maxopedia
things I know + some stuff I made up
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day trading monthly resultsStock Day Trading Results April 2008April 1, 20081. Short 200 OWW at $7.02 April 2, 20083. Short 300 COT at $3.4801 April 4, 20085. Buy 100 GU at $15.15 April 8, 20086. Sell 100 GU at $14.21 loss: -94.01 This one was particularly frustrating due to the fact I could have easily sold at several points for a profit, and possibly even over $80 profit. You can see some of my thoughts in this post: Anatomy of Failure, a bad GU trade. April 9, 20087. Short 100 CRY at $10.1701 April 10, 2008I should have made this trade in my SogoTrade account... I ended up paying $9 commissions... now back to SogoTrade... April 11, 200813. Short 300 NTZ at $4.00 April 15, 200814. Buy 500 MNKD at $2.00 April 18, 200816. Short 200 NXTM at $6.46 This NTZ trade was silly on my part; this stock was going absolutely nowhere and just trading within a range. I should have taken an early profit and gotten out. 19. Short 500 EDEN at $2.59 April 22, 200821. Buy 500 MNKD at $2.08 Hmmm... just about out of free SogoTrade trades by now ain't I? In order to avoid the SEC pattern day trader rule in case I want to liquidate my position intra-day, I do the next trade with Zecco, paying $9 roundtrip commissions... April 23, 200823. Buy 500 CPSL at $3.66 This trade was annoying, because I should have done 1 of 2 things: either sold into an early spike for gains closer to $50, or waited it out for a later spike, which did come despite the fact I got scared out of the trade. April 24, 200825. Buy 500 CPSL at $3.6999 Back in CPSL again, and too close to the middle of its current range. April 25, 200826. Sell 500 CPSL at $3.65 loss: -$34 April 28, 200827. Short 300 NXTM at $6.36 This NXTM cover is where my free trades in my SogoTrade account ran out. It was good while it lasted, and I'd be down an extra $75 without those free trades! April 30, 200829. Buy 500 MNKD at $2.25 Account BalancesZecco: $2514.35 My net change for the month of April was +309.64, which despite having some good luck, was largely because of a better definition and application of my strategy. However, please note that without the copious free trades from SogoTrade and Zecco, I would probably be sitting at a loss simply due to transaction costs. I have made well over 60 individual trades since opening my brokerage accounts; even if all of those were $3 SogoTrade commissions, I'd be sitting at +$0 and likely be posting a negative return. It's kind of funny that most of my good trades have ended up in my SogoTrade account. Of course, since my SogoTrade account was opened much later, and I didn't start getting a strategy together until early last month, it's not surprising. Also, SogoTrade has much better short inventory than Zecco, so sometimes I am unable to make profitable short trades in my Zecco account purely because I can't borrow the shares I need from Penson.
Stock Trading Summary March 2008: Zecco and SogoTradeMarch was an interesting month. I saw my losses deepen while I simultaneously started using my 25 free trades up from SogoTrade. It's quite fortunate that I didn't have to pay commissions for this month. When I'm dealing with perhaps twice the size that I'm comfortable dealing with now, it might not be such a big deal. As it was, I learned this month that I need to size my positions more appropriately so that my trades do not control my behavior. Also, I was using AMD largely as an index proxy, and this methodology started to have no edge as AMD started diverging from tracking the indexes (particularly XLF) and slowly sank beneath the waves. Worthy of note is that I went into this month holding 300 shares of JMBA long that I originally purchased at $3.05 a share. March 4, 20081. 10:53 Buy 250 AMD @ 6.50 March 5, 20085. 11:50 Buy 100 COIN @ 15.9699 March 11, 20087. 10:36 Buy 300 AMD @ 6.17 March 12, 20089. 11:35 Buy 300 AMD @ 6.61 March 13,200810. 10:28 Sell 300 AMD @ 6.51 Net Loss: -$30.05 March 14, 200813. 12:15 Buy 300 AMD @ 6.45 March 17, 200816. 11:15 Buy 300 AMD @ 6.35 March 18, 200817. 14:51 Sell 300 AMD @ 6.39 Net Gain: $2.95 (when will the AMD garbage trades stop?) March 19, 2008Now we're on SogoTrade... free trades again but no stops! Unfortunately I briefly continue my madness before massaging my strategy into place. I also start trading more than one position at once, which is VERY BAD for my novice state. Henceforth, I will trade only one position at a time. Also, I begin to learn to work with more appropriate position sizing, but not before some mistakes... 18. 11:51 Buy 300 AMD @ 6.30 March 20, 200821. 12:25 Short 100 CHNR @ 17.20 March 24, 200823. 10:06 Short 200 VVTV @ 5.81 is the AMD madness over? March 26, 200826. 9:55 Short 300 BPAX @ 3.31 March 27, 200828. 10:34 Buy 100 SOLF @ 13.14 March 28, 200830. 14:16 Short 300 BPAX @ 4.70 ConclusionFrom these numbers, I had realized losses of -$222.97 for March 2008. With the addition of $90.09 in realized gains from February, I have lost -$132.88 since I started trading. However, I must have messed up somehow, because my account balances don't quite jive with my trading journal. Account Balances So according to this, I'm down -$127.92 - I'm not sure really sure where I messed up my numbers although I do know there's a little bit of money market interest floating around. Lessons LearnedOnly be present if there is opportunity. If you feel like you need a second opinion on whether to take profit right then and there, TAKE THE PROFIT. Size positions correctly. Too big and there's too much perceived risk. Correctly sized positions lead to rational decision making. Also, although I don't like SogoTrade, I do like the little account balance graph they give you.
