The Road to Consistency

[trader99]

10/22/2019:
Taxable Acct: Trade Zero
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Realized gains:
-$322.50
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Taxable Acct: Merrill Edge
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Realized gains:
$357.41
==============

The first realized loss in a month or so! When I'm on a winning streak it goes on and on. Today the first loss for an INTRADAY strategy. I was in BIIB when it was consolidating then it went down a lot and I got so scared. I KNEW from my pattern and chart analysis that it will breakout later in the day after consolidation. But psychology got the best of me. At one point I was down quite a bit even on a small 350 shares position. But for a $285 stock 5 point moves are nothing. Lesson learned. I held and held. Then finally got out of a small loss then of course it finally broke out like I thought it would. Should have kept my original limit order and just leave it there. Would have made nice coin.

On my Merrill Edge account, I just upped my size again. Now traded 20K shares averaged in. Learned my lessons from yesterday. Did put in an order for 20K at one price. Averaged in and got a good average price. Only made a few pennies. I got out in piecemeal. Else it would be higher like over $600. I should execute a bigger block of shares when prices were optimal. But glad I got out else it reversed. My next target is 30K shares or maybe even 50K shares and try to get out at least 5 cents. That's $2500/day to $5000/day. Not bad. Every day there seems to be at least a 5-10 cents moves on these superliquid low priced stocks.

Swing Trading:
==========
I'm holding on some losers now. I should have stuck with daytrading. But I'm experimenting with swing trading. So I'm letting it have some more slack though a bit painful from a daytrading perspective but from a swing trading perspective it's probably within normal variations. I will exit in a week or SOONER if things are not going the way I thought it wuold.

 

[trader99]

10/23/2019:
Taxable Acct: Trade Zero
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Realized gains:
$1533.95
==============

Taxable Acct: Merrill Edge
=============
Realized gains:
$915.17
==============

Total P&L: $2449.12

First time trading those fast moving small cap stocks with size. This time 10K shares. But was so nervous and flipped out too soon. But this is tiptoeing in this new style. Next time I will hold longer for the trend ride.

On the Merrill Edge account I traded 15K shares clip again. Got out decently. Then on the pullback I put out a limit order for another 20K shaers but got scared and canceled it the last minute. That would result in another $1200! To be scared and not enter and miss out on a good trade is just playing it too sacred. Of course, it doesn't have to move that way.

The optimistic thing is that there is PLENTY PLENTY of ROOM for IMPROVEMENTS! Good times ahead!

Swing Trading:
My swing trade came back a little but still underwater. I think once I'm totally out of my swing trades, I will just focus totally on daytrading. Maybe only 1 of my accounts I will put on a small swing trade position. I like the constant turnover of capital. Get in and get out. Wash. Rinse. Repeat. Take the money and run.

 

[trader99]

10/24/2019:
Taxable Acct: Trade Zero
=============
Realized gains:
-$2569.33
==============

Taxable Acct: Merrill Edge
=============
Realized gains:
-$391.33
==============

Taxable Acct: IB
=============
Realized gains:
-$693.20
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Non-Taxable Acct: IB IRA
================
Realized gains:
-$140
================


Total P&L: -$3793.86

Wow! Today was a horrible day. Lost on every single account. I was basically winning every single day this month until came along. The thing is that the dollar amount loss is big which wiped out my big gains yesterday and some. It was the right trades. I was just too big on size!

My lesson on that is to buy on pullback and not chase prices. I was chasing this one momo stock and bought near the high of the move. Then it came back a few pennies and I exited. So decent risk control. But I have on 25K shares! LOL. So a few pennies on 25K is still a decent sized hit!

 

[jl1575]

10/24/2019:
Taxable Acct: Trade Zero
=============
Realized gains:
-$2569.33
==============

Taxable Acct: Merrill Edge
=============
Realized gains:
-$391.33
==============

Taxable Acct: IB
=============
Realized gains:
-$693.20
=============

Non-Taxable Acct: IB IRA
================
Realized gains:
-$140
================


Total P&L: -$3793.86

Wow! Today was a horrible day. Lost on every single account. I was basically winning every single day this month until came along. The thing is that the dollar amount loss is big which wiped out my big gains yesterday and some. It was the right trades. I was just too big on size!

My lesson on that is to buy on pullback and not chase prices. I was chasing this one momo stock and bought near the high of the move. Then it came back a few pennies and I exited. So decent risk control. But I have on 25K shares! LOL. So a few pennies on 25K is still a decent sized hit!

Yes, large size is a double edged sword, and it can bring both big profit or big loss.
For chasing or buying on PB, actually it is hard most time, as price is running, you are just not sure where would any PB, or the PB is at the much higher price than the current one, dont blame yourself too much. However, giving your constant success this month, maybe you got a little bit bold and didnt double check signals/context. That happened to everyone.
Your honesty in reporting both P/L should be valued highly at ET where many people just gloat about their P, but skip their L conveniently due to fragile ego.

 

[trader99]

10/25/2019:
Taxable Acct: Trade Zero
=============
Realized gains:
$789.72
==============

Taxable Acct: Robinhood
=============
Realized gains:
$1969.70
==============

Taxable Acct: Merrill Edge
=============
Realized gains:
$299.67
==============

Taxable Acct: IB
=============
Realized gains:
$133
=============

Non-Taxable Acct: IB IRA
================
Realized gains:
$948
================

Total P&L: $4,140.09

Today is the OPPOSITE of yesterday. I made money in every one of my account. Could have made significantly more if I was more aggressive. There are too many good opportunities to track when you are a manual trader! So I was only able to participate in some of them. Glad that I was able to make back my big losses yesterday! This tells me it wasn't all luck. Good trading.

