Recent content by mockingbird

:confused: Can anyone give a definition of what is meant by tape reading and what strategies it is useful for (e.g. only useful for scalping, swing trading, day trading, etc.) is it meant to predict the next move or meant to estimate the strength of the current move, is it meant to determine...

:confused: I had read on this forum at some time that you can short QQQs on a downtick, but I have also recently heard that the uptick rule applies to them and you cannot short them on a downtick. Since I have heard different things, can anyone help straighten me out on what shorting rules...

Previous post, thanks for that point: that it depends on what you trade. I forgot to mention I like to trade QQQs. Thanks for all the other good points too. What thoughts about trading QQQs in spring / summer vis a vis volume, liquidity, choppiness, relative volatility.

No, I wasnt looking for a 3 month vacation, I have just been told that volume and liquidity and volatility are so low in the summer months that it's very difficult to trade. Since I am a new trader, I was trying to get some useful information about what months of the year I ought to avoid. How...

Do all of the traders here take the summer months off? By summer, does this mean June, July, August? When the summer doldrums begin, is it a pretty sharp cutoff, or are May and September pretty bad months to trade also?

Magna, thanks, this is good info; sorry to be so clueless, but I am also confused about the following point: are partial fills possible on limit orders or only on market orders? I had considered what you said about lifting the offer and hitting the bid, I wondered if using limit orders this...

Using CyberTrader, is there any way to avoid partial fills? Or what is the best way to handle them? Trying to trade QQQs in lots of 2000.

Thats really interesting about protrader going away -- I think they are the very last retail office left here in Atlanta. Somebody correct me if I am wrong about that. So anybody have any opinions about Cybertrader?

Does anyone here have thoughts about / experience with protrader's gr8trade?

Does anybody know of a good free simulator out there which allows you to trade on yesterday's data, for any given stock, make trades, track profit / loss etc. I am currently using Cybertrader, which is free and has no time limit; however lately it has been showing the same day's data over and...