options day trader Sunny

insane GS rally

2009-06-04T18:40:00.005-04:00

stocks ran rampant today, especially GS and POT. i sold POT, right at the open today, sensing weakness, but it was a fakeout. it opened near 112 and finished the day near 115. i totally did not see that runup coming. what was even more surprising was the runup on GS. it was up around 146 or +4 from yesterday and i thought beautiful short and bought puts. it then kept on going up, closing over +3 from where i bought for a total move of +7 to 149. monster run. i totally did not see that. all i can say is, if you are a day trader, and you went long GS after a $4 open runup, you have gotta be insane.

price movements make no sense anymore. it's like somebody is manipulating the market ;)

anyway i had coffee at greenberry's. too much coffee actually. had to stand in line for a god awful long time to get my burger. just for that they get no publicity. went back home and closed my YM short for a loss, bringing my total YM profits for the day down to $24 :) hey atleast it wasn't a loss. i was playing safe with only 2 contracts throughout. it was more for fun.

doubled down on GS near the close. after a $7 run, it should give back some tomorrow and that way i can get out for near breakeven. but, it's a risky play and i will definitely be up bright and early.

Underlying	Quantity	Action	Price	Description	Time	Date	Exch.	Commission
POT	10	SLD	13.20	JUN09 100.0 CALL Option PYPFT	09:31:30	20090604	CBOE	7.00
GS	1	BOT	10.70	JUN09 155.0 PUT Option GPYRK	09:42:23	20090604	BOX	0.75
GS	1	BOT	10.70	JUN09 155.0 PUT Option GPYRK	09:42:23	20090604	BOX	0.15
GS	1	BOT	10.70	JUN09 155.0 PUT Option GPYRK	09:42:23	20090604	BOX	0.45
GS	7	BOT	10.70	JUN09 155.0 PUT Option GPYRK	09:42:23	20090604	PHLX	4.90
YM	1	SLD	8685.0	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	10:35:50	20090604	ECBOT	2.13
YM	1	SLD	8685.0	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	10:35:50	20090604	ECBOT	2.13
YM	2	BOT	8670.0	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	10:41:04	20090604	ECBOT	4.26
YM	2	SLD	8705.0	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	10:57:04	20090604	ECBOT	4.26
YM	2	BOT	8700.0	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	11:25:23	20090604	ECBOT	4.26
YM	2	SLD	8705.0	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	13:10:08	20090604	ECBOT	4.26
YM	1	BOT	8720.0	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	15:00:15	20090604	ECBOT	2.13
YM	1	BOT	8720.0	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	15:00:16	20090604	ECBOT	2.13
GS	1	BOT	8.45	JUN09 155.0 PUT Option GPYRK	15:03:11	20090604	ISE	1.00
GS	1	BOT	8.45	JUN09 155.0 PUT Option GPYRK	15:03:11	20090604	ISE	0.40
GS	8	BOT	8.45	JUN09 155.0 PUT Option GPYRK	15:04:03	20090604	ISE	5.60

okay day

2009-06-04T00:38:00.005-04:00

sold my NUE short, way too early. AH yesterday, STLD got smushed...and i had a gut feeling that steel and NUE would also crack worse than the prices i was seeing at the open, but after the IBM fiasco yesterday, where i was too slow to sell, i was out of the trade in 2 minutes in from open. i probably wouldn't have held till the afternoon when we saw max. smushage, but i should have been able to game another 400/500 off it easily. 5 more minutes actually.

GS...i was slow to get into that play. it cracked from 143, which would have been the correct entry point, but i did see weakness at 142 and thought that it would break inline with the rest of the market smushage. my first mistake was that i entered a speculative play, 145 puts, GS is at 142 and they are selling at 7. that's a $4 risk premium. second GS wasn't breaking, at least not in the clean break sort of way that i like. there was resistence. thirdly, the rest of the market was already close to the bottom, i could see, and this thing is still only down a duck. screw that, it was too risky. it was spiking around like mad, so on the next run up, i doubled down and on the next spike down, i dumped it for +.15 and +.2...not big profits, but i was glad to be out of that trade. within that set of spikes i could have gamed .20 cents more and later in the afternoon it did break 142, but around close it zoomed to 144 in 15 minutes.

why the long writeup, because this was well traded. i saw the impending break - good. watched closely for 30 minutes and saw it was too risky. exited the trade promptly. if you don't like it, get the fuck out of it.

the double down also needs to be explained. my initial position size of 10 was good, it's GS, don't go nutty. but, i screwed up by buying 145 puts...it was the type of option buy, which requires large moves on the underlying to really pay up. for $1 move in that, GS would have to move $2. i realized that within minutes and switched strategy to double down, to capitalize on the smallest of moves. i basically decided i was gonna be out of the trade within minutes. all of this only because of the ass lickin' PDT (pattern day trader rule). google my site to read my venting on it.

although i tracked the YM, i was too chickenshit to play. get this, around 3:42, i'm thinking this day is pretty much over and after looking at the charts, i enter an order to buy POT calls, at a price 20 cents lower than current spread. i'm thinking it'll either hit it or i'll fine tune the price or whatever. i had other stocks lined up as potential buys. so i'm looking at the YM and xx18 seems like a good short entry point, i enter click transmit, check on some stuff, go back and bam it's at xx32...wtf, it's zooming up at the end of the day again. a move of 60 points in minutes. luckily, my POT order went through just seconds ago and so my YM order didn't have enough money to get triggered. phew! thank you GOD>

btw, i figured out the reason for the end of the day spike. the big guys (and me) were waiting for mad smushage into the close. we had smushage, but we didn't have mad smushage. and so that meant, things were still safe and the swing trade was go long. the same time i went long POT, the big boys went long everything else and that pumped everything up big time, plus that kind of runup triggers all kinds of stops and short covering, which fuels the runup even more. that's why it's such a spike.

i feel very good here. i'm in touch with the trading flows. i'm synced. fingers crossed.

Underlying	Quantity	Action	Price	Description	Time	Date	Exch.	Commission
NUE	10	SLD	9.20	JUN09 55.0 PUT Option NUERK	09:30:57	20090603	NASDAQOM	7.00
GS	10	BOT	6.99	JUN09 145.0 PUT Option GS RI	13:09:28	20090603	NASDAQOM	4.50
GS	10	BOT	6.95	JUN09 145.0 PUT Option GS RI	13:30:28	20090603	ISE	7.00
GS	2	SLD	7.15	JUN09 145.0 PUT Option GS RI	14:05:53	20090603	ISE	1.40
GS	2	SLD	7.15	JUN09 145.0 PUT Option GS RI	14:05:53	20090603	ISE	1.40
GS	2	SLD	7.15	JUN09 145.0 PUT Option GS RI	14:05:53	20090603	ISE	1.40
GS	2	SLD	7.15	JUN09 145.0 PUT Option GS RI	14:05:53	20090603	ISE	1.40
GS	2	SLD	7.15	JUN09 145.0 PUT Option GS RI	14:05:53	20090603	ISE	1.40
GS	10	SLD	7.15	JUN09 145.0 PUT Option GS RI	14:05:58	20090603	ISE	7.00
POT	10	BOT	12.00	JUN09 100.0 CALL Option PYPFT	15:44:45	20090603	PSE	7.00

good day

2009-06-02T20:21:00.002-04:00

too exhausted to blog....enjoy the trades :)

Underlying	Quantity	Action	Price	Description	Time	Date	Exch.	Commission
NUE	10	SLD	8.70	JUN09 55.0 PUT Option NUERK	09:37:09	20090602	NASDAQOM	7.00
IBM	20	SLD	3.20	JUN09 110.0 PUT Option IBMRB	09:39:25	20090602	NASDAQOM	14.00
YM	4	SLD	8735.0	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	11:01:21	20090602	ECBOT	8.52
YM	1	BOT	8730.0	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	11:09:03	20090602	ECBOT	2.13
YM	2	BOT	8730.0	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	11:09:03	20090602	ECBOT	4.26
YM	1	BOT	8730.0	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	11:09:04	20090602	ECBOT	2.13
YM	4	SLD	8735.0	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	11:12:04	20090602	ECBOT	8.52
YM	3	BOT	8725.0	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	11:15:51	20090602	ECBOT	6.39
YM	1	BOT	8725.0	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	11:15:51	20090602	ECBOT	2.13
YM	3	BOT	8710.0	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	11:37:38	20090602	ECBOT	6.39
YM	1	BOT	8710.0	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	11:37:38	20090602	ECBOT	2.13
YM	1	SLD	8705.0	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	11:40:19	20090602	ECBOT	2.13
YM	3	SLD	8705.0	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	11:40:22	20090602	ECBOT	6.39
YM	4	SLD	8705.0	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	12:46:10	20090602	ECBOT	8.52
YM	4	BOT	8704.0	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	12:50:40	20090602	ECBOT	8.52
YM	4	SLD	8734.0	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	13:51:45	20090602	ECBOT	8.52
YM	1	BOT	8730.0	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	14:00:06	20090602	ECBOT	2.13
YM	1	BOT	8730.0	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	14:00:06	20090602	ECBOT	2.13
YM	2	BOT	8730.0	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	14:00:06	20090602	ECBOT	4.26
YM	4	SLD	8745.0	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	14:21:45	20090602	ECBOT	8.52
YM	4	BOT	8738.0	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	14:25:50	20090602	ECBOT	8.52
YM	1	SLD	8755.0	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	14:46:06	20090602	ECBOT	2.13
YM	3	SLD	8755.0	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	14:46:06	20090602	ECBOT	6.39
YM	4	BOT	8745.0	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	14:50:13	20090602	ECBOT	8.52
NUE	2	BOT	7.70	JUN09 55.0 PUT Option NUERK	15:46:12	20090602	PSE	1.40
NUE	8	BOT	7.70	JUN09 55.0 PUT Option NUERK	15:46:12	20090602	PSE	5.60

slow day

2009-06-01T16:59:00.003-04:00

due to a bad habit i spent most of the morning chasing dreams in my bed. justifiably, i was a little eager to get back to trading, especially as today was my smush YM, in the ass, day. okay, i only put "in the ass" because...well...YM treated me that way on friday. sob, yes i was treated oh so badly, so vilely....okay sorry...so my first trade i short the YM and within minutes i see it's a bad trade, but my brain's still doozy and i watch it run up and then sit there marvelling at my stupidity. well i watched tv in between. animal planet rocks. anyway i was able to collapse for a minor loss and after that, just from watching the tape, i had got my rhythm back.

the easy money was in the morning runup. well, easy...if your watching the damn chart in the afternoon. hahaha..ha. day trading humor.

well, i reversed and went long. made up my loss and some extra cash. GS was very weak. i think this rally may have a dip tomorrow morning. went short NUE, was gonna double down, but then realized this was a strong commodity rally...so instead shorted IBM. large speculative position in IBM, but fairly confident it's runup is bogus. weakness at close confirmed, but tomorrow's another day.

had a mango. nectar of gods.

