Well, where do I start? First off I have been in the market now for about a year. The first 6 months was just on paper, and reading as much as I could stand. The last 6 months has been actual trading. I work 40 hours a week at my full time job, so my trading is limited to researching at night, logging into etrade about 9:00, placing a trade between 9:30-9:45, placing my limit and stop, then going back to work. I'll check the quotes every hour or so, and if everything looks good to exit either with a profit or a loss, I'll exit, otherwise, I wait till about 3:30, then exit no matter what. I was trading with about $40k, margined out to $120k, but a recent event forced me to pull 20k out, and now I trade with 20k, with no margin (Thanks to the stupid 25k rule). The stocks I trade are normally Nasdaq stocks pulled off of stuff that i've traded recently, the previous day's highest volume stocks, or the days upgrades, or downgrades. I totally prefer shorting, don't know why, I've had about equal success with both long and short, but for some reason my mind always tells me to look for the best shorting opportunity. I have been considering changing over to futures, but I haven't finished doing all the research on futures trading I'd like to before I move my money over. Plus my futures account application is still processing with E*Trade who will probably take their sweet time in approving it. My normal stop is -8%, and my limit is +8%. Anywhere between that I'll make a call to take the profits and run, or wait. Normally when I was trading with 120k, +1% was fine with me, that was a lot more than I make at my job, but with 20k, now I have to try and squeeze more profits out, but generally I don't mind exiting early and quickly. Alright, since I'm done for the day already, I'll post todays pick in the next posting..
Entered: SS POWI @ 23.42 at 9:35 AM Cvr POWI @ 22.90 at ~2:30 Had 550 shares on it so took a $275 profit. Got this one from the downgrade list. It lost about 5% overnight, but then as soon as it opened it shot up to about 1% down. This seemed ripe for the picking. Since start of journal - +$275
SS 600 CCCG @ 22.05 9:45 AM CVR 600 CCCG @ 21.58 11:00AM +$280 Since Start of Journal: $555 (4% gain)
SS CSAR @ 10.80 06/15 9:30 AM CVR CSAR @ 11.10 06/16 3:00 PM I hate to hold positions overnight, but my cover didn't hit the limit yesterday and I was so busy with work that I didn't get to change it to a market before close.... Day's gain: -$220 Profit since start: $335
Had to sit out fri and mon due to not being at work (planning wedding)... hopefully tomorrow will bring good picks..