Thursday, March 04, 2010



sold RMBS


















sold TIVO.
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6 comments:

joshua said...

TIVO was a beast today. In your experience, is it more likely for a stock to fall after the first bar pop or to keep going up? I used to think you had to buy those pops, then i started shorting them, but today has me re-thinking maybe you are supposed to go long. Also, I have read to conflicting views about scaling out of positions. In Trading in the Zone Mark Douglas talks about scaling out and says it is a good thing. Van Tharp in Trading for a Living says scaling out is the wrong thing to do. He says it equates to reverse position sizing i.e. having your smallest position when your gain is at its highest. Any thoughts? thanks

5:43 p.m.
Scott said...

j-ya TIVO gave me some filthy lucre today thanks for sure.I caught that one pretty early.
Every situation is different whether you buy or short, it all depends on the momentum. Trading is an art and not a science so 1 hard and fast rule does not apply - better to go with the flow yet take profits when it'd be stupid not to.
I agree with Van Tharp(whoever that is)on scaling. i don't think of it as scaling in, I think of it as trying to maximize a profitable opportunity. If something is moving strong then go with it. I'll add to my position when it says it wants to go. It comes down to risk and also momentum. If you have surmised the momentum correctly then the price quickly moves away from your entry point thus making the risk issue disappear.
I never scale out. I think when the time is right to sell it's better to sell it all. Also working in my favour with this is that I'm not a greedy fool trying to trade 30,000 shares. Selling 2, 5, 10,000 shares is easy with these liquid stocks and the risk doesn't weigh heavy on your mind and take control of you.I'd rather just put on some more trades.

6:17 p.m.
Blue said...

Ahh Scott, you never fail to disappoint! I wasn't able to trade today but got home with 1hr left and saw TIVO and SCOK on my scan list and I just KNEW you were in on that TIVO move buddy. I paged back to see how you played it move by move.

62% in a DAY! Nothing like getting a mega million court decision to spark a massive rally. Amazing. You are a machine man! Long, now short. Short again. Didn't work. Long, ok take profit, short again, didn't work. Ok Long again... :)

Amazing tenacity Scott.

Joshua...read Rule ONE and Rule TWO:
http://www.webtrading.com/phantom/chapter5.htm

12:03 a.m.
Scott said...

Blue- when asked why he robbed banks, a famous bank robber replied "because that's where the money was ".
It's the same for me with volatile stocks

7:55 a.m.
Blue said...

I agree. I've got top % and $ gainers/losers that create a new watch list for me, but I need something to alert me like what you have. This opening ramp and camp shit is really difficult to trade with out old stand-by's. After 7:30am our time we're left with a no volume flat dead market. All the action are in a few select stocks you have to be quick to find.

I've been working to re-tool how I trade since last Nov. I now use Think or Swim through TD Ameritrade ($6 flat commissions). I trade less with more success but not enough to live on yet. At least I still have 90% of my capital from my Oct 2008 high.

11:03 a.m.
joshua said...

blue,

thanks for the link. that is some good reading material. i like the idea of being wrong until proven correct and that the big money is made on the surprise side.

as far as scanning the market you should look at trade ideas or mad scan. i use trade ideas and it is great. the reason i use trade ideas, is that it integrates with quote tracker. quote tracker is a free charting software (because you are a td ameritrade customer). one of the great uses of quote tracker is that you can draw a trendline on a chart, and when the price passes the trend line, you will get an alert. while running trade ideas, everytime a stock comes up on the scanner, all you need to do is click the stock and the charts automatically propagate.

with trade ideas i have a momentum scan shows me stocks up more than .30 on the 5 minute bar, that trade avg 500k volume, $1 avg true range, that are moving on 3x as much volume. i also have a scan set up for the downside. as well as the high low tickers for the nyse and nasdaq.

you should also consider moving your account to lightspeed. if you have 25k you will be able to use their direct access platform and .40 commission per 100 shares. if you have less than 25k, they now have a web trader platform. it would work just like your td ameritrade account except that you would pay .40 per 100 shares vs $6.

i have some screen shots of the quotetracker on my blog.

10:47 a.m.

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