Underlying	Quantity	Action	Price	Description	Time	Date	Exch.	Commission
YM	4	SLD	8700.0	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	13:20:34	20090601	ECBOT	8.52
YM	4	BOT	8710.0	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	14:53:45	20090601	ECBOT	8.52
YM	4	BOT	8700.0	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	15:12:47	20090601	ECBOT	8.52
YM	4	SLD	8720.0	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	15:29:40	20090601	ECBOT	8.52
NUE	10	BOT	8.20	JUN09 55.0 PUT Option NUERK	15:34:57	20090601	PSE	7.00
IBM	20	BOT	3.10	JUN09 110.0 PUT Option IBMRB	15:42:01	20090601	PSE	14.00

god damn

2009-05-29T16:29:00.006-04:00

was up 500 ducks on my excellent bottom of the day close of my overnight GS puts. then tinkered around all day playing the YM, as i was thinking right until the close, masterfully. up 1K, that's right, for the day on the YM, self congratulating and patting my back. entered for one last scalp, market spiked hard and then spiked like i have very rarely seen. over 100 points in the YM in over 5 minutes. it was so fast, before i thought of a level it was broached never to be reached again. i was short at 8400 and briefly i could have closed at 8425, but then 8440, 8460, 8480 and finally i just hit sell at 8490. it peaked at 8530 and settled at 8415. had i held on, i would have lost even more money. total loss on this one trade alone 1.8K, demolishing all hard earned profits for the day and putting me in the hole by 200 ducks.

i had a similar experience with a YM runup at close once before. but, as i recall that one wasn't as bad. i need more experience with the YM. things to consider, change number of contracts. not all trades need maximum leverage. don't trade the last 20 minutes as they seem to be the most volatile. start adding stops to YM trades, something i don't do with my option trades.

btw, the best reason i can think of for the runup, was end of the month book balancing. closing bad positions or looking in gains for the month by big funds. something to remember in the future.

on the plus side, i scalped the YM for over a K on a very dead day. but, at the same time i managed to lose it all in one trade. i still can't conclusively say that trading the YM is a good idea. today's experience was productive, but it hurt like hell.

i could use a drink right about now.

same damn pattern

2009-05-28T18:58:00.002-04:00

the start of the day was horrible. i got up early and checked the futures and they were nicely up. MON was up to around 81 dollars in premarket and i'm thinking ka-ching. So the market opens and the spread is 11 on a 11.5. i'm thinking small spike and i might be able to hit 11.7...i enter that in and click transmit and my fucking computer just freezes. it's making all this electrical noise. 2 mins go by. i am fucking freaking out. i'm clicking on all the windows nothing's happening. then it's back. MON has gone down to 80.3...70 cents in 1.5 minutes from the open exactly. i quickly enter 10.5 and get faded instantly. that minute and a half delay cost me $500 dollars. i would have changed my 11.7 to 11.5 and then to 11 and i would have got it. MON spiked again to about 10.7/10.8 and then for the rest of the day it went down hard. i wanted to throw my computer out of the window. i think i definitely need another just for trading laptop.

i was in a bad mood about that for a while.

i thought the index was gonna die, so sold some YM, made some nice coin on it, but GS looked even juicier. i got some puts and it crashed, sold them too early, but the severity of the crash was unanticipated by me. but, get this, the entire move down was very rapidly covered again. very fast spike down and a pretty quick recovery. very treacherous market.

i had a bad hangover, so i went to the coffee shop. but, i mostly fucked around. i didn't feel like trading. and then i made the same damn mistake i have been making each and every day. i re-shorted GS around 12pm and then it spiked up a dollar and traded in a 1-1.5+ range for the rest of the day. no smushage at the end either. every fucking day i short too early. sigh.

went and got some pho. it was delicious. the guy got my number wrong and gave me pho with chunks of fat or cartilage in it. it was fucking delicious. usually i only get no. 11 or 12, like clockwork, but i think i have a new no. now. years of eating pho at PHO 75 and now i eat fat, cartilage, stomach, u name it. the pho place is right next to the coffee shop.

got home and remembered i had more funds in my account now, because i have been making some coin and found i could trade 1 YM. so i short it stupidly and watch it go 20 points up, but it's only a loss of 100 dollars, so i resolutely plan to hold till close. when out of nowhere, there is a crazy spike down and i sell right at the bottom of it, making 60 ducks. very nice scalp. i wouldn't have held like that if i had my normal 3 contracts.

overall good day trading. just finished watching "mifunes sidste sang", a danish dogma movie and am gonna watch "la habitacion de fermat" spanish next. it's supposed to be very good. it's nice when your day ends by 4pm and ur already home and you can watch movies or go outside and cool yourself under the pouring rain.

all i need now is a woman, a dog and a place in the countryside.

Underlying	Quantity	Action	Price	Description	Time	Date	Exch.	Commission
MON	10	SLD	10.50	JUN09 70.0 CALL Option MONFN	09:37:00	20090528	NASDAQOM	7.00
YM	3	SLD	8345.0	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	09:53:01	20090528	ECBOT	6.39
YM	3	BOT	8325.0	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	10:00:16	20090528	ECBOT	6.39
GS	10	BOT	10.70	JUN09 150.0 PUT Option GPYRJ	10:05:16	20090528	ISE	7.00
GS	10	SLD	11.80	JUN09 150.0 PUT Option GPYRJ	10:10:11	20090528	NASDAQOM	4.5
GS	10	BOT	9.90	JUN09 150.0 PUT Option GPYRJ	12:19:57	20090528	ISE	7.00
YM	1	SLD	8378.0	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	15:32:39	20090528	ECBOT	2.13
YM	1	BOT	8365.0	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	15:54:36	20090528	ECBOT	2.13

good day

2009-05-27T16:54:00.002-04:00

i woke up with a badly upset stomach. i could barely sit at the computer, so even though the market was fluctuating i set a sell level of 12 (breakeven) for my POT and went back to sleep. MON had given bad guidance and i was hoping that sell off would at the very least tamper POT's gains. i woke up to find that my POT had already been sold at breakeven. it was at the same level again and sinking lower. what really pissed me off, was the price differential. i bought my puts yesterday, when POT was at 116 for 12. today they offered the same price 12 only when POT reached 115.3. that's some serious price gouging. i don't like trading POT ;|

i watched the indices flutter around and traded the YM. was up $400+, when i made a bad buy. i survived that one (last one below), but the lesson learned is now becoming fairly clear. YM is a very dangerous instrument to trade. very volatile and it's not that easy to see where the overall market is going, compared to a single stock. i have to be very cautious trading this fucker.

gonna rest up now, since still not fully recovered from my stomach flu. or is it the pig flu ;)

Underlying	Quantity	Action	Price	Description	Time	Date	Exch.	Commission
POT	10	SLD	12	JUN09 125.0 PUT Option PYPRE	11:24:57	20090527	NASDAQOM	7
YM	3	BOT	8339	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	14:28:00	20090527	ECBOT	6.39
YM	3	SLD	8345	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	14:29:47	20090527	ECBOT	6.39
YM	3	SLD	8360	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	14:40:38	20090527	ECBOT	6.39
YM	3	BOT	8350	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	14:58:35	20090527	ECBOT	6.39
YM	3	SLD	8366	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	15:07:22	20090527	ECBOT	6.39
YM	3	BOT	8350	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	15:10:54	20090527	ECBOT	6.39
YM	3	BOT	8311	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	15:24:19	20090527	ECBOT	6.39
YM	3	SLD	8310	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	15:46:58	20090527	ECBOT	6.39
MON	10	BOT	10.3	JUN09 70.0 CALL Option MONFN	15:59:53	20090527	PSE	7

yesterday was blah

2009-05-27T16:11:00.006-04:00

i woke up with a memorial day hangover and was pleasantly surprised to find both POT and futures down. it is very rare that holding options in a security like POT over a long weekend pay's off (within day trading scope). It was trading around 113 and even then i only got a palty .7 profit. luckily i sold at the open, because it spiked huge right after. another minute and i would have been fucked.

i have been experiencing mad problems with running my trading software (TWS) on my linux based laptop. It is extremely slow. The problem is that it's written in Java and my machine only has 1GB ram. I might have to install windoze on my laptop until i can upgrade it's ram.

luckily my kid brother's new laptop was there, only $400 bucks and so fast. i traded off of it. re-shorted POT around 116 at 10:30 am. watched it go up to 117 and remain there for the rest of the day. very frustrating day. +200 on the dow and it never broke, even at the end of the day. i feared we might be getting a genuine push up across the board in equities.

Underlying	Quantity	Action	Price	Description	Time	Date	Exch.	Commission
POT	10	SLD	11	JUN09 120.0 PUT Option PYPRD	9:32:54	20090526	NASDAQOM	7
YM	3	SLD	8420	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	10:24:21	20090526	ECBOT	6.39
YM	3	BOT	8410	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	10:25:57	20090526	ECBOT	6.39
POT	10	BOT	12	JUN09 125.0 PUT Option PYPRE	10:30:27	20090526	PSE	7

dismal week

2009-05-22T17:27:00.007-04:00

the week started out on a happy note. no more boring desk job. no more hiding my trading screens. i figured out how to trade futures. coffee shops. sunny weather. girls.

the reality. told my dad i'm trading and as usual he chewed me out. he calls it gambling and no way to "live life". i felt very bummed out. i made a real bonehead futures trade on thursday, which shook my faith in futures being easy to trade. i didn't make any coin on my regular options trades either. overall i'm down 500 for the week and my last options play today on POT could be a looming disaster. time decay alone is going to eat me. sigh.

i will say this STRONGLY....the way this market trades has changed significantly from last year. last year was a bonanza, mini fortunes were made. all you had to do was go short. these days the chop is damn near unpredictable. long dead zones when no trades can be made. you need real patience to trade.

The Upshoot. i can't just be a daytrader. the money just isn't there. plus there is much more risk. and it's not fun. i don't want to stare at the ticker all day. once in a while for kicks, but not all day, every day. i need a job. i need some regular people banality in my life.

here are the stinky lousy rotten trades....i don't even feel like getting drunk.

