Cool web! I go thro the same problem like yours some times.But like the earlier post suggested you could have got a .10/.20/.30 cent trade out of appl. Just stick to indices etf SPY,IWM or ym,es,er2,nq(if you like scalping 8-10 ticks) & few high volume stocks whick mimick the index. QCOM is one of my favourite.I will scalp it altleast .10c /day out of it. JUST Watch2/3 chart with 2-3 high roller stock including OIH. You will get your trade. Do not paper trade as you will not feel the pain when your stop loss is hit. Trade 100 share & feel the profit(happy) &loss(dejected).Loss shoild be affordable I guess
Cool web I have to confess that I kind of freeze like a deer in head light when I watch too many tickers. so I stick to 2/3 steel/coal/oil stocks apart from spy,iwm,qcom.may be smh,IYT. I dont lurk too much.just concentrate with minimum tickers in 2/3 chart with your favourite indicator.(maximum 10 tickers,3,4 charts open in my Medved QT) I do not trade indivual gold stocks.just a bit in XAU options if the market has a extreme move eiether way.I will get .2/.4 in the ATM option. I will look seriously at the GLD perhaps
the difference between a scalper and a swing trader doesn´t lie on the frecuency of your trades. You could be swingin to the 1 minute chart... looking for formations and so... The real difference is that the scalper doesn´t try to predict, or even get a high probability of something. The scalper doesn´t care what the market is doing next, he cares for what the market is doing in this very moment. If you see a move to the downside starting, then go short... see a rally? buy. Once it stops moving for a few seconds, bail out. There´s no waiting for the right set up, or waiting for the move to start, or thinking of the probabilities of the move going a particular way, you´re not in until there is a move, and you´re only in as long as there is a move. Once it stops, so do you. At first you´ll be too slow, catching the moves once they´re over... That´s why they say that at first you´ll learn how to lose, before you can learn how to win. A good start is using 100 shares and being profitable {before commisions} You wont be profitable after commisions until you´re up around 500-1000 shares... depending on your frecuency... The reason most scalpers use NYSE instead of nasdaq is that it is a lot cheaper to remove liquidity in NYSE and as a scalper you´ll be removing liquidity most of the time. If you go to PFE you can get into shorts without that annoying uptick rule...
Hello, I like to say thank you to everybody following the journal, I have stopped scalping and switched back to swing trading. I did not take 1 aapl trade this whole week, why? Theres no real trades to be taken unless you are really scalping, I'm not scalping with momentum, I'm always trading by charts, so I have no real concerete setups where I can have a 50+% win ratio etc. ------------ I also realized, its going to take me an extra 2-3 years to become a profitable scalper by myself. I think I would have a much better ROI dedicating that time in adding to my swing skills at the moment. Because its not about the timeframe that makes you a trader, Its about the unique entries that takes thousnads of scalping trades to build up to where you can actually have a toolbox of entries you use to scalp that timeframe. Back to swing: http://www.elitetrader.com/vb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=61468 It was a good learning experience
Just pulled an intra-day over the past 10 days. This thing trends like a fiend! What basket of stocks do you watch for scalping opportunities? (Heh, we might as well keep it going and derive value from it). Thanks in advance, JJ