Trading Recap 2/10/16

If you're wondering why I'm posting this recap at 2:30AM instead of sleeping it's because my fucking roommate doesn't know how to tell a bitch to stfu and be quiet when fucking and now I can't go back to sleep.

Anyway, broke even on a trade today I took in the later hours of my trading session (around 11AM). I was talking to my trading buddy and we talked about how a lot of the ideas/thesis we have at the open, while more volatile, usually work to a good degree and that trades later on may be more hit or miss. Obviously the trades at the open are much more risky and (cue it is hard for small account) but on the same token trades with a clear pattern setting up are less risk etc. Just some thoughts. If something is setting up, you should take it if it fits your parameters. It wasn't necessarily in the middle of lull (it was only around 11AM) so there was still a little time left and the market was volatile. I don't regret taking the trade even though I lost on commissions, which in the grand scheme of things isn't a big deal.

White arrow is entry followed by exit.

RLYP: I originally had this on watch in the morning for a fade since the daily looked nice for a continued fade and on top of that it had relative weakness compared to the IBB for the prior day, which gave me added confidence in the trade. It went to the prior day's support (now resistance) in the morning and I saw it then and thought this would be a good short and then it had failed follow through and I don't know why but I didn't enter the trade. It would have been a very nice short. Anyway, later in the day after the oil/Yellen news had been digested by the market and it was heading back lower, I saw a g/r rejection on RLYP and it failing at the resistance. This seemed like a good short opportunity since it went up with the market but now with the market failing and its relative weakness, it might fade back to the LODs or close. I shorted at $16 and did get a small wash but I wanted to be patient with it. Unfortunately, it came back and reclaimed the $15.9 level and I did give it some leeway since I didn't want to repeat LNKD from Monday. It jumped a bit and looked liked it stuffed so I held on but it just kept holding on so I took if off for breakeven which was the right choice.

BTU: I had this on watch due to it gapping up even though the energy sector wasn't doing too hot. I thought the news was fluff and unless it got a trend going, all the chasers thinking it would be the next ENOC (since it had similar news of a ruling in their favor) would sell. It flushed/stuffed right away at the open but then consolidated near the lows which is where I was very interested but I didn't go for it. It was a nice all day fade.

VIAB: I had this on watch for more failed follow through. It just dumped at the open and didn't provide any pops. Ideally, with the failed follow through you just start in partial and add on pops with risk to r/g or $33 over/under. Any short covering to provide an entry would have been nice but oh well.

SCTY: I had this on watch for continued fade. However, I figured it would be on a lot of people's radars and there might be short covering at the open which got me to only wanting to short pops/lower highs. In the below chart I drew a small price line and once it went above that and fell back below and peaked, I was interested in the $19.80 range. Didn't take it due to the Yellen comments about to happen but it worked nicely for a scalp. While I was in the RLYP trade though, I noticed this had a really nice pattern of higher lows/ABCD and if I wasn't in RLYP I probably would have gone long.

Things to work on:
1. Take morning trades?
2. Good job of being able to get out for breakeven and making an objective decision and not an emotional one. Keep it up.

Trading Recap 2/8/16

Another slight loss today although I ended up topticking my stop by not giving it enough space and the trade would have worked nicely. No big deal, something to keep in mind. I realize that this is all for practice and that it is a good way of getting out any bad habits. I hope I am not making bad habits but I don't think that is the case. Idea generation is still solid. Execution needs to be improved upon. But for now, a $20 loss doesn't really matter. I am being more selective and sticking to my thesis requirements for trades I take. So far so good, even with the recent small string of losses. My emotional control is slowly getting better before and after the trade. I don't get emotional if I have a win or loss like I used to. I am much more neutral. I have to work on my emotions within the trade, but those are getting better. Reminders like today are needed though, but the goal is to need them less and less until you barely need them at all.

Oh and last week I didn't post anything because I was sick early in the week and didn't trade and then didn't find anything I liked for Wednesday or Friday. Some ideas would have worked but I wasn't confident in the ideas.

White arrow is entry followed by exit.

LNKD: I was still short biased on this and when Citron came out with his long recommendation, I looked for any failure of trend to get short thinking that a lot of people bought this on his recommendation and that any weakness, especially given the market we are in, would cause people to panic sell. When it started peaking at 111.50s I got short with risk to that over/under. I should have known better and given it more range, given the volatility. I stopped out when it looked to be going past 112 and top ticked it. Stupid. However, it came back down and looked to hold the 111.50 level so if I hadn't stopped out before, I probably would have here since it looked like it dipped, held, and was going to go higher. But it didn't and instead it did what I thought it would do. This is why it's so important to do what lots of the pros say and start in small and then add on confirmation and tighten risk. (Cue it's hard to do on my account, blah blah) I had 20 shares and maybe I could have done 10 and 10 but (cue commission talk) at the end of the day $20 loss is no big deal in absolute terms. I have to remember from now to just let things trade out and even if I take a "hit" of $40/50 that is nothing and only feels like something due to the small account size. The real stop should have been 112.50 over/under. Add after it tried to break out and failed and retested resistance. Also, I don't know how much the market helped push this lower but the next day it went down 9% while the market bounced.

UBNT: I had this on watch due to it having a large gap up then being sold off for the rest of the day. I wanted to see any failed follow through for a short. Instead there was a nice pop and then a stuff which I saw but didn't act on. It came back to HODs and once it peaked again at the prior resistance, it faded the rest of the day for the most part. Mostly putting this here for remembering the setup.

MRO: I had this on watch for a short. With CHK and others going down I thought this would fall as well. It fell at the open and then consolidated near the lows. While everything else was getting slammed, this was holding up. This gave me pause in my short idea because it looked to have relative strength in the sector. However, it tried to break out of its consolidation and got slammed back down. To me, it became a 50/50 trade and wasn't worth it, although my original idea as correct for a bit. It didn't fade that much and it ended up coming back to make new highs before coming all the way back down again.

Things to work on:

1. Improve emotional control within trade - let the trade pan out either way. Worst thing that happens is you lose some money but as long as you stick to your plan then you'll be fine.