Underlying	Quantity	Action	Price	Description	Time	Date	Commission
POT	10	BOT	11.00	JUN09 120.0 PUT Option PYPRD	09:34:27	20090522	7.00
POT	10	SLD	11.50	JUN09 120.0 PUT Option PYPRD	09:45:28	20090522	7.00
YM	1	BOT	8257.0	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	09:51:48	20090522	2.13
YM	1	BOT	8257.0	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	09:51:48	20090522	2.13
YM	1	BOT	8257.0	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	09:51:49	20090522	2.13
YM	3	SLD	8260.0	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	09:53:19	20090522	6.39
YM	2	SLD	8260.0	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	10:00:43	20090522	4.26
YM	2	BOT	8270.0	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	10:01:40	20090522	4.26
YM	3	SLD	8278.0	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	10:09:41	20090522	6.39
YM	1	BOT	8278.0	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	10:12:40	20090522	2.13
YM	2	BOT	8278.0	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	10:12:40	20090522	4.26
POT	1	BOT	10.30	JUN09 120.0 PUT Option PYPRD	10:20:29	20090522	1.00
POT	1	BOT	10.30	JUN09 120.0 PUT Option PYPRD	10:20:29	20090522	0.40
POT	7	BOT	10.30	JUN09 120.0 PUT Option PYPRD	10:20:31	20090522	4.90
POT	1	BOT	10.30	JUN09 120.0 PUT Option PYPRD	10:20:32	20090522	0.70

treacherous YM gives headache

2009-05-21T19:46:00.005-04:00

so i'm up early to get rid of my GS and i'm worried, because futures are down considerably and so i think get rid of it as fast as possible. it opens about 1.5 below my position and i'm sweating bullets and it zooms up and i sell for a measly .2 loss. sigh of relief turns to horror as it continues skyrocketing, touching 139, +3 from my position. i couldn't believe it, the entire market was tanking and it was zooming. it stayed up there for a while too, pissing me off for most of the morning.

the rest of the market was solidly red...i scalped the YM a bunch of times and felt mighty good about myself. then i went to bed, but i didn't feel like sleeping, so i decided to go get coffee at Greenberry's. they finally got wireless. i get there and the market is flat. no movement at all. which is fine with me. i drink coffee and enjoy the sun. look at the chicks. go get a delicious burger at Ray's Burger joint, which i totally scarfed. the rest of the patrons must have thought what a pig, but then again they don't trade the YM.

the day ended very badly however. i shorted YM at what i thought was a good level, because i thought the market would continue to tank downward. big mistake. the market zoomed up and zoomed even more at close. i bought at the low and sold literally at the high. such bad trading is almost unprecedented for me.

was it because i was bored and didn't pay attention? was it, i still don't understand how to trade YM? or was it the kind of smushage i have gotten conditioned to over the past year, simply don't happen any more? new patterns are emerging for sure.

anyway, i got a big loss, vaporized all my profits and got a nice headache as well. sigh!

Underlying	Quantity	Action	Price	Description	Time	Date	Exch.	Commission
GS	10	SLD	10.30	JUN09 130.0 CALL Option GS FF	09:33:31	20090521	NASDAQOM	4.50
YM	3	BOT	8286.0	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	09:37:10	20090521	ECBOT	6.39
YM	1	SLD	8284.0	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	09:41:55	20090521	ECBOT	2.13
YM	1	SLD	8284.0	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	09:41:56	20090521	ECBOT	2.13
YM	1	SLD	8284.0	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	09:41:56	20090521	ECBOT	2.13
YM	1	SLD	8298.0	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	09:48:01	20090521	ECBOT	2.13
YM	1	SLD	8298.0	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	09:48:02	20090521	ECBOT	2.13
YM	1	SLD	8298.0	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	09:48:02	20090521	ECBOT	2.13
YM	3	BOT	8288.0	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	09:59:46	20090521	ECBOT	6.39
YM	3	SLD	8294.0	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	10:01:12	20090521	ECBOT	6.39
YM	3	BOT	8284.0	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	10:02:13	20090521	ECBOT	6.39
YM	2	SLD	8290.0	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	10:03:28	20090521	ECBOT	4.26
YM	1	SLD	8290.0	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	10:03:28	20090521	ECBOT	2.13
YM	1	BOT	8285.0	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	10:13:49	20090521	ECBOT	2.13
YM	2	BOT	8285.0	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	10:14:02	20090521	ECBOT	4.26
YM	3	SLD	8290.0	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	13:00:55	20090521	ECBOT	6.39
YM	1	BOT	8277.0	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	13:05:07	20090521	ECBOT	2.13
YM	1	BOT	8277.0	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	13:05:07	20090521	ECBOT	2.13
YM	1	BOT	8278.0	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	13:05:07	20090521	ECBOT	2.13
YM	3	SLD	8230.0	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	15:02:17	20090521	ECBOT	6.39
YM	3	BOT	8290.0	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	16:00:22	20090521	ECBOT	6.39

ym my favorite future to trade

2009-05-20T20:19:00.005-04:00

i got laid off from my job....friday was the last day....so the last 3 days i have been trading full time.....funnnnnnnnn (a little scary also).

YM, dow futures is my favorite so far....i like the volatility, but haven't yet quite got the hang of how to trade it....too impatient, need to wait sometimes. here are the trades

for May 18th:

Underlying	Action	Quantity	Description	Price	Time	Date	Exch.	Commission
YM	SLD	1	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	8425.0	13:59:25	20090518	ECBOT
YM	SLD	2	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	8425.0	13:59:26	20090518	ECBOT
YM	BOT	1	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	8484.0	16:01:30	20090518	ECBOT

for may 19th:

Underlying	Action	Quantity	Description	Price	Time	Date	Exch.	Commission
YM	BOT	2	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	8450.0	09:54:00	20090519	ECBOT	4.26
YM	SLD	3	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	8506.0	10:35:43	20090519	ECBOT	6.39
YM	BOT	1	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	8490.0	11:00:28	20090519	ECBOT	2.13
YM	BOT	1	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	8490.0	11:00:34	20090519	ECBOT	2.13
YM	BOT	1	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	8490.0	11:00:36	20090519	ECBOT	2.13
IBM	BOT	10	JUN09 110.0 PUT Option IBMRB	5.40	14:19:47	20090519	PSE	7.00
IBM	BOT	10	JUN09 110.0 PUT Option IBMRB	5.40	14:19:47	20090519	PSE	7.00

for may 20th:

Underlying	Quantity	Action	Price	Description	Time	Date	Exch.	Commission
IBM	10	SLD	5.60	JUN09 110.0 PUT Option IBMRB	10:07:25	20090520	PSE	7.00
IBM	7	SLD	5.70	JUN09 110.0 PUT Option IBMRB	10:14:05	20090520	PSE	4.90
IBM	3	SLD	5.70	JUN09 110.0 PUT Option IBMRB	10:14:05	20090520	PSE	2.10
YM	1	SLD	8493.0	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	14:07:18	20090520	ECBOT	2.13
YM	1	SLD	8493.0	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	14:07:18	20090520	ECBOT	2.13
YM	1	SLD	8493.0	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	14:07:18	20090520	ECBOT	2.13
YM	2	BOT	8470.0	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	14:13:42	20090520	ECBOT	4.26
YM	1	BOT	8470.0	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	14:13:43	20090520	ECBOT	2.13
YM	1	SLD	8476.0	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	14:34:23	20090520	ECBOT	2.13
YM	1	SLD	8476.0	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	14:34:23	20090520	ECBOT	2.13
YM	1	SLD	8476.0	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	14:34:23	20090520	ECBOT	2.13
YM	3	BOT	8481.0	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	14:40:04	20090520	ECBOT	6.39
YM	3	BOT	8455.0	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	15:10:37	20090520	ECBOT	6.39
YM	3	SLD	8445.0	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	15:19:53	20090520	ECBOT	6.39
YM	3	BOT	8420.0	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	15:30:20	20090520	ECBOT	6.39
YM	2	SLD	8400.0	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	15:52:02	20090520	ECBOT	4.26
YM	1	SLD	8400.0	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	15:52:02	20090520	ECBOT	2.13
GS	5	BOT	10.50	JUN09 130.0 CALL Option GS FF	15:53:21	20090520	ISE	3.50
GS	2	BOT	10.50	JUN09 130.0 CALL Option GS FF	15:53:21	20090520	ISE	1.40
GS	3	BOT	10.50	JUN09 130.0 CALL Option GS FF	15:53:30	20090520	ISE	2.10

trades dow emini today

2009-05-14T16:40:00.003-04:00

Underlying	Action	Quantity	Description	Price	Time	Date	Exch.	Commission
STLD	SLD	30	MAY09 10.0 CALL Option RQLEB	1.45	09:34:24	20090514	CBOE	21.00
YM	SLD	3	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	8301.0	11:25:03	20090514	ECBOT	6.39
YM	BOT	3	JUN09 Futures YM JUN 09	8300.0	15:55:17	20090514	ECBOT	6.39

WOW...i love the futures...no daytrading restrictions on the number of trades i can make in a day....finally. very liquid. yesterday i traded the S&P 500 emini future and today the DOW 30 emini future. i have been reading up and researching on this stuff all day today. 2 drawbacks. contract price is 2.4 per contract per side approximately...which is well above .7 per stock option contract. despite the blabber you might read on the net, commission per trade in futures is much higher than stocks / stock options. 2nd - i am buying everything on margin. what rates am i paying?? and what does that amount to in dollar terms. i will look over reports this weekend and report :)

but, so far i'm rocking it. i made $15 on my YM trade, although i was down as much as 600 at one point. freaky volatility. double edged sword, but so far it's not as crazy as i thought it would be.

finally i trade ES.....WOW

2009-05-13T16:22:00.010-04:00

Underlying	Action	Quantity	Description	Price	Time	Date	Exch.	Commission
NUE	SLD	32	MAY09 45.0 PUT Option NUEQI	4.00	13:59:16	20090513	PSE	22.40
ES	SLD	1	JUN09 Futures ESM9	883.75	19:10:47	20090513	GLOBEX	2.40
ES	BOT	1	JUN09 Futures ESM9	883.00	19:12:43	20090513	GLOBEX	2.40
ES	SLD	3	JUN09 Futures ESM9	883.50	19:45:54	20090513	GLOBEX	7.20
ES	BOT	3	JUN09 Futures ESM9	883.00	19:51:43	20090513	GLOBEX	7.20
STLD	BOT	30	MAY09 10.0 CALL Option RQLEB	1.40	19:55:49	20090513	CBOE	21.00

trades

2009-05-12T16:20:00.003-04:00

don't really feel like blogging, but here are some trades.......

bought some POT

2009-04-15T17:38:00.004-04:00

sssshhhhh....don't tell the cops, see, i had a line .... wait a minute i bought puts on GS...damn i thought i had this killer line, i bought POT last week....and it did me no good. that's it i'm done with POT for ever now....never again am i touching that filthy....stock. hahaha. sigh. chuckle.

yup i bought some GS. bad buy again. should have waited a little bit more and right after i bought it i regreted it. way out of the money so that time decay is gonna eat me alive. what was i thinking. greed of course. also GS showed no weakness afterwards, even though the market did. tough draw.

it's all that filthy, swineish PDT law...worried about the number of trades i can execute...i would have sold otherwise...will sell first thing tomorrow.

of course, i am going out tonight. have been cooped up in my apt. for the last couple of days, ok well 2 days :) hopefully i will not go insane on the beer. plus, i slept at 5am yesterday. not partying. just couldn't sleep. saw a gem of a movie.

