A few blown lay-ups turned what should have been a four digit game into another blah. +862 before commissions, +374 after, 13400 shares on 7 of 15 shooting, 3 bullets.
Pre-Market: The piece of news that ruined my day, 3% increase in oil price, daily charts on energy screamed shorts, didn't put up a bullet until it was almost too late because of this news. After the initial squeeze it was a silky smooth sell-off. NYT downgraded, should have bulleted GUC, KRI, a little slow in getting to them. DRD and WMT upgraded and I had a list of drug stores in mind. Some financial and insurance upgrades rounded out the package (didn't get to them in time).
9:30: Saw a big sell-off in CEX (I didn't think of this at the time but it clicked later) because chemical companies require oil as a raw material hence raise in oil price kills those stocks. Bulleted PPG and only got 500 shares filled, got 80 cents out of the trade, a huge miss there. Went long CVS and WAG, got a quarter out of CVS, out of WAG for a dime loss after some churning. PSS had a good daily, went long at 53.75 and this thing is too thin, I am not going to trade it again (I raised volume requirement to 300K a day since I started to trade bigger), made 15 cents when the BID disappeared.
10:00 Consumer confidence number came out, crap numbers and I thought they will sell the market (they did, but not then), market tanked briefly I used bullet on PPG immediately, lost 15 cents as the market ripped in my face! Gave drug stores one more shot with LDG and it was clear that this just won't work, lost 10 cents in the long. Took some PX and ECL on chemical rebounding (oil price was falling), out flat on both as I didn't trust the upward move and watched them rip big time.
10:20: By now I definitely see the weakness in energy, I already missed more than just a few shorts, bulleted SGY at 31.61, stock fell to 31 and it squeezed back to 31.75 in two prints! I sold some more up there as the OSX was still weak and I covered everything near 31, and it tanked 1 point in two prints after I covered. That was the turning point.
11:00: UTY broke support on daily's, took DUK on the short and watched index tank and DUK doing next to nothing. Barely recovered bullet cost after commissions on that one. Took HP on OSX bounce out flat. Time for a long break.
3:00: Took RSH on RLX rebound out flat. Took AHC on OIX bounce and I was spreaded half a point because I carelessly jumped in too early without watching the tape first. Saw big volume prints going off at 59.30 so I poped in a tight stop for my existing shares and bought a little more down there with a very hard very tight stop as the tape said it was the bottom, managed to minimize the damage on that trade. Went long in TYC/GE/IBM etc for small scaps as futures went up into the close . . .
Holding on to a $100 lead for the week, $1400 for the month, 3 games left, I know I can still make this respectable, talk is cheap, just do it . . .
Reading daily charts every night is certainly helpful, back then I thought it was worthless because at least half of the set-ups just won't work period, but lately I realized the advantages of doing daily's for my watch list (150 stocks as of now):
1) Before the market opens, by looking at news and futures, I will immediately eliminate a quarter of the set-ups from your list.
2) As soon as the market opens, by looking at futures/sector indexes I will immediately eliminate half of the set-ups from your list during the first 10 minutes of the game. I will have a quarter of the set-ups left, very high quality set-ups, coupled with tape reading very high percentage shots. It really adds to my existing morning game. Every little bit helps, all it takes is one or two good trades in addition to the inevitable churns to make a good day.
3) Reading a lot of daily charts each night helps to put my mind into a trader's groove. For anyone to succeed in anything he must live/eat/breath it, and I believe I am getting close to the next break through in my skill level. It also helps me to remember symbols/industries, so when I look through briefing.com every morning I can recognize more and more symbols from that upgrade/downgrade list.
4) Last, but not least, when the plan is working like you wrote it, it makes you very confident and a lot more likely to hold on to winners. Also, people don't make top tier money by coming into the office at 9:20 every morning, effort may not give result at first, but it eventually will. At equivalent skill level, he who put more effort into his work will come out ahead, as simple as that, and the best of the best at my firm walks in at 7AM every morning with a 1 hour commute!
