at least you are sticking to it... I had a rather significant loss trading directionally the other day because I was too stubborn to recognize the trade didnt worked out and focus instead on the next trade and not hoping... and that took me off trading for almost 2 weeks... but now I am back and just focusing on trading correctly like you vs trading for P&L... my biggest issue with trading directionally is that if I make $300 it feels like too litle so i tend to overtrade a lot ... for some weird reason, I dont do the same when trading spreads since those trades can last hours to days... so I commend you for just respecting your limits, losses and just sticking with it..
Finally got a new lab top that has the snipping tool. I was way to frustrated with my last one which did not have it. Sorry for showing up a couple months ago and disappearing. Especially to Chuck who kindly emailed me step by step info on how to use the snipping tool. I unfortunately had to withdraw 25000.00 dollars in the past 5 months which has really inhibited my profit for the year. My account balance as of right now is 1800.00. So I have been buying options to trade. I have been trading out of the money weekly options and have paid out the ass on commissions. Also I realized if I had bought in the money weekly options I would have done much better considering when you buy out the money weekly options and the stock stays flat you lose your total investment. Here is my profit for the year.
Here is my account balance which is disheartening. I love to trade so much. At the same time my parents have lost everything and for the past few years I have helped them keep their home and been overly generous. My parents gave me the best upbringing and did everything for me as a child. So really it's just payback. I need some capital. Fortunately I have sold a few big jobs in my construction business and hope to get 10,000.00 back in. I know it's peanuts. But to be honest I have been in the game for about 4 and half years. The first three with very little money to lose. Which was a blessing. I got my start July 25th 2012 with a 14000.00 dollar investment. Between the profits and with drawls it is hard to tell what my profit has been since. I figure about 130%. Just wanted to show my balance as I typed it in instead of using a blotter in my last post. My account balance:
Here is my performance since my start. About 11 months in. I am happy to say I am a profitable trader. Through over 200 trades. I started with 14000.00 dollars and through the with drawls and a couple small deposits I figure I am up about 130%. Not completely sure though because of all the action in the account. Again I feel the commissions are outrageous due to out of the money options buying. I make about 4 trades a week. My p/l for the past 11 months:
+13 gross I was having a decent day and then things turned on me. I'm shutting it down. I don't want to go from a decent day to negative. It's weak, but this is the first time this month I've had two positive days in a row. I'm making some strategy adjustments as market conditions have changed. Hopefully, it pays off soon. Normally, overtrading is my weakness, but today was a day of trades I didn't take. Since I've been struggling I've limited myself to one trade at a time. It is frustrating now to look at the screen and see multiple trades that I didn't take that are doing great. Overtrading would have been awesome today! Hehe. ofthomas, thanks for the support. As much as I suck a trading, I am good at sticking to my risk limits. There is always another day and another trade.
As I mostly swing I'll shoot for monthly sometimes weekly posts. I was down 300 dollars on Friday. Happy with monthly gains so far considering a next to nothing account balance.