Un maledetto imbroglio (1959) by Pietro Germi. Now he's a master of his craft.

so tired

2009-04-14T16:17:00.005-04:00

i feel so tired these days. no energy. no oomph. it's either because i quit smoking or i just got old all of a sudden. probably a combination of both. so this lack of energy and the non stop nonsense of working in a room with other people took a big toll on my trading recently. i have to hide everything and i can't look at my charts in luxury or just stare at the tape. i was able to get back from the IBM fiasco to near even and then i went and stupidly bought POT.

what's even worse is my handling of the aftermath. in 3 days i managed to loose 11K. unbelievable. i had anticipated the worse case sceanrio for the next day also. i thought we might gap up $2, in which case i'll liquidate at the open and take the hit. unfortunately, i have been drinking a whole lot more lately. like every other day i get drunk and that was one of those days. but, even after that i wouldn't listen to my conscience. i kept thinking to myself collapse this trade...under 85 is still not bad. but, nooooooooo.....i held it over the weekend and watched it rise to 88.5....today with all the bad news and carnage, it was one of the few stocks that went up.

that's the death knell...you know ur fucked when the market goes down and your stock goes up and stays up. i can't tell you how bad i felt in the morning. i wanted to cry. by the afternoon, emotionally i was sucked dry. like a french prisoner about to be guillitoined, i went out and looked at the sky. fuck it. end of the day and it's still at 89. sell at 3. 30 secs to close and i'm liquid again. i just don't care anymore.

i got beaten bad on this one. but, the worst part is. i don't even feel like trading anymore. my parents, all the haters who said day trading is gambling won...i've lost my passion. now, i'm back to being a normal 9 to 5'er. i'll probably end up a fat, alcoholic, do nothing all day fuck, stuck in a dusty government cubicle for the rest of my pathetic miserable life, until i retire and have to move to butt fuck West Virginia, because i have no money.

when i get to 50, i'm definitely buying a gun. no way i'm going out like a dog.

on point, but no action

2009-04-08T17:51:00.003-04:00

gone are the days of mad volatility. i still remember November, what a bear fest. i was making money hand over fist, left and right, all you had to do was go short. why in the hell did i ever listen to my parents and try to get a job !

i was in early today. sipping my hot chocolate, watching the market. i wanted to go short. i thought there was still some weakness from yesterday to shake out...but overall i still felt we were in a rally mode. GS was weak. other names were okay. i just couldn't see a low risk trade. meh. i had a meeting at 10 am anyway. meeting spilled over. had to go give my car for repairs. went to mexican for lunch.

i come back, there's been a nice rally. the dip down in the morning had been a fake out. unfortunately, the rally was already starting to break. i wanted to short IBM, but meh again. i felt the day would end flattish. there really was no trade.

now here's where i fucked up. what i really wanted to do was a quick scalp on POT. the kind of stuff i used to do back in the day. in and out with a couple hundred bucks profit. 200, 300, hell even 100, it's all good. but, my brain these days thinks more like a swing trader and i fucked up. i didn't watch the tape closely enough. didn't take the small profits when i had the chance. and ended up with an overnight which i totally didn't want.

why? cause POT is really volatile. my position risk is 20 puts, rather than a more manageable 10. we are still in a bull rally. it stayed strong through close. plus, the chart like the market is neutral. we could see a huge gap up or down tomorrow. only thing in my favor, is that hopefully the market will be indecisive tomorrow, swing around and let me offload this position.

so here's the lesson. make up your mind. what kind of a trade is this. Day trade or Swing trade. don't fucking switch them around.

now i need some beer. but not too much.

tuesday was good

2009-04-08T17:04:00.004-04:00

i had a mad hangover on tuesday morning, when i woke around 11:30pm....we had gotten the pullback we so desperately needed on IBM...it had dipped to 88.5 and then rebounded. crap. the market looked depressed. i figured i had time to get to work and then game it from there.

i thought the market would go down till the close and i was partly close. the market trended down and then flattened out. particularly, in IBM's case, it wouldn't go down below 88.5. i watched the tape for a long time, but i saw that there was support there, so i sold 20 of the puts for 6.9 and held on to 10. it spiked to 89.3 and i thought yikes, but then it sold downwards to the close. i sold right at the close for 6.8. you have to trade options for a long time to gauge sell levels so well. things get illiquid at the close, but i got lucky.

even though it was a loss overall, it was not so bad, and i am very glad that i'm liquid.

still holding onto IBM puts

2009-04-06T16:14:00.004-04:00

i thought it might break big, because it's not buying Sun, which is a kick ass company with a lot of good technology that IBM could use. But, they play it safe. The stock showed okay strength. Today it traded with the market, i.e. it was slightly weak, but there was no huge break to say 98, based on the dip in the futures this morning. sigh!

i still like it's chart. a lot of stocks are trading mid 2007 prices now and these i must say are decent prices. i would be bargain picking here and banking and real estate would be my first choices, not tech, especially not IBM which is just $18 ducks away from it's all time high. YES, 120 or whereabouts i think.

if there is a break in the market, this thing is going downtown and my target is 98....which gives us maybe 7.5 and a breakeven....although i had a sell for 6.8 the whole day today, just on the off chance.

i've been double thinking a lot about this stock, and that is both good and bad. you can never be too cautious. the only bad part is that statistically speaking, almost every time i hold options over 2-3 days, i end up losing money. almost 97% of the time.

i'm watching like a hawk, but fingers crossed.

hold the line

2009-04-03T16:17:00.002-04:00

no trades today.

barely even looked at the market. saw that it wasn't going anywhere and needed the rest anyway. will tackle IBM on Monday...need a pullback to get rid of this fucker.

beer, beer and more beer.

shitty day

2009-04-02T16:13:00.006-04:00

BOT 10 IBM Option APR09 105 PUT IBMPA $6.30 ISE(USD) 10:17:02 GMT-0400 on Thu, 02 Apr 2009

yesterday evening, finished a bottle of wine. head said stop. cook some food. heart said go out. keep on drinking. nice time at the bar though. it was empty. only Bill. and then some asshole black air force guy. and then a black chick. i blacked out in the middle of our conversation. don't know how the night ended. i saw in the trash that i had cooked some ramen soup. i didn't smoke. didn't even bum one from Bill.

my internet got cut off. i had been paying the bills intermittently. last time i paid it was $400. i looked at a bill finally. they had bumped me from $60 a month to $140. the wooing period was over. they charged me some outrageous sums of money. i calculated that i had blown $1200 due to laziness. basically, i couldn't see the futures in the morning and was unprepared for the strong open.

got in at 9:30 am. market up strongly. ibm up 2. damn. i should sell ibm. this day has the makings of a very strong rally. i don't do anything. i'm not really in the mood to trade. a litte while later, i see some weakness in GS. the financials are done. rest of the market is playing catchup. i short some more IBM. it will all work out.

in the afternoon, IBM peaked at 102. +4 ducks. just what i thought earlier. tomorrow should be interesting. might have to hold this till next week.

RIMM just came out with earnings. up +10 AH. IBM up +1.17. crap. more fuel for the fire. if i collapse this now, i'm back to square one. all gains for this week evaporated.

no energy. need to rest up.

april fool's day

2009-04-01T16:20:00.003-04:00

sadly, i could think of no tom foolery...trading sapped all my creative juices.

market/IBM opened down. i should have sold instantly, but thinking of my GS sell from yesterday i hesitated and IBM ran up 1.5 in like 3 min's. i was totally bummed out...thinking should i sell for a loss. partly, new people in my office were to blame. but, then luckily, IBM dived back down to the open prices and this time i did not hesitate. got out of 20 at the lows of the day. phew and good trading.

rest of the day, i watched the rally. it looked strong...would there be a selloff. i was tempted by GS, but thankfully resisted. i decided to rework my IBM short. i am already comfortable with the price action on it for now. i shorted around 97.5 my old levels around 2:30pm, so not so bad...i was hoping for a correction starting around 3pm. there was one, but not big enough and i decided to hold overnight.

i am over 25K now, but i want to build a base before i agressively day trade. anyway with all these people in my room, i can barely think, much less concentrate for something as risky as lightning fast day trading. sigh. it's like i am working two jobs. i don't mind the tech aspects of my job, but hiding my screen from people and having to listen to their inane office politics posturing gets on my nerves. oh well, for now i have to deal with it.

market is still fragile, but we could be in for a very sharp rally. i will probably collapse my current IBM short early tomorrow morning. Fri. is unemployment numbers, but they shrugged off ADP today, so you never know.

how to get around the Pattern Day Trader (PDT) designation

2009-03-31T18:10:00.005-04:00

as we discussed a couple of posts earlier the Pattern Day Trader (PDT) rule has caused quite a lot of grief in my life. and i suspect many a other trader has suffered under the insanity of this abomination foisted on us by an idiotic SEC.

so recently i was PDT'ed again and because I was worried about just such an occurence I had been doing research on how to get around it. Below, are some thoughts on the various mechanism's found on the net. all legal ofcourse.

1. To the best of my knowledge, PDT applies to all the following trades. stock buy/sell, stock options buy/sell, futures buy/sell, futures options buy/sell. i am not sure about currency or commodities trades. but, frankly you can't trade those two without a fairly large account. 100K++.

2. Open an account with a brokerage based overseas. There are 2 problems with this. I could not find a single decent brokerage outside of the USA, which had a nice internet front end and fairly cheap trades. I checked out UBS, Australian brokerages, etc....but, nothing good. This might work though. Except, when I tried UBS, which is Swiss, the moment they knew i was an US citizen, they funneled me to their USA offices. So, that didn't work out. I gotta check out Japanese brokerages though.

3. Go through a proprietary trading firm which sets up a shell account in their name, but with whatever level of capital you bring. i don't think you can trade their capital, except on exhorbitant margin rates. plus they charge all types of fees and here's the worst part they take a % of your gains. but not your losses. stay away from them.

4. OK, HERE IS THE BEST WAY TO GET AROUND THIS. open two trading accounts with different firms. in one trade only as a daytrader, i.e. with net worth over 25K. in the other trade with the daytrading rules in mind. So that way, if you get over 25K, you wire the funds from one firm to another and now you can happily day trade away. and if you dip below 25K, no problem wire the money to your daytrading restricted account in the other firm and you're all set to go. the only bad part, is the wire cost, about $50 max and the delay in moving funds around. but, hell that's barely a day.

