November Trading Journals

For your reading pleasure, I have uploaded all of my trading journals from the interview to present on a personal web site. It is a huge archieve as some of those files are as large as 300KB or more.

http://hitmantb.tripod.com/

I will back up to the address above on a monthly basis, and who knows, someday I may write a book and dedicate it to her. I just realized that I wrote a lot of stuff over the past 18 months and I really don't want to lose them.

As you can see this is not an advertisement of any sort, the only ad banner is forced by Tripod, totally non-profit!

Lescor:

My goal is to develop something that is totally different from what I do right now. Something that doesn't derive itself from futures and sector indexes, like a bottom-up approach, stock specific news, etc . . .

Uptick:

I actually enjoy office dynamics, I had great fun side stepping corporate bullets, backstabbing others at my previous job, what I am experiencing here is more like kindergarden variety. Besides, it is vital to have a group of friends to stay together after work, a very tight bond, that office is like a barrack before battle and a medical center after :-)

I feel at home when I am at the office, honestly, it is almost addicting, as I said, friends who get smoked together, smile together and rebound together. Fellow traders who are on your side feel like the closest companions when things get tough, like squad members on a SWAT team.

Magna:

As I mentioned a long time ago I have always looked for some sort of bottom-up play to compliment my primary game. For example, that ENE/DYN thing, or even the Barnes & Noble news (could have shorted say, Borders). Just poking around, I mean, it is always good to have options, and when I attempt stuff like Tony's filters or Pair Trading I always do 100 shares so it is at worst a distraction, not going to hurt my bottomline . . . You never know when your bread and butter stops producing, a secondary game is always helpful and I am still looking for one.

Liltrdr:

As weather gets colder I realized that I am getting very little in return for my energy bullets, around April-June you had to have them every day but nowadays the long side seem to be much better (and the broad market for that matter).

As for upturn, I leave that to swing traders as I try not to develop longer term biases too much.
 
Originally posted by liltrdr
Great posts hitman. Your office is like a trading soap opera!
More...

Yeah...As The Worldco Turns...

As always, great stuff Hitman.

Kirk
 
What was supposed to be a light and choppy day turned into a solid open at the expense of course some really tragic events. The crash site is less than 50 miles away from my house in Brooklyn, and quite honestly this is some pretty heavy stuff going on especially with speculation that Bin Laden may have access to mass-destruction weapons. No place is safe, just have to accept the fate I guess, live or die . . .

But as soon as the market opened I had to do what I have to do as a trader. Honestly, I really didn't expect such a smooth sell-off as many stocks did not gap down at all and went down 1 point. I had 4 bullets up unfortunately only 3 worked and I was very nervous on the way down, covered too fast as soon as I heard "there was no indication of a terrorist attack". While I did lose some money there I still have to say I am more relieved than disappointed, even tho I still believed that it was a terrorist attack.

8200 shares on 6 of 7 shooting, +997 before commissions, +567 after, a really nice rebound from Friday as I traded very conservatively.

Pre-Market: Nothing else mattered . . .

9:30: I actually wasn't totally aware of what went on because I wasn't really paying attention to the news, it came out so close before the open and I missed it because I was so closed focused on ticker tape, when I saw the futures tanked at the open I actually asked "what hell is happening" . . . Still you play whatever come your way as a trader, I bulleted IR, BJ, CRA, needless to say I got some pretty bad fills and I covered for 30 cents profits at the first sign of a squeeze, anticipating a big squeeze. LXK was not falling and I bulleted just a little of him (500 shares), but he and the rest of the technology sector was actually stronger than I expected and I lost 40 cents there, throw in bullet cost a pretty damaging loss given that I weren't playing big size today. Tried TYC bottompick first try and was stopped out quickly for a 10 cents scalp, tried it again and second time scored a quarter scalp, and GE for a 15 cents scalp. Classic 10AM reversal rule still applies. I think the specialists were caught off guard because had this news came out just 20 minutes earlier they would have had more than enough time to gap it all down for a serious killing, BJ tanked 1 point since I covered, incredible. You could have bulleted any tier 2 stocks off the open print and got away with it, but I was playing conservatively.

