If your account falls below $25K, you can still trade if you hold overnight. You may be hesitant to do so after your last overnight trade, but in my experience this is where the real money is made. To swing trade safely, you should avoid exposing yourself too heavily to any one stock. I'd recommend that you mentally divide your account into 8 pieces and resolve not to devote more than one of those pieces to any one stock. Spend some time with daily charts and look for setups that produce reliable returns. A good place to start is to try to identify extremely oversold stocks that are due for a bounce. Use a spreadsheet and track entries and exits. There's no quick shortcut here; you need to do the work yourself or you'll never have confidence in the system. Once you've found a daily chart setup that you have confidence in, rotate your account in and out of stocks exhibiting that setup, devoting one piece of your account for each stock. The gains on any one trade will be small but they'll add up. I've been trading this method successfully for a while. Check out my trading journal if you're interested: http://www.bigmiketrading.com/elite-trading-journals/15667-swing-trading-journal.html
worldwary, thanks for the input. I'll check out your journal. I do realize that overshoots are none of the most consistent setups out there. To this date, I've only seen one overshoot that did not either correct back to its original line of movement or reverse. One has to draw out their lines carefully though. I know that there is big money in swing trades due to large gaps in opening prices. I do like to sleep better at night. I'll check it out.
+55 A lot of movement with GS. In the end, it's a trend day for it going up. I took advantage of most of it early. I dunno why but I have no guts to go with the trend. Too many trading range days last few days made it tough to determine whether it is a trend or trading range day. I tried to set an order to enter on a stop but it still executes as a market order. I tried this at a time I didn't feel bad if it executed. Does anyone here know how to do an entry with a stop using the Lightspeed system? Sold Short 98.16 09:37 Sold Short 99.85 09:41 Bought Cover 98.03 09:38 Bought Cover 99.76 09:43 Sold Short 100.53 09:53 Sold Short 101.59 10:01 Bought Cover 100.49 09:54 Bought Cover 101.53 10:02 Sold Short 100.505 10:51* Bought Cover 100.48 10:52 * Lucky to get out. Bad Entry price. No trading tomorrow. Have to do a gig during market hours.
hi sfbay my advice is to try swing trading just a few shares say 50 or so if you don't like holding over nite.....also not sure if you know but if your short using margin you don't have to pay any interest for holding. I just shorted a meager 35 shares of GS today at 105.26 for instance I don't plan on covering till its in the mid 90'S next week or so. but I day trade as well you got to mix it up.
I don't know if GS will go back to the mid-90's. I didn't read the news but saw the way it went up something happened. I would say at most a return to the high 90's if it's going to go back down. The market seems to really want to go up for now. I would say that if GS goes up another $2 tommorrow, I would be short if I was to swing trade. One thing about swing trading is that there is a lot more speculation and news can be more of a factor. No trades tomorrow so who knows what will happen and unfortunately I won't be around to watch the market.
+4 SPY Sold Short 131.26 10:22 Bought Cover 131.23 10:24 Not much going on. Was hoping GS would keep going up big so that I could short but oh well. Don't think I'll be able to trade Monday. Have to go to do an event.
-38 Tough day considering I was up early and could've stopped. I started trading other 100 level stocks. Couple bad trades where I doubled down on V was a bad deal. Bad Trades: V Sold Short 100.16 (200 qty) 11:33 Sold Short 100.41 (200 qty) 11:39 Bought Cover 100.46 12:20 I was trading V which doesn't seem to get the volume that GS & SPY get. I guess that's why traders didn't jump in on the overbought parabolic chart pattern. The volume on it was just poor. MCD Bought 98.76 09:51 Sold 98.945 09:51 SPY Sold Short 131.03 10:03 Bought 131.06 10:14 Bought Cover 131.02 10:03* Sold 131.09 10:14 Mixed up on the price I bought at.
+23 Was experimenting on doing higher volume today. SPY Bought 130.98 10:08* Sold Short 132.53 15:22 Sold 131.00 10:09 Bought Cover 132.47 15:22 Bought 132.66 15:42** Sold 132.68 15:43 Bought 131.23 11:46(400 qty) *** Sold 131.24 11:49 GS Sold Short 106.54 12:28 (300 qty) Bought Cover 106.497 12:29 * Didn't like where I was and just wanted to get out quick but could've gotten a little more had I waited but not much. ** Did a with the trend entry since most trades I've done of late is counter trend. I just got spooked and exited. Rolled the dice on this one. Should've stuck with it. LOL *** Really didn't like where I was with the entry price, larger share load, and how much time I was waiting for a bounce back and opted to just get out. Must've pulled +1 on this one.
+6 Bought 109.38 10:08* Sold 109.40 10:09 *Only got a partial fill of 34 shares at 109.38 initially, then it pulled back. I was stuck a bit and waited till I got all 200. Unfortunately that made me wait so I bailed out early Bought 109.06 10:23 Sold 109.09 10:23 Got to do a job interview so I am done for now.
+6 Sold Short 109.34 14:11 Bought Cover 109.30 14:11 One last one I did as I came back. Don't think I passed my interview. Got too nervous as I fumbled my words a few times. I always think that it looks bad.