Thus ends my trading month of March. I would be violating the pattern day trader rule to make a trade on Monday or Tuesday of next week.
Stock Day Trading Feb. 2008 ResultsRecently, I decided to open a brokerage account with Zecco. They offer 10 free trades a month if you have at least a $2500 balance. Because I wanted to try stepping into the shark-infested waters of day trading, I figured this would be a good way to get a little experience while minimizing my commissions. After you use up your 10 free trades, it is $4.50 per trade. Due to the amount of capital I deploy on a trade, that $9 on a round-trip would eat up almost all my profits. However, being able to make 5 free round trips each month is pretty good, especially considering the 'pattern day trader' rule. You can only make about 12 roundtrip intra-day trades each month. You can hold positions overnight as much as you want, but I'm mostly interested in the intra-day action. Currently, I employ a long-only strategy. I am converting my account to a margin account to play the other side of the market - it is essential for an intra-day strategy. basic info for trades in February 2008 (roundtrip delta includes commission and transaction fees if applicable)
So my realized profit is $90.09. However, I am sitting on -$162 in paper losses on my JMBA position, bringing my total realized and unrealized delta to be -$71.91 There were a two points I could have cashed my JMBA position out and been sitting on $50-20 worth of profits. There was one point this past week I could have closed out the position and been sitting at about $10 of realized gains. Given the market conditions, I feel I did reasonably well. Given the market conditions, I should not be holding onto that JMBA stock. I should have closed the trade a $20-30 loss on that same day I bought it. You live you learn. Rightly or wrongly, I have chosen to ride out my decision on JMBA. However, I will likely close out the position at the end of the year even if it is a loss, in order to possibly better my tax situation (this would make my JMBA losses count as short term capital losses for 2008). Lesson? Don't keep an open position on a micro-cap stock that's just mostly trending with the current bear market. As an aside, $2.50 is an excellent price for JMBA, one well below book value at a P/E of around 7.8 - unfortunately I bought at the height of a bear market rally, and have not seen the price of JMBA crawl back to even $3 yet. All in all, not a bad start to trading considering the current market environment. I just wish I could have gone into March without depositing a little bit of extra money in order to get the 10 free trades from Zecco in March. Conceivably my JMBA could spike and I could get the free trades, but I'm not going to bet on it. (Zecco just requires that at one point during the month your account be >=$2500, if it is, you get 10 free trades that expire at the end of the month.) Paying commissions = murder!Even though I executed 3 profitable AMD trades while paying commissions, the two trades where I payed round-trip commissions have miserable profit margin. In part, this was psychological in that I wanted to make sure I wouldn't be paying just for the pleasure of making these trades, so I tended to cut my profits a bit early - although one of them was a perfectly executed scalp in the long direction during bear conditions that pulled out almost the maximum profit. It's worthwhile to note that if I had simply initiated the very first AMD position of 200 shares @ $6.44 and kept it until this last friday, I could have easily sold the lot for $7.20+ a share, netting a profit of $152. My system, particularly in this turbulent market, does not give me such distant insight into stock prices. I am only able to trade my beliefs about the market.
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