Calhawk01's Trading Journal

C

calhawk01

Hello,

I am a finance student at Towson University, MD. I am twenty two years old. During most of my short trading career I traded stocks that were less than $1.

I have recently changed my strategy. Initially I started running streaming filters that would utilize moving averages to find stocks. However, I was getting too many results and I was distracted looking at all of the stocks. Currently my goal is to only trade a few stocks until I cannot trade them no longer. Theoretically I think it should give me the "edge" needed to "beat" the market if I trade the same stocks over and over because I should become familiar with their stock movement. My entries and exits will be using "price action."

Stock list: FAS SPY POT AMZN RIG

I will try my best to post a summary of all my trades for days to come. My goal for this journal is to record my trading history and get some opinions from other traders -- of what they think is wrong with my trades.


Wish me good luck.
 
Quote from NoDoji:

Hi Cal,

I think you have the right idea and a great selection.

Best of trading to you!

NoD
More...
Thanks NoD. I got the idea to trade AMZN and POT from you. I actually got a another idea because I have had a lot of success trading FAS. The idea is to recreate my selection of stocks so that they are all financial -- this way I will be SPECIALIZING myself in one sector, hence, I can possibly trade better. I will do some backtesting before I pull the trigger.
 
+224

Shorted RIG premarket at 85.90 and 85.95.-- covered at 85.73 and 85.74 (200 shares)

Shorted POT premarket at 110.30 and 110.21 because the stock got downgraded. Covered at 109.40 and 109.56. I should had let this one play out a little longer but I have always had problems letting my profits run. (200 shares)

Long SPY premarket at 120.24 because the market sentiment was very positive premarket -- which carried into the open. Sold at 120. 41 (200 shares)

Shorted RIG again, 85.16 and my stoploss which was hit was HOD at 85.25. This trade was a big mistake because oil was kicking ass. I was actually unaware of that. I need to make it a habbit to read news more often. (200 shares)

Bought POT when it was oversold at 108.69, 108.60 and 108.56. I was up 90$ within a few seconds! BUT this time I actually wanted to let my profits run..........I ended up taking a LOSS when my stop loss was hit at 108.54. I guess I should had taken my profit because my trade was AGAINST the MACRO trend. (300 shares)

Bought SPY when the entire market had a dip from profit taking at 120.14 (great entry) but i only had 100 shares :( Sold at 120.27 (100 shares)

Shorted JPM at 47.21 and a few seconds later bought at 47.24... only to see the stock plumit after i covered. Poor trade management.. i should have had not panicked and let my stop loss hit.. which was at 47.30 (200 shares)

Shorted RIG AGAIN!, Stupid mistake.. I should have had NEVER been in this trade! Shorted at 86.31 x2 and 86.48. Covered at 86.66 for a big loss... about $90 loss (300 shares)

Shorted POT.. at 109.39 and 109.40. Only two hundred shares and for some reason i did not want to use a stoploss at 109.5... I wanted to get out asap the trade went against me. I really liked this setup but I let my PREVIOUS trade of RIG get in the way. I was shook at this time. I was scared and did not want to take a big loss because by this time I had cut my profits in half.... Covered waay too early, again because i was shook from my previous trade of RIG at 109.24 and 109.19.

Tried to short RIG again.. took a loss (200 shares).... Stupid mistake..

RIMM NEWS.. Went long after the huge sell off.. average price was 73.10..500 shares.. Sold at 73.27 and 73.34.. again.. I didnt let me profits run.. but this was a profitable trade

Traded FAS toward the end of the day... 100 shares.. In at 117.15, 117.16, and 117.09.. sold at 117.35 and sold my last 100 shares at 117.61. This was a good trade.. +79$

For most part I am happy that I used stop losses.. I'm pissed that I did not let my winners run. Overall I think that i was not disciplined and i need to focus on that.

pnl.png
 
-560

Horrible day today.. I was down 1000$ at some point of the day.. was able to gain some back.

Shorted POT premarket.. because the news everywhere that i had seen was that it was downgraded etc... so when it was up pre market i shorted it. However, apparently -- there was a news out there that i still cannot find ( i need to sign up for a news service i suppose, because my fidelity account and ameritrade account did not have the news) I got rapped on this trade. Funny thing is that if i held my shares all day i would had made money on this trade. Oh well... still learning..

