quite deep in the money with a stock only to close the trade barely flat (granted, the example was with 100-200 shares and I am sure in real trading he would have pared in and out to get a little more meat off the bones). I just realized a key weakness in my traidng is that I look at my P&L too much, now I am up $800, pullback I am only up $500, I get frustrated, I sell, I end the day with $450 instead of $1000 had I held on longer. I guess the point is I should ALWAYS keep at least some of my position if a stock is strong and add on pullbacks. All in all, I am very sure he made a positive impact on my trading, for every position I took today I kept 100 shares until intraday support/resistance level is broken no matter what, and as I become more confident, I am sure my holding time will increase, and I will be able to pull more profit out of my ideas. First Alert is now running on my second computer and I can see why they gave me a second machine, it really is resource intensive and having it on my primary machine can really hurt. I am going to configure Tony's set-ups as well as some of Jeff Cooper's set-ups from Hit and Run trading and I will trade them with 100 shares and report back what happened. And if any stock I normally trade with sector index shows up I am going to take at least a half lot (500 shares). Before I go on to today's trading, a very big thanks to Sniper, I really really really underestimated you, and I RARELY underestimate people. I had no idea where you came from and my sincere apology if in any one of my posts I showed any cockiness. I am not sure how far I can go, but even if I don't ever trade Tony's set-ups I think I already made some improvements in my own game. I am at a stage where it is hard to learn something new everyday but EVERY LITTLE BIT helps a LOT, and I really really appreciate it. And of course, a big thanks to Tony (but my honest first impression is, your second books is nowhere near as good as your first one simply because it doesn't include trading journals I can't believe you spend the time you did with me on the phone and I didn't even ask any serious technical questions, but I also can't believe how much I think my trading will improve even when I didn't ask you any serious technical questions (although they will come, guaranteed, a few weeks from now). I don't know how I can possibly explain it, after I got off the phone with you I spend two hours with your book and then I did a lot of thinking about how I can improve my style by incorporating some of your techniques into my own game, and something subtle just clicked. I didn't trade any of your set-ups but it still helped me with my own positions. Whether this will address my inability to let the winner run remains to be seen, but I am very optimistic and can't wait for next week. And of course, the compliment you gave me was a huge confidence boost, and I can see a breakout down the pipeline soon. I can see clearer now that the rain is gone, although whether my P&L will take a solid upswing remains to be seen. +975 before commissions, +532 after, 13600 shares on 7 of 14 shooting, 2 bullets. Pre-Market: Nothing really caught my eyes. 9:30: Energy gapped up and I bought SGY and DO, both were near yesterday's support but OSX quickly reversed so I got out of DO for flat and SGY for a 15 cents loss. Bulleted both, and DO traded a quarter point lower and I barely got my bullet cost back, SGY was a little better but he squeezed hard and again I barely got my bullet cost back. In chaos I bought a stock called DP instead of covering DO and I was filled at 47.77 the top print of that morning move, and I sold for a half point loss (of course, it closed up 3 points, lol). 9:47: AGN printed super size at 64 and I took some at 64.01 since DRG was going up and 64 was support, pared some out on the way up and got 15 cents out of the trade. He traded below 64 and I shorted a little, of course, it was bull because he did that to blow people's stops and that happened to be the intraday low, I wish I flipped it but at the time I just saw the damn DP on my blotter and I really wasn't confident. 10:33: Bad trade, took SGY at 41.10, no siupport there whatsoever. Lost 30 cents. Took DOX long at 27.13, another bad trade, stopped out at the figure. 11:30: I was really mad, I had no winning trade today, I started playing around with First Alert and Mrs F on my team said "oils may have a chance", she trades oil everyday (as a matter of fact everyone around me specializes in a couple of sectors each but I trade EVERYTHING so they all split ideas with me every now and then), energy has been selling off a lot lately and I saw XNG/OIX rip (in the morning they went down then OSX went down so I thought those are the leading indexes in energy today), took HP at 27.12 for a 30 cents move and SGY for a 30 cents move. OSX quickly moved to resistance and bounced off, should have waited, it pulled back and blew right through intraday resistance from yesterday, should have took HP again for a 1 point move after he wiggled. Instead I took DO and got half a point. I can see my mistake that I didn't milk that breakout, and I can see how a stock breaking resistance can bring some confidence for me to hold with looser stops. 1:13: Took some DNA for a half point move on a BTK rally (probably some Anthrax news came out). Tried to get AHC on OIX rally but OIX didn't go up as much as OSX so I got out flat. Took LXK on COMP move up and I stopped out at 50, he went below the figure, blew stops, and took it back up, I really really hate those damn specialists. 3:00: Futures broke intraday resistance, took PPG, MWD, DOX, and DNA. PPG I took a quick 20 cents scalp out CEX pop. MWD I took another 20 cents. DNA a quarter as it could not break 47 resistance from two days ago. DOX was a bastard traded up to 27.6 and I thought I was golden and he filled me near the figure on the way down, I pared out on the way up but I lost money on shares I pyramided. Every time I feel uncomfortable I just sell 100 shares, or if I like it I buy another 100, since my commission is cents per share based it really helps me to keep my cool. Eventually I will be able to just sit on say 1-2K shares and just wait, but for now this is not a bad transition, take a half lot and hold. My holding game must improve, I must recognize my best position early and milk it. Finished this week up 1K and I can't wait for the opening bell on Monday.
I think I enjoyed our talk just as much as you did, if not more It charged my batteries and I'm ready to take on the market next week. I think we charged each other's batteries I promise to stay in touch, but as I told on the phone, when I get busy trading, it's like Tony Oz disappears from the face of earth
Hitman, I agree with you 100% watching your P+L can be one of the worst thing you can do , at least that is my opinion. I found that I was very influenced by the P+L instead of the trade at hand. I found I do a lot better since I don't look at it at all during a trade. Mr X
Lit: Worldco does options at its PTJP hedge fund division, which is the equivalent of our Navy Seals Mrs. D and company are relocating to 100 Wall Street soon, I don't think of anything else when I trade and it is not an issue to me.
Thanks for getting back to me. So options are not available to the average worldco trader if I understand correctly. I have a question about your firm's culture. Your firm is probably the biggest and baddest prop shop and I want to work there someday. But I was wondering what the culture was like? You talk about it in your posts. Seems like there is a lot of pressure to perform as well as using a scalping strategy (which makes sense, theoretically less risk and more firm commissions). Good luck on monday man.