Let me see if I can answer all the questions that have been posed to me.
Snowboarding was good yesterday, hasn't snowed here in about two weeks though, so it was a bit icy, but since I'm getting better I didn't fall down as much. I've found that running has helped work out my legs enough so that I don't feel like I got my ass kicked after finishing a day of snowboarding, but its a blast after you are confident enough to go down the hill fast and make those tight turns.
My volume varies on what type of trading I'm doing. If the market is slow and not trending well I'll do baskets of only a 100 shares, and if I think the trade is going to be layup or if I have some tight stop losses I'll go up to 600 shares, anything past that there seems to be a lot of slippage, with this light volume, I can blow through a couple of price levels with only 600 shares. And try getting out of 600 shares with only a 100 shares on each price level and 10 cent difference from the previous price level, that is too much like calling the bottom.
On the question of making money using my trading style which is whatever works at the time, most people can't do it, hell sometimes I don't think I can do it. But I'm taking trading strategies that have worked in the past for me, or those I personally know. Scalping, I made a career of it for two years, before I tried other things. The position trading, I tried a bit on my own, but thanks to a friend of mine, I've learned the fine art of position trading (though at times I revert back to scalping) but man scalping is tough, not like the old days where each price level was a 1/16 or 6 cents, now with pennies, even if it clears a bunch six price levels your only up 6 cents a share, and then momentum stops.
Back to my friend, his trading strategy allowed for in a two year period to never have a down month net. This past year I believe he's gone 8 for 12 months positive. He's spent thousands on backtesting by programmers, every month he has his programmer go back and crunch an ungodly amount of numbers on all NASDAQ stocks, using multiple filters, guidelines, stops, based on spreads and some other things. From that he is able fine tune and constantly perfect his trading strategy.
On the issue of basket trading like in WorldCo. and some other firms, I know people that have done real well doing this, especially if you pick the hot sector of the week, Oils and Oil Services were hot a few months back and it was easy money, now I'm leaning toward the Biotechs and SOX. You pretty much have to trade in an office to basket trade because you need every possible advantage to get quick executions and to recognize opportunties. Can this be done at home? Yes, but I won't try to learn at home, trade in an office first, see how it works, cause you can get screwed on baskets big time if your executions and quotes aren't up to par.
Now for the trading today, I forgot to print out my trade sheets today. Sucks I know. I can tell you again, I flated the day again. Three days straight, not feeling to bad about it though, markets I watch never really broke either way to much. I really don't want to try guess the times and prices of my executions, b/c I don't want anyone to see a different chart pattern then one I though I remembered and think that was what your supposed to look for. A trader next to me, who has been doing a little better than me of late traded INTU today. Was a nice consolidation and breakdown early today...followed by another consolidation and breakdown. I think he locked in 2 points out of a 3 point move down.
Time to take a nap.
