Skips69 Journal

S

skips69

Hello and welcome for visiting my Journal. I am interested in making some discretionary income with my limited funds (1K) that I currently hold in my TD Ameritrade account via swing trades.

The theme of this journal is going to be for me to learn from my mistakes and try not to repeat them.

I'm employed full time and taking six college credits per semester to complete my bachelors degree within the next two years.

The books that I have read thus far include Benjamin Graham's "The Intelligent Investor" and Jim Cramer's "Mad Money". After reading many posts on this site, I'm sure you'll all have fun with the Mad Money read.

I began trading with one of my favorite companies (not because of their balance sheet) but more from a "heart" perspective. Although I quickly learned that this was not the way to go, I was ultimately profitable after six months of holding the stock.

This morning I learned that I need to focus my trading habits on what I am seeking to gain. I purchased RTP thining that it's balance sheet looked good to me and that it was a good buy. For those of you who care to post, I am interested in hearing what I may have missed with RTP from Benjamin Graham's perspective.

Mistake #1
I put all of my available funds into this stock.

Mistake #2
I watched the stock price value in the first three hours of the first trading day that I owned it, became nervous, and sold at a loss. Only to see it recover a small amount just minutes after I sold.

Mistake #3
I don't feel as if I know enough about this company, which made even me more nervous (see Mistake #2).
 
Reading Erik Kolodny's post "Day Trading Thoughts For Tues. Dec. 22" I did a little research and bought into CMLS.

Not much action yesterday on this stock, but this morning I watched it go as high as 35% above my buy in.

This wasn't so much a lesson as much as it was a reminder. I sold off when I started thinking "don't be a pig". Nice gain.

Thanks again Erik!
 
Taking Advantage of my time off during the holidays and learning how to set up custom screeners and using backtesting using TD Ameritrade.

Not quite sure yet about the backtesting but I finally had an "ahaa" moment when I dug into the stock screener capabilities.

Trades that caught my attention (not saying that I am buying - Just looking) were NYSE: FE and AAPL.

The custom screener that I set up was looking at stocks that closed above their previous highs for two days, yet below their 10 day moving average. I'm not going all in on this strategy quite yet, but I'm learning what "doing your homework" is about.

Also found that I don't need to keep going back to Google Finance for my charts. TD Ameritrade certainly has more capable charting options.
 
Just reading my opening thread. I really hate it when people forget to correct grammar....

"Hello and welcome for visiting my Journal." :confused:

How about.."Hello and thank you for visiting my Journal.":D
 
Spent another day setting up various screeners and watching the market. I'm not sure what other trading platforms offer as far as analysis, but I am pretty happy with TD Ameritrade's platform.

The surprising thing is that there are over 300 stocks that closed up at least 2% according to one of my screeners. Kind of an eye opener for me.
 
Bought (3) CME @ 191.85 on 12/30 and Sold (3) CME on 12/31 @ 207.7706.

Bought (31) GE @ 15.68 on 12/30 and Sold (31) on 12/31 GE @ 16.24.

For these, I simply looked at the price versus the 10 and 50 day moving average. It worked, but I'm not sure that I will use this strategy again.

Not like these are going to let me retire early, but at least profitable.

I wasn't able to get into ARIA at .86 this morning, but it would have been my pick to go to .91 had it opened at or above Thursday's high of .85. I need to do something about that capital thing...the first two trades have to settle before I have enough $ to get back into the market!

The stock that I am looking at for Monday January 5th is:
CHTR - If it opens at or above today's high of .119.

But again...can't get back in until Tuesday January 6th
:(
 
Okay...after reading a few posts on ET, it has occurred to me that "Penny Stocks" are frowed upon on ET. Didn't realize that.

I'll keep looking for something that's a little more "respectable".
 
Quote from skips69:

Okay...after reading a few posts on ET, it has occurred to me that "Penny Stocks" are frowned upon on ET. Didn't realize that.

I'll keep looking for something that's a little more "respectable".
More...

Your kidding right? You actually care what other people think!! If you are making money with the pennies than that's all that counts. Any trading product is good as long as you make money trading it.
 
Quote from Zodiac4u:

Your kidding right? You actually care what other people think!! If you are making money with the pennies than that's all that counts. Any trading product is good as long as you make money trading it.
More...

As I began typing this reply, I had to backspace.:eek:

I was going to say that I wanted to trade like most others on this forum. Even being relatively new to trading, I recoginize that would be my first mistake.

Thanks for the response!
 
Alcoa (NYSE: AA).

If this breaks through the 12.45 upper resistance, there should see a pretty good run on this one throughout next week.
 
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