But I have finally made up my mind as to the kind of trader I am. I'm a daytrader. I really don't like sitting on a position for days. I like the immediate feedback of daytrading. I got out most of my swing trading positions today. So the gains above were mostly MTM gains. I know it's still money. But, I'm more proud of real daytrading gains rather than being down then recovering from that and getting out at small realized gain but the system records total gain including MTM gains that are now finally realized.

Happy Friday! Have a good weekend ETers!

 

[trader99]

Yes, large size is a double edged sword, and it can bring both big profit or big loss.
For chasing or buying on PB, actually it is hard most time, as price is running, you are just not sure where would any PB, or the PB is at the much higher price than the current one, dont blame yourself too much. However, giving your constant success this month, maybe you got a little bit bold and didnt double check signals/context. That happened to everyone.
Your honesty in reporting both P/L should be valued highly at ET where many people just gloat about their P, but skip their L conveniently due to fragile ego.

hey @jl1575

Thanks for following this thread and my journey in the other thread:
https://www.elitetrader.com/et/thre...like-theres-so-much-more-to-go.324108/page-22

It's been quite a journey. I'm glad I stuck with it. I'm still progressing towards the goal of $5K/day. While today I'm up $4K+, I don't consider that as real trading gains. A lot of that was just holding onto swing trades that were underwater and now came back up. I want a real intraday trading gains of $5K/day.

With Wednesday's again of roughly $2.5K pure intraday trading gains, that goal doesn't seem to be so far and out of reach now. The real work is to consistently doing that every day. Bang out $5K/day in and out. Or some days more like $10K and some days less. But averaging out to be $5K/day is the long term goal. Maybe I'll get there sometime next year. Maybe sooner.

let's see! Keep reading this journal as I make this journey!

As to the P&L, yeah. Losses are natural part of trading. nothing to be ashamed of. But one has to learn from one's mistakes else the loss would be a total waste.

As to your comment about large size, I'm rethinking this. The journey has been increasing from 5K to 10K to 15K to 20K and now 25K shares all on one stock. And I was excited that I'm making money swinging size. At one point, i was thinking putting in 50K shares in one name.

But given yesterday's big losses, I'm thinking of breaking it up. Because putting 50K shares all in one stock is somewhat risky. Even for a low priced stock that only moves pennies. What happens if it moves against me and even if I get out for 5-10 cents loss that's a $2.5K to $5K hit!

I'm very comfortable swinging 10K to 15K on low priced highly liquid stocks. 20K i'm ok too.

Maybe I can spread it out. Maybe watch and trade 3 - 4 super liquid stocks at 15K to 20K a clip. On 3 stocks that 45K to 60K shares total. Even for a 5 to 10 cents move that's a good day.

I want to thank the zero commission movement! It's been great.

Good trading to you!

 

[trader99]

10/28/2019:
Taxable Acct: Trade Zero
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Realized gains:
$2475.55
Unrealized loss:
-$1954 (OUCH! still holding onto swing trades)
==============
Net gain: $521.55

Taxable Acct: Robinhood
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Realized gains:
$266
==============

Taxable Acct: Merrill Edge
=============
Realized gains:
-$1,106.59 (ouch still holding onto swing trades)
==============

I told myself to focus on just daytrading. I got out almost all of my swing trade ideas. Then now I'm back to it again. doh! Now holding onto scary swing trading positions...


But at least for my pure daytrading positions, I made close to $2500! Yay, that's an improvement. Please tell me to stop doing swing trades.

Today was my first 30K shares per clip and on the short side too! First time using hard to borrow feature of Tradezero. The borrow fees were expensive. So it ate about half of my profits. It was a scary hold. I should have reshorted then I would have made many multiples of the borrow fees.

Trading size is the only way to make some real money. But I gotta get used to the swings on bigger size...

 

[trader99]

10/29/2019:
Taxable Acct: Trade Zero
=============
Realized loss:
-$1361.26
==============

WHAT?! I was up close to a $1K and still got screwed. Couldn't get out! I'll NEVER trade illiquid stocks again!

https://www.elitetrader.com/et/threads/how-to-get-out-of-illiquid-stocks.337353/

Still down a lot on open swing trades! Never swing trade again! Never trade illiquid stocks again!

Of course, now it comes all the way and I could have gotten with a super small loss or even slight profit.

 

[trader99]

10/29/2019:
Taxable Acct: Trade Zero
=============
Realized gain:
$67.70
==============

Today was busy with non-trading stuff. And my platform miscalculated my margins and thus reduced my BP and I couldn't get into positions. Ridiculous. Else I would have made $1K+ I entered 10K shares limit order for a small priced stock and my buying power shown on the screen is several times higher. But for some reason the software platform rejected it! Of course, right after that it went up 10cents so that's $1K loss opportunity.

They just switched clearing firm. So still working out the glitches.

What can you do right?

Still holding onto open losses on my swing trades though they came back slightly. very slightly. Hopefully they will zoom up the few days so I can get out of it and no more swing trades for me!

 

[trader99]

10/30/2019:
Taxable Acct: Trade Zero
=============
Realized gain:
$1119.00
==============

Due to my holding onto losing swing trades, it reduced my available margins. Even with that reduced margins I was able to hop onto KHC this morning and rode it for a while. It has a nice upward momo pattern. I should have held longer. But I'm proud that I was able to hold from 30mins to 1.5 hours getting out at various prices. Of course, if I held til now it would be better. But I still feel good to make decent profits even on reduced margins. Learnt to be grateful. Thanks @Overnight

But what's pissing me off and messing up my P&L is my stupid swing trades. I'm not sure what I should do! I never should have gotten into them. I'm down a lot but the weekly chart still shows some support. I don't want to get out at the bottom.

Any suggestions?!

Once I'm out of these swing trades, that's it. Just focus on my daytrades.