NOTE: I don't absolutely know for sure that this will work. I have already opened another account, but for now i will soon be over 25K (hopefully) and IB is my primary broker. I really honestly don't think your previous trading history is available outside of one firm, so they really don't know if you are a daytrader or not. so basically, even if you are pegged as a daytrader at one brokerage, the other doesn't know about it. unless they transmit the info. to the SEC and it retransmits it back down. and i can't imagine the SEC being that on point :)

so, there you have it. my thought's on how to escape the PDT designation.

oh btw, here is another way to get around this, but it is so whack...it worked for me though. i got designated a PDT about 2 / 3 months ago. the rule say's you can get one reset only in about 180 days. so i got a reset. then i got redesignated and i said WTF i'll ask them to reset it again. AND IT WORKED. they reset my account a second time. maybe they don't keep track of the resets. maybe they just don't care. maybe 2 months is too long a time for them. they sure like my commissions of course :)

SEC ABOLISH THE PDT RULE, u nitwits ;p

whack day

2009-03-31T17:53:00.005-04:00

as you know i was long GS and X and when i checked in the morning...the futures were up, fairly nicely. but, i didn't like it. i was worried about the downside. i thought it was a setup. i usually compute sell level, but maybe it was the hangover or that i needed to get to work at some point, but i didn't compute crap. i just sold at the open. i was more worried about GS and sold that first and then got rid of X. i should have done the opposite, because GS went on a massive tear for the rest of the day...up over 6 ducks...i left a lot on the table. but, i don't have any regrets about that because the action for the whole day was pretty illogical...i thought definitely we needed a rally, some bounce back and that would have been around 100 points on the DOW, but GS closed it's entire gap, i.e., it went from 108 to 101 and then back to 108....it only sold off some at the close. that made no sense to me. i wanted to short it at 106, luckily i didn't. it was a scary market.

i did however, create a minor faux paus...before i left for work, my conviction for the downside was such that i shorted IBM around 96. actually it was a level i had computed from the day before. so i get to work and crap IBM is at 97.5...there goes my theory. the market was tepid but GS and IBM were blazing. the rest of my screen was pretty limp. weird. around midday i bought some more IBM puts...i wanted to average down and this really felt like a fake out rally. no way would i value IBM at 98. fuck that.

IBM held up pretty good for the rest of the day. it and GS cracked at the close, so no i am about break even, but tomorrow is critical. the market is overall at a balance right now, with some stocks like GS and IBM overbought...so we could go in any direction tomorrow. i might be out of this trade fairly quickly although back to 94 would be nice.

two pretty girls are playing catch ball in the park below my office. how nice. spring is finally here. i have to go home and do taxes. fuck. merde.

first let's catch up on the trades

2009-03-31T17:23:00.006-04:00

as you can see from a couple posts back, i finally got out of GS, which was a terrible trade, but overall my equity was not so bad. only thing was i was stuck with the PDT designation and i was thinking of ways to get around it. finally, i thought that why not ask them to reset my account again. i didn't think it would work, since they just reset it like 3 months ago and the rules require 180 days in between. but, somehow it worked and they reset my account. it took a frustrating amount of time though, with some very juicy opportunities just waiting to be had.

anyhoo...on Friday my account was reset. i could trade again. straight away i wanted to scalp something / anything...it would waste one of my day trades...but i wanted something warm and wet hanging from my belt. (wtf, is he talking about?)

i shorted 20 IBM near the end of the day, because it was one of those days, where things just keep on going down and always close badly. unfortunately, IBM did not follow the script and i now had an overnight on my hand. and a bad one at that. huge down day and i'm short, going into the weekend. oy vey.

luckily, Obama slammed GM and the futures were very solidly down on Monday. i had a hangover and didn't want to be greedy, so i sold right at the open...and that was the lowest IBM went that day. after that it went straight up, even though the market was tanking. i thought about shorting it at close, but thought it still had strength and quite wisely decided to give it another day.

some very nice duckage on that....check the trades :)

like i said, IBM kept going up even though the market was tanking badly. around midday i shorted IBM again...but it was unnaturally strong and fluctuating around like mad, so i sold for a small gain...and very wisely too, because a couple of minutes later, IBM jumped up big and kept up going up from there.

i thought the market was oversold into the close and i bought some X, based purely on it's 13% decline and at the last moment went long GS as well. it was beaten down a lot for no reason, but i was worried about it...it was near 100, a break point.

unfortunately, i thought Monday was a Tuesday and went and got drunk again. Fucking quitting smoking is gonna make me an alcoholic :) we'll see !

sorry for all this delay

2009-03-31T17:07:00.002-04:00

i just haven't felt like blogging for the past week or so...plus i'm trying to quit smoking, which is going fairly well, except that i am drinking way more now...anyway here are some posts for you...cause my trading has been going well.

the aftermath

2009-03-27T17:27:00.007-04:00

well, as you can see after the GS fiasco, i was severely, well not depressed, but certainly disenchanted with my performance. how could i screw up so much !!! i needed some time out to think over things and to heal. also , i wanted to watch this latest rally, to see what i could learn from it. there were some technical aspects which needed to be studied at leisure.

however, an even bigger problem has been looming on my daytrading amitions...it's the mother fucking Pattern Day Trader (PDT) rule.

this rule created by the SEC, stipulates that if you make more than 3 day trades in a 5 business day period, you are a pattern day trader (PDT) and need to have at least $25K equity in your account. this equity can be a combination of stocks and cash, but the amount is at least 25K, with brokerages having the ability to set this level even higher but never lower.

1. the real reason for the PDT rule is to protect brokerages which lend to traders on margin. The SEC saw that brokerages were lending traders 2 to 4 times leverage which when used with risky positions, like naked shorts, writing calls/puts, could lead to rapid losses, the decimation of the entire position, and in fact put the fucking brokerage in hock for your position.

THE FUNNY THING ABOUT THIS IS THAT THEY REGULATED YOU, THE SMALL TIME TRADER, WHEN WALL STREET WAS LEVERAGING 10 to 20 ON EVEN RISKIER INSTRUMENTS....the irony here is unbelievable.

So, basically they said have $25K in your account, so that there was some cushion for the losses.

BUT, the whole problem is margin...DON"T ALLOW MARGIN and the whole problem is MOOT....but not in our lobbyist oriented congress...the brokerages MAKE MAD MONEY ON LEVERAGE, on any given day they are lending millions at 5-8%...allowing rampant and systemic SPECULATION.

Here's some common myths about this rule which i would like to debunk (since i have been researching it for months now):

1. it was created to protect you, John Doe the helpless public -- bullshit -- this rule has the opposite effect, since it doesn't allow you to trade with smaller amounts and learn from experience, but instead makes you save 25K, which then causes all kinds of stress and panic. Case in point, take me, i have flirted with this level many times and many times i'm thinking more about this level of funds than my position, worried if i go lower, i can't trade. it really shouldn't be a factor in trading at all.

2. the poor brokerages have to be saved -- i don't disagree -- but, this problem was solved long ago...the good brokerages just didn't allow you to trade risky positions on margin. simple. want to buy calls or puts, no margin, have the cash. 0 risk for the brokerage. now for more complex positions....firstly they were disallowing margin...however, for some of these types of trades...for eg, shorting a stock is net debit transaction for your account...basically you sold something you didn't even have...stock goes down...good all around...stock goes up, now your account is going negative...since there is no limit to how much a stock can go up, it can eat up your account and then the brokerage is on the hook.

however, brokerages hate to lose money and long ago, they put severe restrictions by themselves on these types of trades. perhaps pre 2000 the technology was not quite there, but i know that the last couple of years, most good brokerages have real time monitoring of your credit situation. that is they let you short, tell you how much losses you can suffer for your account before they liquidate your position. and they are very conservative....i have only written naked calls or puts a handful of times, because the margin requirements for these transactions are very severe.

just to be fair, here is the only scenario the PDT will work...you are in a risky position, very close to be being called by your brokerage, i.e. being collapsed out of the position by them, and the trading day is over. now you have an overnight. a plane could hit the headquarters of your company, the US could go to war, Brad Pitt could go back to Jennifer Aniston, Bernanke lowers the Fed rate to -1 %...haha...oh my i have so many more of these...but basically your position could get blown out of the water....and next day you can't cover and the brokerage now loses money.

this kind of price movement overnight is very rare, especially over one stock and in any case the margin's are usually calculated with 15%-20% price volaitility in mind....something which was never done with mortgage loans, or the CDO's (collateralized debt obligation) based on the loans or the CDS (credit default swaps) based on the CDO's.

and here they are regulating us little fish Patter Day Traders...like us with our chewing gum money are going to wreck the financial system. HOW IRONIC !!!

so the PDT sucks...read the next post on ways to beat it and my own current experience with it :)

anatomy of a meltdown

2009-03-19T11:51:00.005-04:00

well i've done it again...gone from a Hero to a Zero !!!

here's how the meltdown happened. last week the much anticipated, at least by me, rally finally came. we made handsome profits on our BNI longs. we left a bunch on the table, because frankly i just don't follow trends too well. i jump around too much. also, because a lot of this rally is gov. meddling driven, not just fundamentals, and as such i really think it's getting to be over blown. anyhoo...

so on the first day of the rally, i went short GS. bad move. should have sold it the next day. didn't. shorted some more. should have sold that. didn't. end of the day i have a massive position in GS. looking at the charts it's looking bad. financials are rallying. i had some few chances to sell. take the hit, my head said. i couldn't pull the plug. net equity went from 38K to 32K to 26K...last chance, day trader status going underwater...didn't do it. it was horrible. my net equity went down to 18, then to 12K. i was so depressed. the weekend was one big bloodbath of drinking.

on monday i came to my senses. GS was supposed to report earnings on Tuesday. i thought they would be good. if good, i would have no money left, these puts would go to near zero. i'm not taking any chances. better to have something, rather than nothing. luckily, GS started going down Monday and i saw that it would continue going down for the rest of the day. i sold all of them around 4. not a bad sell...i was worried about any last minute jump ups.

the aftermath, they didn't report earnings. don't know why. no news on that. they went down just a little bit more the next day in the morning and then a massive reversal. i sold on monday and since then they have broken 100 conclusively. my puts would have been worthless. thank you GOD>, u saved my worthless ass.

