Half way through life and not close to being consistent

gamblingman said:
I guess I look at trading as playing poker (which based on laws is considered gambling).
You're making an educated guess based on your analysis and if you're convinced enough that you have an edge you put on the trade. Once the trade is on though all bets are off and you're hoping for the best within your exit/loss parameters.
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Mate, I would like to play poker with you :D

How can you have confidence in anything you do if you are failing at it? The more failure you have, the more skeptical you should be and vice versa (limits apply to both skepticism and confidence).
 
kut2k2 said:
Good traders are adaptable.

When the trend is up, they're long.

When the trend is down, they're short.

They only go mean-reversion when the market is reverting to the mean.

If you don't know how to trade trends, then learn to stop trading when the market is trending. This is basic stuff. If you can't learn how to read the markets, the markets will take you to the cleaners.
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Great post, you're stating the obvious, but the obvious NEEDS to be stated.
 
Visaria said:
How can you have confidence in anything you do if you are failing at it?
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I don't know (trust my my confidence isn't where it normally is) I don't think it's ego but then again I don't think many folks would recognize it if they stare at it in a mirror.
 
Great week. I think the S&P closed up 5 days in a row, couple new all time highs, so perfect conditions for being short. Blew 13k5 this week (yearly profit is @ 16k today so another week like this and I'll be @ Jan 1 again). Based on the fed it'll be blue sky going forward. Nobody is worried about taking some risk off the table and if you traded through 99 this feels just like it with the exception that there's no .com crazyness but stellar growth companies like Cat or JNJ are being bought up by everybody.

I guess there's not much else for me to do than to change my position and go all long (not going to happen at this level that's for sure) or to sell more hedges and wait until somebody breaks the law and we actually have a down day.

@ Dolemite, good thing you didn't pick this week to hold on to your underwear until we have a down day.
 
There's a quote in Jack Schwager's book 'The New Market Wizards' where one of the traders interviewed says he will take a chart of the current market & stick it up on the wall.

Then he will walk across the room, and look at the chart from a distance, in order to identify the general trend in the market.

Here is the chart of the SPX.

(No criticism intended by the way.)
 
Mo06 said:
There's a quote in Jack Schwager's book 'The New Market Wizards' where one of the traders interviewed says he will take a chart of the current market & stick it up on the wall.

Then he will walk across the room, and look at the chart from a distance, in order to identify the general trend in the market.

Here is the chart of the SPX.

(No criticism intended by the way.)
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You're absolutely correct. Looking at this and believing in trend there's very little reason to be short.
 
gamblingman said:
So would you rather be short at all time highs or long?
Or more directly, would you buy the market here or go short if you don't have any existing position?
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Uff, maybe I am wrong, but after such long time of trading it seems that you have not done your homework (proper statistics) yet... :-/ Hmmm, I am continuing to read this thread and maybe I will write some more of my thoughts later... :-)
 
tom_czr said:
What is your performance target in percents per year?
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I'm not sure if you can call it a target but my goal is ~ 50%/year.
Having said that if I'm @ 51% and it is close to the end of the year and I find a good opportunity I'm definitely taking it (with the risk that it'll impact my yearly return).
 
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