10:10: Tried GE again this time losing a dime. Tried CRA short again covered for flat s a big print went off and he didn't really budge. A look on my P&L I was up just $100 on the day after bullet cost.

10:30: Thought the market had another leg and it did, took TYC and GE again, GE I took a lot and TYC I took very little, would have made 60 cents off TYC and I had it light, GE I took 30 cents, still a good trade but I wish I had more TYC. Took BEN at 34.62 on XBD rally, a big offer showed up and I got out immediately for a 7 cents loss as he stepped down with authority, bought him back when he stepped down to 34.27 and was knocked out by buyers, scalped the spread for a 20 cents move . . . Knowing it is a holiday and bond market closing soon, I didn't really feel there was any other need to trade, rebated my bullets and called it a day.

Readjusted my screen layout a little bit (you can find an updated screen shot at http://hitmantb.tripod.com I will upload it when I get home. It is more efficient than before but my eyes weren't not used to where a few indexes were and I missed a few moves, but I believe this layout will make me more efficient as I become comfortable with it.

Not a bad start, hopefully I can have a better week than last, for the light of my life.
 
is trading a spiritual experience for you hitman.....:-)

one other thing, where's the great tape reading you espouse? you appear to have a lot of losers there. tight stops are great but where's the wonderful tape reading to keep you out of trouble???
 
Hitman,

As you are probably aware, Doug Neston is TradeRX. This confused schizophrenic changes his nickname on a weekly basis. If he is bothering you, simply use the ignore button.

Candle
 
A great open turned sour as I could not make enough shots down the stretch to make it a four digit game. Still an acceptable victory as I didn't have to work too hard for it, +993 before commissions, +792 after, 6 of 9 shooting on 8800 shares, the P&L before commissions is similar but without bullets it is just a lot sweeter . . . with two games left in the pay period I am up $2500, would like to extend it with hopefully two solid games.

Pre-Market: Even tho I don't really buy the cause of the tragedy, it caused a run-up and I played my laggers as usual, I thought retailers would do awesome with the economic numbers and I was right.

9:30: Saw futures going up and bought APD as it opened almost unchanged (wish I took LXK too but I waitd a little and he spreaded 30 cents). Bought at the opening print, a basket of laggers, BJ, PPG, LM, added to PPG immediately as I saw it only gapped up a quarter and market was going straight up along with CEX. I was up $800 in just a few ticks on each as I took 70 cents out of APD, 35 cents out of PPG, and 50 cents on BJ, I miss judged the strength of the market and I did not buy the PPG pullback and I should have held BJ, a little more patience would have gone a long way there. Unfortunately, that happened to be my intraday high as I would never make another dime rest of the way.

9:52: LM came back in and I lost 10 cents on him, spend a lot of time churning him today as he really lagged and did a stealth rally during lunch hours (and I held 300 shares for half a point as I went to lunch, unfortunately that barely covered commissions I churned on him during my earlier attempts to long. LXK came back to unchanged and I bought him for a 35 cents scalp on futures rip. I took 1500 TYC when futures made a new high but I got out flat as it slightly broke above 55. I took WMT on a pullback at 55.25 and again churned quite a bit as it was the weakest RLX stock today.

11:15: By now, I realized I just missed a huge OSX rally and I wasted a lot of effort churning WMT/LM. Earlier in the year I remembered WMT being a very tradable stock and then I struggled in him big time, I guess he hasn't really changed. Went to lunch at ctown (Chicken wonton soup of course) with Mrs F, Mr M and Mr S (M's friend, poor new guy is down 10K or so after commissions and trying to fight his way back, I remember the "not so good old days"), came back to see LM going up half a point, very pleasant :-)

2:00: Opted to stay out as I was happy with today's numbers and didn't want to churn, as I realized that I played very poorly after the first 20 minutes of the game . . .
 
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