PHEW !!!

the lord giveth...the lord taketh

2009-03-11T16:02:00.006-04:00

it's funny but whenever i fuck up i start thinking about GOD> and i couldn't have fucked up any more royally than i did today. a.) i didn't collapse my GS short yesterday, even though it was running like a rocket in a screaming up market, b.) i didn't collapse it first thing this morning (actually i tried, but it ran up 2 ducks in 30 secs, it is near impossible to see or react to such runs...i could have collapsed it then, but i dreamt it would go lower at some point...dream me a river :), c.) i shorted GS some more at 10 am for a short short trade, then got distracted and didn't sell for a small profit and watched it run away some more...basically the story of the day...GS running away. fucker.

anyhoo, i scalped it a little in the middle of the day, but the rest of the day i was out of it. i had a GOLDEN chance to collapse my earlier 10 am trades for small losses. my scalps would have covered that. then i could have reshorted GS at much higher levels, cause i could see that it wasn't going to die today...costly mistake.

now, i can only hope that GS goes down to 90 at some point. or AIG could file for bankruptcy :))

to distract me i will watch a foreign movie tonight. or cry.

great day for bulls

2009-03-10T16:23:00.005-04:00

it was a great day for bulls. the rally we had been waiting for the last week, finally arrived.

when i checked the futures in the morning and saw them up 100, i had a feeling we would get a killer day. mentally i set my BNI call sell levels for 53.5 / 54. unfortunately, i was in a meeting all day and that distracted me so, that i sold early. the people next to me must have been wondering what's with all the charts. i left at least 2 points on 4k shares = 8k down the drain and all i had to do was watch a fucking computer screen all day. it would have been that easy ;/.

i scalped GS for some cash in between, other than that, the meeting consumed me. it was one of those days where after the initial runup there is very little move to the up or down side. the day is mostly done. i shorted GS in the afternoon, when it was up around 14%. i could have collapsed the trade later, but got too greedy. later it ran away from me...so i am kinda worried. GS is fairly oversold and that fucker can move. i will sell it ASAP tomorrow on any weakness. oh, i also shorted X for a low volatility end of the day (EOD) play.

otherwise, it was a great day. great profits. some beers are in order :)

slow day

2009-03-09T23:25:00.006-04:00

woke up late, had a hangover, since i am trying to quit smoking, so i didn't feel like trading, but i still kept on checking the charts / prices, because i am a pro. and finally around 3:20, i got a good feel for the market. unfortunately, it said go short, but the market was already down and i just wasn't feeling it. i wanted to go long, which i did on BNI. not the best entry price on the first buy, but i thought it might spike at the end of the day, which it didn't.

i am holding a very large position as you can see and i have butterflies in my stomach. i feel fairly confident, but the tape action has been pretty negative for some time now. too many people are expecting the short term pop. anyway, tomorrow's a new day. it sucks that i have an all day meeting. it's like every critical day, i have work related shit blocking me.

if i was as good at macking chicks as i am trading...

2009-03-06T16:38:00.004-05:00

i would be FUCKING BRAD PITT !!!

look at my trades. serously, look at them ;-/

the sell on my BNI longs was put in the system the night before...i hit it on the head...only a differential of .25 from the absolute top....how awesome is that ?/

i got back to work and looked at my quote station and it was a sea of red....my heart sank...i looked at the BNI graph and saw that it had gapped up at open...feverishly, i checked my trades executed window...LA LA LALA !!

the market tanked the rest of the day. due to my massive profits on BNI, i am now once again a full fledged DAY TRADER. yay!

i bought some BNI longs in the afternoon and to test / flex my day trader muscles...i entered into a quasi irrational GS long. i made money on both and collapsed them both, since now that i am a DAY TRADER, i don't need to take the unnecessary risk of holding over weekends.

2 weeks to options expiration this month....get ready to kick ass...cue techno !!!!!!

jammin...but not so jammin'

2009-03-05T16:48:00.007-05:00

like i said yesterday, my gut feeling was yelling long, but i was short BNI at the close of the day, with a bad strike price and not the best buy levels. so i was kind of sweating it yesterday night, but when i woke up this morning and checked my computer, surprise surprise, the futures were down quite a bit.

i wasn't sure why, but i didn't want to hold on to my shorts and sold them straight away at the open, although i didn't get the best open prices, but i mean BNI gapped down over $2...which is quite a lot and i thought don't be greedy. then i dressed up and zoomed to work.

i get to work and the whole market is tanking bad. GM is dead, which is the official excuse. but all traders knew that GM had been dead for a while. i don't know why, but the market went down hard and it stayed down hard all day. very little chop. just downward trajectory. i had a feeling we would retest the lows one more time, before we went higher and i think this day was it. should i have held on to my BNI's ? honestly, i didn't expect such a big day down on large volume and no big reversals of any kind. very surprising.

so, being the dolt that i am, i decided to go long. usually on such major drops i wait for the end of the day to enter...but, i broke the rule and bought BNI calls around 11 and then some more just a few minutes later (that's a big trader's no-no) and bought some more 2 hours later. basically, i used up my whole account to buy BNI calls. how do you spell BAD MOVE ;/

actually, i am not too worried...stocks generally held up much better than the index's point drops show. i bought BNI pretty near the bottom and the last hour's action was OK...it didn't gap down a couple of points on me. and i'm still feeling LONG...this is bullshit overselling...i just hope i have the balls to hold this position for longer than a day...but i doubt that :)

the only bad news is that i have to travel for work tomorrow and will be out of action from 10-11 atleast...peak hours. i really wanted to watch the opening tape...because, you know what we say, fuck gut feeling...the TAPE is GOD> or this may be GOD>'s way of telling me something......HELP !!!

i'm really starving for some low down, smoky, drinky, fun :p

i'm back

2009-03-04T16:13:00.008-05:00

ok like (toss my black hair) i thought this blog was a waste to time, nobody reads it and i just blabber on and on anyways....it's not like i post any useful trading ideas or thoughts....or atleast i don't try to....haha....but then i got an email from these ad's people and they had 150 hits from my pages....so naturally i was impressed....my other blabbering sites rarely break 2-3 a day. so i decided to continue the good work and keep on posting.

as for the TRADING...i never STOPPPEDD.....and i've been kicking ass. i started out with 50K got decimated to 3k and have resurrected it from the ashes of November to 25 K. I KICK ASS, SEROUSLY>

basically, i have been shorting stocks, but a couple of longs in there also. the main thing that has changed about me is my willingness to cut loose my dogs. if a position runs against me i watch double intently and close it as soon as possible, even for a loss. before i would hold on hoping for dear hope it would come back. no more. just a few days ago, my MON long got crushed overnight...in the morning futures were down 100+ on the dow and i thought it would get crushed....and sold a few minutes into the open. i just didn't want to take the risk. better to lose 2K than lose 4K and frankly when i am well tuned into the market i can easily make 2K in a day. so i don't hold on to the dogs anymore.

today was a good day....i had gone long yesterday, because i felt everything was oversold and i bought right at the end of the day for seriously killer prices. even so i was stressed last night....the selling pressure is insane right now. i get to work, check the stat's....HOORAY....futures up big time....i calculate sell levels, decide to sell at the open, i was afraid of the fade, and thought if the fade ain't that bad, i can re-enter my long's.....i was bullish about the day.....so i get good sells at the open, 9:32 for X and 9:36 for BNI and i'm LIQUID....how's that for fast trading !

rest of the day i spent watching the market. i felt things overall would go long, but was so afraid of the afternoon drop, i ended up not buying anything. because my account is still under 25K, i only had one trade for the day.....otherwise you know how i play the chop....so i have to double think everything. i really wasn't feeling it, but like a bonehead i shorted 20 BNI at 56.75 at 1:19pm....jesus christ an afternoon trade....before 2pm....what an amateur trade. BNI went up $1 duck for the rest of the day and ended the day back at my entry price. actually, i really didn't like this trade at all and i am still feeling long inclined....i wanted to get rid of it, but also i didn't want to waste my day trade....near the close it was fluttering right around my buy level....i set it to sell for what i bought it for....it was very close, but nobody took my bait....WTF, i'll just hold it overnight, if i take a hit, i take a hit. fuck it.

i pray to the futures god's to be kind to me, and give me an intial drop or even better for some european bank to go belly up or some other kind of human misery to crush the stock markets.....wicked aren't i ;p

exciting yet confusing day

2009-01-23T17:11:00.004-05:00

i was really looking forward to trading today. i am on a under 25K capital restriction, where i can only do 3 day trades in 5 trading days. that's because i lost a lot of money :) but i am building it back. one step at a time. it's frustrating in that before i went in and out of positions really, really fast. you get good enough at it, you can make $500 easy on these wide volatility moves and all those add up. now, i have to double think my positions and i try to maximize my return, which causes problems such as today (more about that later). also, now i try to do more over night's, which don't count as day trades, but are riskier overall. that's why i haven't traded for the last 3 trading sessions.

in any case, i was so excited, that i didn't go to sleep till 6:30 am. i know, i'm crazy. the alarm rang at 8:30 am and i was way too tired and i decided to trade later in the afternoon. i only had one day trade for the day anyway, so it didn't really matter. i woke in the afternoon. the morning had been way oversold, so a nice rally was developing, yet i didn't really believe in it and decided to short either IBM or AAPL. i calculated buy levels and waited and waited and in all that waiting i got kinda confused and finally bought IBM but not at the best levels. it happens. you second guess yourself to death over time. sometimes, my best trades happen when i just decide on a buy/sell level quickly. second guessing is just killer. get the big picture and just make a play. quit it if it goes against you. easier said than done.

the buy is not too bad. 2:30 pm market is tanking....lalala...i turn on the music, light a cigarette and am prancing around. now based on analysis i had set a sell level earlier of a +1 profit, which i thought was reasonable. IBM was close to it about 30 cents off. so i'm prancing about and all of a sudden it goes down that 30 and i have my sell level. but, what do i do, i get greedy and wait some more. it goes back up 30 and after that it never comes down to that level again for the rest of the afternoon. so basically, i got greedy, ignored my sell level, which was superbly calculated and so lost out on an easy 1 K. fuck. merde. i cursed myself for the rest of the hour.

i could have sold for a + .5 profit...but IBM is showing weakness, so i will hold over the weekend. which i hate doing, due to time decay. oh well, at least my day trade was not wasted and i can now use it next week. and IBM may well tank. CAT is reporting Monday and that should suck. but, i am fearful of a rally. it could come anytime. creep up on ya.

i try not to use too many "but's" in my sentences, but that's trading...nothing is concrete, everything has a fucking "butt".

it's friday. i guess i'll go and get drunk, but it would have been way more fun with that little profit under my belt.

eventful friday

2009-01-22T23:37:00.003-05:00

RECAP OF FRIDAY the 16th's trading:

i woke up early and went to murky coffee house. C and BAC had reported, but AH they were up. i thought the results were bad for both, but who knows. I was short GS. GS was up by about 2 dollars from where i bought it and many times till 10 a.m. i almost sold it. it just wouldn't break and was just swinging back and forth and my heart was in my mouth and i thought that any moment now it will break up massively. but then around 11:00 am it broke nicely and i was able to sell. i left over $3 on the table also, the break was quite extreme. but, i was glad to be out of it.