Bought AMZN on the first dip.. made some money
Missed the first dip on FAS because i was side tracked by POT trade..
I bought FAS at 11:15 at ~ 118.00... I thought it was the bottom but the bears out wrestled the bulls and the market continued to crash..Later bought FAS around 12:25 for 116.70 (500 shares) Sold at 117.60. This trade cut my losses a bit..

I also went long on SPY at the same time i bought FAS at around 12:25... 30 cent gain..

I come from playing penny stocks where people tend to not use stop losses. Especially sub penny stocks because there is a problem with slippage. I NEED to learn how to weigh risk/reward and start using stoplosses. I went through all of my trades today for the past month and i noticed that most of my trades are winners but every week there are about 3-4 trades that i loss my shirt on. I need to limit my losses.
 
Quote from NoDoji:

Cal, can you post a chart with your POT trades indicated on it?
More...
I only had one trade on POT today.. i was disgusted by it so I left it alone. I had no idea what to expect from it since it is oversold and because it exploded at the open even though it had been downgraded! BUT ofcourse the stock has a few dollar selloff.. gotta love it. I feel as if most of the time it is better to do a intraday swing trade rather than daytrading it.. i duno just a thought.

My entry was premarket at average of 110.40 (500 shares) and i did not use a stoploss because this thing just moves too quick. How do you deal with slippage?
 
Quote from calhawk01:

My entry was premarket at average of 110.40 (500 shares) and i did not use a stoploss because this thing just moves too quick. How do you deal with slippage?
More...

To trade POT off the open, you have to have a directional bias and a specific price trigger. Otherwise, wait patiently for the opening madness to settle down and then trade the price action.

As you said, right now it's very oversold. Yesterday left a textbook reversal bar at the bottom of a downtrend (hammer on the daily chart). If anything the bias off the open would've been up.

Once the first 5-min bar was put in, long looked solid, stop just below the opening low.

The first short signal was the double top @ the 10:25am bar, stop above the high. That trade gave very little, but that's to be expected on the first counter-trend signal.

Next short signal was the lower high @ the 10:54am bar, stop above 112.25. If price breaks down the previous pivot low (111.76), look for an initial target just above the next support level which was 111.00.

If you like to hold positions all day, there was no reason to exit until the end of the day, because price traded in a narrow range on low volume and would be expected to continue what it started and break down further, which it did. If you held the position through the midday range, your stop would be somewhere around 111.65, which was the resistance spike just before the range.

I usually had a .20 -.40 cent stop trading POT, but I only traded 200-400 shares.
 
This is impossible..

04/16/2010 -614.40
04/17/2010 0.00
04/18/2010 0.00
04/19/2010 70.18
04/20/2010 19.75

Today -200...
WHATEVER i do.. i should had done the opposite..
 
I'm starting to think if DAYTRADING is even possible. I have seen some people here that are able to put profits week in and week out (NoDoji). They have admired me to keep trying. I have been trading for over 2 years. I used to trade penny stocks and I have recently started to trade bigboard stocks. Bigboard stocks are unbelievably impossible to predict, it seems. I have a vast knowledge of how market works. I never get greedy. I have tried many trading methods with no success... below is my daily PnL for the month of April, 2010. It's horrible. Should I start doing opposite of everything that I have learned in the past two years in order to succeed as a trader? I have tried trading the same stocks over and over, I have tried scalping, I have tried mean revision. Nothing works. It seems as if - it is me vs the market. Whenever I open a position, the market does the opposite. Makes me wonder.. is daytrading even possible? For example, POT.. I started shorting it in April.. The stock DID go down, but since I cannot hold a position over night (trade with a prop firm) I have been trying to DAYTRADE my shorts.. and everything I shorted the stock.. it turned against me..this is rediculas
04/01/2010 -131.47
04/02/2010 0.00
04/03/2010 0.00
04/04/2010 0.00
04/05/2010 267.44
04/06/2010 285.83
04/07/2010 -682.18
04/08/2010 -221.33
04/09/2010 -10.22
04/10/2010 0.00
04/11/2010 0.00
04/12/2010 269.04
04/13/2010 -415.60
04/14/2010 229.70
04/15/2010 -576.33
04/16/2010 -614.40
04/17/2010 0.00
04/18/2010 0.00
04/19/2010 70.18
04/20/2010 19.75
04/21/2010 -203.11
04/22/2010 -117.43
04/23/2010 -200.21
 
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