2014: The Battle for Survival

N

neke

After three consecutive down years, it was a welcome relief having a positive year in 2013. Of course that was like scratching the surface after the massive draw-down that started four years ago. It is still a battle for survival, especially given I have to take cash out of the account on a monthly basis.

The key remains to be able to abstain from trades that do not meet my criteria. I will continue making the daily decision on what strategy/stocks to trade, the input parameters for the strategy, all before the market opens each day, while leaving the system to do the rest intra-day.


PRIOR THREADS
2012: The Battle for Survival
2011: Rebuilding My Battered Account
Taking 410K to 4million by Year End 2010
Taking 320K to 3.5million by Year End 2009
Taking 103K to 1.2million by Year End 2008
Taking 76K to 500K by Year End (2007)


QUICK RECAP

Here is a quick recap of my past trading. Opened an account and placed my first trade with Datek Online in Dec 1999 at the height of the dotcom bubble, starting with 16K (basically my whole savings) and within 2 weeks I lost 50% of that. Through the years till Nov 2004 I lost a cummulative of 54K (account goes down, let the account idle for sometime until I can save
some more money, and then replenish, get the next drawdown, and so on). At that low point, the balance in my account was 5.3K. Every thing in the account now sprung from that balance with some additional deposits, and lots of withdrawals as follows:

Code: 
	From		To		StartingBalance			Net P&L		Return%		Net Cash Movement	Closing Balance
	===========	===========	===============		===============		=======		=================	==============
	Nov 2004	Dec 2004	          5,300			  8,700		    164			    1,000		 15,000
	Jan 2005	Dec 2005		 15,000			132,000		    880			  (12,000)		135,000
	Jan 2006	Feb 28 2007		135,000			115,000		     85		 	 (174,000)		 76,000
	Feb 28 2007	Jan 12 2008		 76,000		        138,000		    182			 (111,000)		103,000
	Jan 12 2008	Jan 11 2009		103,000			377,000		    366         	 (160,000)		320,000	    
	Jan 11 2009	Jan 10 2010		320,000			210,000		     65			 (120,000)		410,000
	Jan 10 2010	Jan  9 2011		410,000		        (44,000)	    (11)		  (30,000)		336,000
	Jan 10 2011	Jan 17 2012		336,000		       (121,271)	    (36)		  (11,000)		203,729
	Jan 17 2012	Jan  6 2013		203,729			(61,573)	    (30)		  (59,000)		 83,156
	Jan  6 2013     Jan  4 2014		 83,156			45,281		     54			  (27,400)		101,037

Notes
* Closing Balance = StartingBalance + Net P &L - Net Cash Movement
* Net Cash Movement is total of deposits less withdrawals. From Jan 2006 up, there has never been a deposit (just cash withdrawals).
* Return% is percentage based on P/L over the starting balance, with no regard to the timing of deposits or withdrawals.
* The periods listed here for 2007 onwards is from start of thread to start of next thread for completeness.


attachment.php
 
I've been following your posts since at least 2011 or 2012. Just wanted to thank you for keeping everything honest and persevering through it all. Your journey over the years is very unique in this online trading world as almost everyone only posts their successes or stops updating after a while.
 
in the context of his total gains, his losses don't look that bad. more like 25% of total account value. he was smart to take money out before he lost it.
 
The fact that you turned 15k into like 100k in a year is pretty impressive.

The results aren't bad at all when you look at how much money you were pulling from the account.
 
Quote from feng456:

I've been following your posts since at least 2011 or 2012. Just wanted to thank you for keeping everything honest and persevering through it all. Your journey over the years is very unique in this online trading world as almost everyone only posts their successes or stops updating after a while.
More...

+1
 
Too bad that there is ALWAYS someone who has to poop on someone else's party.
The way I see it, neke made an average of 90K per year over the past 9 years.
I'll take that any year.
Good luck in the future.

And xelite777 - lighten up. You'll live longer.

Gabe

I just noticed that xelite777's post was removed.
 
Monthly Update for period 1/3/2014 - 2/1/2014 (4 weeks)

Impressive start to the new year, up 23K (23%). Really feel now like a real break-out above 100K.