i then lazed around and watched the tape, looking for opportunities to go long. i went long SPY and took a double position...RISKY ! but i felt good and had quite a bit of profit for the week, so i thought what the hell. good call.

i sold the SPY's when i thought the tape was going weak and went short RIMM. bad decision, because RIMM had massive strength behind it based on the AAPL steve job's health story. i didn't realize that completely. market never really broke, but on other stocks i would have made a small profit...on RIMM i took a -1 loss. could have been less, but i held till the close. sold at 3:59:41.....phew, huh!!!

those options expired that day and i don't know what would have happened if i hadn't sold. probably my trading company wouldn't have given me the best prices on it's execution.

good week. drank too much coffee. should have gone for lunch....will work on that. it's good to relax the mind.

dismal week is turning out good

2009-01-15T23:01:00.003-05:00

the dismal part is in lamentation for my IBM loss. it's done. i'm over it.

as you know, my GS puts were looking very good last night. the only question was at what level to sell them. i'm thinking 70% gain, dream of 100%, but nah that won't happen. in the morning i dilly-dally in my bed. i'm pretty sure the market's are gonna go down and i want to give them some time. the bottom's usually around 10-10:30 and probably for this day they will go down for some time. the sun is shining on my face. i'm half dozing, kinda worried. my phone rings. it's a job recruiter. it's 10 a.m. bless him. he woke me up at the perfect time.

i run to my computer. quick look at the indices. carnage. i log in feverishly. i take one look at the quote and hit the sell button. 100% return. no if's, and's or but's. i don't even think. i don't care where it goes from here. that's an instant sell. thank you GOD>

so i sit there watching and it's going lower. i'm thinking things have to bounce. i want to buy the calls right away, but i do due diligence. check the news, other stock quotes. i come back and it's gone up a little. pull back a little bit for me sweety. it's so close to my buy price. i don't get my price. fuck it. i'm not going to risk it. i am going back to bed, with my 100% gain and no worries hanging over my head.

i wake up in the afternoon and things are going back up. strong. the whole day would have been good for daytrading. it went up, then down and then a strong up. it was 1:30 pm and i quickly decided that the rest of the day needed to be spent at Murky coffee house. 2 hours of bliss coming up. that is if watching the tape turns you on.

it's frigging freezing out there. i get coffee. two cute college girls sitting across from me. they're organizing their future. how cute.

it's too late for me to participate in the rally. and i don't like it anyway. i've seen days like this before. i'm ready to short. i calculate various price levels for GS. 76 is heavy resistence. 76.5 is optimal. high from last day. highly unlikely it rallies past that point. i get in at 75.8.

that's the hard part. now sit back and watch the tape. it only came close to 75.8 once, rest of the time, it just trended lower. i calculated sell levels. watched like a hawk. swooped. nice. +2 points.

it trended lower for a little bit more. then it jammed higher and i shorted it again at close. C's reporting tomorrow and it's not going to be good. their management sucks, board sucks, assets suck. i'm a little uneasy, but what the hell. no guts, no glory.

AH, the news is mixed. BAC moved up it's earnings date to tomorrow morning. and it seems they will be getting more money. TARP II passed. it's a mixed bag.

it's 11:55 pm and i am going to get a late night beer. need to clear my head. relax a little. sleep. tomorrow is going to be another fun day.

sold IBM bought GS

2009-01-15T19:52:00.006-05:00

Overview of Wednesday the 14th's trading

as you know my IBM puts were sucking. i am a day trader, if i am holding a security for over 2 days it's a real bad sign. IBM had crossed the 2 weeks mark. at this point i just couldn't tell what it's future was. monday and tuesday of options expiration week, were whipsaw. as told in the last post IBM showed some unusual strength in the face of overall market decline, so i was really worried. wednesday, the news in the financial sector was really bad and i thought things would go bad all day. i am watching the tape in the morning and IBM is down a dollar, but it's dithering around and i said "screw this" and sold it at 6.1. i bought at 7.5. i went back to bed disgusted.

in the afternoon i check the quotes and not 5 minutes after i sold, IBM went down in a straight line. in less than 10 minutes it was at 82.3. i would have sold at 7 or 7.5 or if i was really on point for a small profit. i was so mad. don't get me wrong, i made the right decision, the trade had gone sour. in such cases you always collapse at the first chance you get. but, it was terrible bad luck. if it had gone down with the market on Monday, i would have held, but that spooked me. trust me, there are market manipulators out there and you don't want to fight them.

i watched the tape all afternoon to fine tune my skills. did lots of research and thinking. i was thinking about going long, particularly AAPL, but the fact that JPM was about to report was weighing on me. C and BAC were getting decimated too. at the last moment i decided i didn't want to go long and went short GS. actually i had bids out for both of them and GS just got hit first.

thank GOD, i didn't get AAPL. steve jobs is dying or about to die and apparantly he's the entire fucking company. how can you invest in a stock, when one man is the sole reason to buy it. anyway, AAPL tanked after hours (AH). and guess what BAC tanked AH as well. they went to the gov. for $10 billion more. lalala .... all the financials are getting killed.

conservative calculations show i might return an easy 70% on my GS short. thank you GOD>

horrible IBM won't die

2009-01-12T17:48:00.003-05:00

well folks the tuesday before christmas on the 30th we (i really) bought IBM puts....well christmas was day off, thurs. was uneventful and friday, well let's just say friday has been the last chance since then for me to sell my puts at a profit. so i am watching the tape intently, and IBM was at the point of cracking, i had like .3 on it and it just wouldn't crack and i thought also i should get rid of this....i don't like the way it's just holding on and at 3:30 there was a huge rally and ibm spiked up over 1.5 in minutes....well actually it dwadled at break even point for me for a couple of minutes....zoom up one dollar and by close up another .5 ...... www.wtf.com

i had a feeling something bad was gonna happen and it did and i was caught with my pants down. it was a really tough call though, the volume has been very light since late Nov., even as i write now in mid. Jan....volatility been really low also.....it was a very tough call to sell and i didn't make it.

the aftermath is easier....ibm went up like a rocket for the next week, i stopped looking at the quote, finally late last week i started tracking it again....friday had a chance to sell at 5.5, but i still think this is a dog and that the market would go down today, i.e. Monday.

well, i was right about the market going down today, i saw the tape in the morning and it was screaming sell sell sell of everything. i could have closed my eyes, picked a stock, gone short and made money. on some, very good money. guess, the one stock that i track which went up and up....fking IBM....i've checked all the sites that i know of and there is no news. if ever you thought of people or unknown entities manipulating stocks, this was a poster child for that day. there was no reason, zero, nada, zip for IBM to go so strongly +1.5 and stay up for most of the day. none. i don't give a shit that their earnings are a week away....they are going to suck and this crapper is gonna break 80 for sure, but for now some unknown, unseen forces are pumping this higher.

i am still short, but tomorrow is critical....at this point i am willing to take a 2 point loss (ouch yes) and watch from the sidelines. there's other chickens to pluck.

wrap up of holiday season trading

2008-12-30T19:13:00.005-05:00

i had tried to get rid of STLD over the holiday week, but missed both my slender chances at +.4 profit, first by sleep and second by phone call. volume was very low so it was very hard to watch the tape go nowhere.

i woke up on Monday of New Year's week, determined to sell it and unfortunately there was a very weak rally and i thought everything would go down and so sold it for a measly +.2, but you take what you get and things did go down.

at the end of the day, i thought RIMM was oversold and bought it for an overnite, since volatility is so low these days, the danger is not so much and was able to sell it today for modest gains, didn't go up as high as i thought. GS was the real screecher, but i didn't see any of that, i should have shorted NUE or SPY for a small profit intraday, but went with IBM, which didn't really die and i didn't sell and late in the day it went up .5 against my position. damnation !! but atleast now i can play it as an overnite and not a daytrade when i make my profit on it tomorrow....hopefully.

relaxed christmas monday

2008-12-22T21:43:00.004-05:00

i woke up late and by the time i was sipping my coffee it was 12pm. i looked at the charts and it seemed like we were going to go down some more. i roamed around and came back and i thought the worst was over, so I bought some STLD. it had zoomed up too fast and was getting beaten up bad too,...down 12%. but christmas week, so everything was low volume. i like it's prospects at this price level, but will keep a hawk eye on it.

i'm back

2008-12-18T18:05:00.004-05:00

back like the energizer bunny...no longer a daytrader since i'm under 25K, but got my account reset and back to trading....watched last 2 days and pounced today.

i should not have played AAPL...IBM or MON was the way to go, but i'm still a little out of touch with the whole thing and i dipped in at 90 this morning. i went to Murky coffee shop after that and spent the afternoon agonizing over my call. flip side was i watched the tape like a hawk and am getting back in the rhythm of that. luckily towards the end of the day, AAPL cracked and i must say i sold it at the very bottom of the bounce down. it was a master sell.

closed my AAPL short, bought at 90 at 88.8, very nice timing on the down, but the volatility....sheesh....

i wanted to go long SPY at close (actually the mad dip at 3:30pm, but i thought maybe it will go lower and then it went up and i was trading options on it and the spread the last 2 minutes was crazy (new to options on SPY) so i let it go......

in general, i don't like overnite's....too many variables for a little fish like me...the mad dip intraday play was the right one for me, but i missed it. live and learn.

and stop banging on beanie for not posting....his advice is a luxury :)

didn't trade

2008-11-10T21:03:00.003-05:00

didn't trade Friday or Monday....on Monday, my NUE calls were profitable in the morning....wish i had sold them.

it's not looking so good....i have a feeling Wed./Thurs. we might get a new rally.

