Opening Orders - 2008

Quote from forsalenyc:

just checked rest of the mkt(been ages)...i guess it could've been made on $50M worth of shorting non-financials....lol

crazy dude

While most financials are banned, not every one is, and a lot of non-financial stocks got smoked off the open. Could've also been long ZION- see that thing trade?

Point is, he certainly could've been long overnight, but he could've also made that trading pre-market and/or shorting the open.
 
Quote from drumbandit:

I can't confirm that he held overnight, but you would've had a very good day had you shorted many stocks other than financials.

I'm sure Lescor or Shreddog had record days if they played the openings this morning.

Echotrade rejected our short orders with no notice. That is ALL shorts. I definitely did not want to be long only and had to cancel all my orders at the last second. Me, Shreddog and PatrickQ woulda all been up 500 to 850k according to our spreadsheet calculations.

With the ES locked limit up all you had to do was look at SPY to figure what price to use.

No doubt it was the opening of my lifetime and I had to watch. Bummer
 
Quote from lescor:

Echotrade rejected our short orders with no notice. That is ALL shorts. I definitely did not want to be long only and had to cancel all my orders at the last second. Me, Shreddog and PatrickQ woulda all been up 500 to 850k according to our spreadsheet calculations.

With the ES locked limit up all you had to do was look at SPY to figure what price to use.

No doubt it was the opening of my lifetime and I had to watch. Bummer

Yeah, we warned our traders about the Up limit, and about the list of non-shortable stocks. I stayed out (due to other issues, obviously)....but we had some great openings, another new record set.

I have to say that I wouldn't blame Echo or any other firm for any of this. This is totally uncharted territory, this absolute governement intervention in free markets is "Communist China" in my personal opinion... and with all the changes yesterday to short sale rules....we sent out a dozen updates and IM's and audio updates all morning.

Hopefully someone in the gov't will come to their senses, and soon.


Don
 
Quote from Don Bright:

This is totally uncharted territory, this absolute governement intervention in free markets is "Communist China" in my personal opinion...
Don

Sadly, there will be some traders and their families financially destroyed by this over at the CBOE. Think of the thousands of short call positions that were not trading yesterday, as premium was zero, and they open up at $5-$10 dollars. I guess these people just weren't "big enough" to save.
 
Quote from DonKee:

Sadly, there will be some traders and their families financially destroyed by this over at the CBOE. Think of the thousands of short call positions that were not trading yesterday, as premium was zero, and they open up at $5-$10 dollars. I guess these people just weren't "big enough" to save.

While I obviously dont want anyone to get "destroyed," With all the speculation about bailouts, and gov't interventions whirling around the markets, I think holding short overnight was incredibly risky in this type of environment...
 
Quote from total_keops:

Did you ever asked yourself the following questions?
What if I lose power at 9:29?
What if I lose my internet connection at 9:29?
What if my computer crashes at 9:29?

There is a lot of sketchy situations. When you do that on a large scale you need some backups (battery, alternative internet, computer,...).
I'm still on small volume so my backup is the internet cafe at the corner of the street but when I pump up the share size I'll have to invest in hardware.

Yup. Amazing how many people have missed 5, 6, or 7 figure days for want of $5k of computer hardware and 1 hour to fill in a second set of broker account opening forms.

I know one guy who even owns his own generator.

Good rule of thumb - if you don't plan for it, it WILL happen, at the WORST time, and you will KICK yourself in the ass for not preparing properly.
 
Quote from Don Bright:

Trading is a game of percentages. What percentage of the time does your television just not work? .001 percent of the time? Sure, if you're in a real rural area, get a backup, have a cell phone (as our traders all do)..... Can't concern yourself with "what if" ---- and, remember this (as I tell my new boot campers)..."...if you lose power, you have a 50/50 chance of making money, probably better than what you had when you entered the trade" (not for openings of course, but for "day trades" when you're new, LOL).

This is terrible advice. Trading is not just a game of percentages, it is also a game of odds. A 0.01% event can wipe you out if the loss will be high enough. That's why you don't sell 10,000 out the money XLF calls at 0.05 the day before expiration.

If you go short or use leverage, or even if you only buy high beta stocks on reasonable size, then you need a backup, end of story.
 
Quote from Cutten:

This is terrible advice. Trading is not just a game of percentages, it is also a game of odds. A 0.01% event can wipe you out if the loss will be high enough. That's why you don't sell 10,000 out the money XLF calls at 0.05 the day before expiration.

If you go short or use leverage, or even if you only buy high beta stocks on reasonable size, then you need a backup, end of story.

Of course, I agree about the odds.......different issues however. "Gambling" on making a penny or two on an overnight risk vs. a daily strategy that works is not the same IMO.

All the best,

Don
 
Quote from lescor:

Echotrade rejected our short orders with no notice. That is ALL shorts. I definitely did not want to be long only and had to cancel all my orders at the last second.

Everyone can make a mistake, but what really annoys me is that there is no explanation or "we're sorry" from noone on what happened. A very frustrating day.
 
Quote from Pasternak:

Everyone can make a mistake, but what really annoys me is that there is no explanation or "we're sorry" from noone on what happened. A very frustrating day.

Same with my firm. Seems like a common practice in the prop industry. I guess retail traders get better treatment but they do pay for it.
 
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