It is a great feeling getting results from my new model of trading: the man-machine partnership. It is becoming increasingly clear that will be the mode of operation going forward. For the first week of the period I was away on training, but because I do all my discretionary job after hours, defining the trading plan for the next day, I was not even present by the computer during the day when the executions took place. At the end of that week, I was up 10K. I was like "gosh I got this much staying away from the computer". That reinforced my earlier commitment. Glad it generated the gains it did.

The biggest single move in the account was a loss of 8.1K on a trade on 27/1. That was an RTM (reversal anticipation) strategy that was allowed to average down. I initially built that into the strategy, believing there was a good case for averaging in under those circumstances. That was the first time the strategy averaged down, had a big loss that day in the volatility of those few days, and I decided to remove the averaging from the strategy (I think I under-estimated the risk of the resultant position when I put that extension to that strategy - the reward is just not worth the elevated risk).

Code: 
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------


Opening Balance:                	101,037
Net gain for period 		       23,196
------------------------------------------------
Net Balance:                   		124,233


TRADES

TYPE	Exit Date/Time		P/L

STOCK		2014-01-06-15-49-08		2378.58
OPTION		2014-01-06-12-52-15		-1840.88
OPTION		2014-01-07-12-58-17		13.2
STOCK		2014-01-07-15-55-12		5.6
STOCK		2014-01-08-09-39-50		3981.3
STOCK		2014-01-08-15-55-12		1684.4
STOCK		2014-01-08-12-20-56		2137.7
STOCK		2014-01-08-12-18-55		514.1
STOCK		2014-01-09-12-08-31		3847.2
STOCK		2014-01-09-15-49-04		-1583
STOCK		2014-01-10-12-21-34		-2230.2
STOCK		2014-01-10-15-48-59		1572.7
STOCK		2014-01-13-14-47-01		-2142.8
STOCK		2014-01-13-14-45-41		-1584.7
OPTION		2014-01-13-15-20-39		-1084.2
STOCK		2014-01-14-11-10-05		-940.2
OPTION		2014-01-14-15-54-49		1521.2
OPTION		2014-01-14-11-38-10		-1379.5
STOCK		2014-01-15-11-37-29		1618.1
OPTION		2014-01-15-15-42-53		900.5
STOCK		2014-01-15-12-55-52		-4581
STOCK		2014-01-16-11-01-19		-371.5
OPTION		2014-01-16-11-12-14		-1374.6
STOCK		2014-01-16-13-34-17		1298.4
STOCK		2014-01-16-15-51-18		454.2
STOCK		2014-01-17-09-46-58		-672.4
STOCK		2014-01-17-10-50-59		1678.7
OPTION		2014-01-17-11-09-34		845.7
STOCK		2014-01-17-11-03-12		2680.2
STOCK		2014-01-17-15-55-17		-1545
STOCK		2014-01-21-15-55-08		-500.4
STOCK		2014-01-21-15-49-07		1987
STOCK		2014-01-22-12-21-34		384.8
OPTION		2014-01-22-14-50-14		321.7
STOCK		2014-01-23-13-50-24		139.3
OPTION		2014-01-23-14-22-28		845.2
OPTION		2014-01-24-10-04-13		-296
STOCK		2014-01-24-14-14-41		412.8
OPTION		2014-01-24-09-44-41		1722.2
OPTION		2014-01-24-14-26-19		-2438.5
STOCK		2014-01-24-13-37-03		739.3
OPTION		2014-01-27-10-20-41		-221.2
STOCK		2014-01-27-15-49-44		-8159.5
STOCK		2014-01-27-15-14-59		6492.6
OPTION		2014-01-27-14-58-35		288.8
OPTION		2014-01-27-15-16-03		1149.1
STOCK		2014-01-28-14-02-30		-210.7
STOCK		2014-01-28-15-37-57		125.1
OPTION		2014-01-28-15-39-33		129.2
STOCK		2014-01-28-13-31-10		-237.5
STOCK		2014-01-29-13-31-12		1508.7
STOCK		2014-01-29-09-53-16		291.2
OPTION		2014-01-29-10-59-23		2188.5
STOCK		2014-01-30-09-06-47		332.9
STOCK		2014-01-30-15-23-46		1793.9
STOCK		2014-01-30-18-42-30		-1799
STOCK		2014-01-31-15-55-46		919.6
STOCK		2014-01-31-12-25-41		3477.4
OPTION		2014-01-31-14-41-31		6008.1
 

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