New JOB starts Wednesday.

ohhh man or i need my mommy day

2008-11-06T18:58:00.009-05:00

PART 1

yesterday afternoon i had a bad feeling upon seeing the market action. it seemed very bearish, plus we were majorly overbought. my gut said if i am to buy, buy at close. i broke that rule, as you know, and bought AAPL midday. markets sank badly towards the end of the day.

instead of doing cool analysis at the end of the day...and i don't know what i was thinking....i very rashly went out and bought calls on BNI, RIMM and NUE. i used up all my money. one of my rules is never to use up all of your money. they were good buys, all at the bottom of the day...i figured worse case scenario i get a little bump and break even the next day.

unfortunately, after hours the markets kept on sinking. maybe the ECB / BOE would cut rates and that would jump start a rally. but, i had a bad bad feeling. there is a worse case than the worse case i'm thinking...but i'm trying really hard not to think too much !!

woke up at 8:30am after a restless night's sleep. the futures are all down...bad, bad and bad. please God I pray, a little bump and i'm out. we open low, rise a very little bit and then slam down. no please remember i couldn't even break even on my positions...we opened for all purposes atleast a $1 lower on all stocks...for a brief 3/4 minutes i could have sold at .5 - 1 losses...if i had just one position, but with 3 positions i panicked and said "how bad can it get".

well...we had another 500 point down day and except for brief moments it went down in a straight line. complete annihilation, especially BNI and RIMM.

well at 10am i didn't really know this...i still had hope and i really wanted coffee...so i throw on some clothes and drive to Murky, where i take a leisurely coffee break....what's the big deal...it will bounce back...look at the sky....look at the cars...a smoke...some music...finally i get the comp out...oh we are only 200 points down in a straight line....this is it...we will bounce back...more cigs, more cars, more shitty sky....look again...straight line down...i got another coffee...play towerz....don't think....peek...straight down....double cappucino...that's 3 shots dear....fuck....no food....i have so much coffee in my system i think i will explode if i even look at the girl by my side...avoid all human contact...peek at the dow...eeks...i'm a worthless piece of shit...chain smoke...nice sky..after all at the end of the day, when you have no money...there's always that fucking beautiful sky.

so everything is 6-8% down....all our hopes at this point lie on tomorrow's employment numbers being not so bad....bad will do, but it they are catastrophic bad...we are going down big time...and no magic wand is going to be saving my soon to be "shit house poor" TM ass this time.

PART 2

man i was so caffeineted...my brain mono lined, you know like when your heart stops...except my brain did that....it was going so fast...it didn't even know how fast it was going...anyway, i managed to get home and through some small glimmer of self persevation... i thought, NO!.... let's not get drunk, let's cook some food and i cooked the worst dish of pasta ever...because in between i started smoking cigarettes and re-planning the US financial system....and the noodles turned to soggy mush...over boiled the salmon (that's the only meat i had) into shriveled pink stuff....the only sauce i had was a can of crushed tomatoe's, been in the fridge for 2 weeks...it's not enough...add some water till everything's swimming....boil some more...it was a beauty....one bite and i threw it over the railing...creating a mini Gobi desert in the vegetation below...then i took a shit...and off i go to get drunk.

don't you wish you knew me.

and oh yeah! NO TRADES FOR TODAY.

shitty day

2008-11-05T16:10:00.003-05:00

i stupidly drank too much last night, celebrating the election victory and it was a real challenge to wake up this morning. which is why i dumped my BNI puts at the open. made nice coin on them, but if i had held to the close....

then i went back to sleep and woke up at 1:30pm.

the market looked awful. my gut said that we would sink all through the day. but, i broke my discipline and bought some AAPL at 106. the market absolutely tanked as i predicted and my AAPL calls are now in deep water.

i bought some NUE, RIMM and BNI at the close, hoping for a bounce tomorrow. they are at low's of the day...good prices, but not fantastic.

i have a feeling we might open up and trend lower before bouncing up for good. or we could open lower and bounce up....which would not be good...that's a bearish signal.

busy day

2008-11-04T20:01:00.005-05:00

i had a job interview at 1pm so that was majorly messing up my day. i had to leave at 12pm to get there and god knows when i would get back.

i still had my RIMM position from yesterday and that was looking to be some major damage control. down 1 at start and RIMM quickly ramped up. eeks....i had been looking to short the gap up and went double short RIMM. usually, in the past this has spelled trouble, but the trades were a day apart and i really had a good feeling about today. i also shorted MON, albeit not at the best price. i had the price target 94.25 set but got greedy.

i was watching the ticker on RIMM and it was strong. the entire damn market except for AAPL was strong. there was hope. all of sudden around 10:15, RIMM broke and i was able to liquidate my positions. i took a loss overall, but now it was a bearable loss.

i was hoping for MON to break majorly, but it just wouldn't budge. i had about +700 on that trade, but i got scared, very rightly so and closed it for +200. very good call on my part. i'm a day trader, if the position doesn't feel right, let it go....live to fight another day.

i still thought MON was overbought and reshorted it around 94 and a little later i doubled down. now time is running out...it's 12am already and MON just won't break. i could collapse the whole position for a small gain or do what? the unthinkable. go to my interview, come back and trade it. i must have been crazy. but, get this i set a sell level about a dollar lower, to where i thought it might break for the day at least and go to my interview, where they eat up my head and i tell them i have to go, drive like crazy through DC and jump to my computer and VOILA....it sold at the level i set and that was the LOW of the entire afternoon. i couldn't have gotten a better price. man, i really rock.

that is some super fine day trading, folks...killer stuff.

i watched the market some more, later afternoon has been fluctuating like crazy and i'm not really digging that today, but BNI shows unusual strength and i dip in for a short. i set a sell for +0.5, but it won't budge beyond +0.4....illiquid stock options are so hard to trade. no matter, it's a good position and tomorrow is a new day. i usually don't like to hold overnight, but volatility is low these days and the overall sense of the market is pretty clear. the upside on these puts i bought also seems somewhat limited and the level of risk is not too much. overnight is okay.

btw, i now have a job, starting Thursday....i wasn't so happy about it earlier...goodbye to sleeping late....but i need some stability...let's just drink some beer and get happy :)

November 3, 2008

2008-11-04T19:26:00.003-05:00

i was determined to get rid of all my dogs. i thought of various price levels i would sell them at and what the resulting balance's would be of my account. it did not look too good.

luckily, the day was in my favor...not massively....but enough.

i gamed MON perfectly and sold at 10:30am at the low of the day....literally the stock did not go lower than .30 cents from this point. you may not know, but with options that is very hard to do.

i was a little greedy on my AAPL and IBM though. i decided to hold them longer, since MON was 20 puts and the majority of my exposure. my risk levels were cut now.

i then stupidly decided to short some RIMM....the buy itself wasn't that bad, but multitasking stocks is a bad idea. the longer you watch the ticker of a stock....it kind of gets into your blood and after a while you get really good at gaming it. the brain works in mysterious ways.

later in the day i got rid of my AAPL. the IBM, by the way, i had bought 2 days earlier and then slept late the next day and completely missed my chance to make a profit on it. all i had to do was wake up. pathetic.

oh well, now for a new start....somehow i'm not so enthused.

seem's like i will be getting that State Dept. job. Easiest interview I ever had. I basically told them I was over their head and the next thing i know they were falling all over me. they asked me like 3 technical questions. i rock.

October 30, 2008 - awesome trading skills display

2008-11-04T19:15:00.005-05:00

man i rocked. i woke up and was determined not only to salvage my losing positions but also to daytrade with the measly amount of money left. enough only to buy 8 calls or puts on any of the stocks i follow....you can see the chart for yourself...i kicked ass....ok, let me break it down for you:

10 mins = 1100
40 mins = 1400
40 mins = 500
35 mins = 0 (atleast i didn't lose money)
2 mins = 500

i basically raped IBM and AAPL at will.

my other bad long positions still stay on the books.

October 28, 2008 trades

2008-11-04T19:06:00.004-05:00

I believe the top 2 AAPL trades and the MON trade were very successful again...greater than +1 profit magnitude individually.

Those trades at the bottom, now there's where i screwed up bigtime. The market ran up big time in the afternoon from 400pts to 900pts and all of those where bought at the 400pt range. I just over leveraged myself like crazy and totally disregarded the market. at the end of the day i had a third sense that maybe i should cut my losses, the market didn't feel right...it would hurt but it could get worse, but i just turned off my computer...you know it's bad when i don't watch the close.

The next day they went even higher and i did not trade. i could see that i was gonna lose a bucket load of money on these trades. the tide had turned. we just had a major bull rally and i was on the wrong side of it.

October 23, 2008 trades

2008-11-04T19:02:00.002-05:00

The 2 IBM trades at the top were very successful. I believe I bought them around 13.

haven't been posting....why ?

2008-11-04T18:55:00.002-05:00

here are the reasons:

1. i made a bunch of really bad calls and was near the 25K daytrading limit again. infact one day i was at about 15K...stressful. can i make money on this long term....i still think i can.

2. i was not sure if i wanted to do this fulltime. what kind of life is it sitting at home all day....RESOLUTION: i love daytrading and can do it almost everyday. i have moved a couple of steps up in my love / mastery of this art :)

3. i was having a mid life crisis at the same time....not fully resolved but somewhat under control now.

sadly, i just got a job....but that may be a good thing. i plan to continue daytrading and worst case scenario i get fired or quit. I WON'T QUIT DOING WHAT I AM REALLY PASSIONATE ABOUT >\ and I"M GOOD AT IT DAMMIT.

Batwings Formation

2008-10-21T22:33:00.001-04:00

beanieville Today 03:24 PM

That sucks marbles... BatWings formation on the DIA and SPY... if i remember correctly, at best we gap up tomorrow but will likely end down.

reply reblog

vodka_tonic Today 05:10 PM

nooooo.....not the BATWINGS formation....:)))

beanie, has other formations also !!!

will hold till Congress does something....plsss

2008-09-30T10:05:00.001-04:00

http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_vN3yY3xwScE/Rixw5n8De2I...
1 point

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ok im a wait till thursday unless we get an insane spike today or tomorrow.....i think we trade sideways till then....stock prices now are insanely low and credit market crunched as they are should be ok eventually.

i mean theyre still making bread and honey (or jam since poor bees dying and they be making all the honies not peeps)
http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_vN3yY3xwScE/Rm6wJSgjnAI...
Huqleberry.com 9 minutes ago 1 point
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fitb
vodka_tonic 6 minutes ago 1 point
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fitb ??

== football iz da bomb ?
vodka_tonic 5 minutes ago 1 point

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FITB Fill In The Blank
FITB Future Income Tax Benefit
FITB Fédération Internationale de Tchoukball (International Tchoukball Federation)

phew....

2008-09-25T19:41:00.003-04:00

the markets are crazy....we all thought we would go down today, so on the morning rise on IBM to 119, +2.5, i shorted it, i got a little overzealous and doubled that bet, still at 119 to 20 puts. the market kept rising IBM at 120, shorted some more....it keeps rising and at 3pm it's at 122....i'm freaking out....all my profits for the week plus some more are about to go down the tube. i can't even hold overnight because of the bailout plan rally threat.

i short at 122 and pray for the late afternoon drop....i watch the tape....i'm like a ninja....compute all exit points....IBM goes down to 120....i collapse all trades...it took nerves of steel.....my 122 was the only profitable leg, i couldn't sell it too early as it was counteracting the losses....but if IBM rallied into the close....with only 10 min's to go i sell the 122 / 120 at 122.3, wait 5 min's and i sell the 20-119's at 120.

total loss of 1K, but it could have been much worse. i was very lucky. some skill too. PHEW !!!

see-saw on the Goldman Sachs ship

2008-09-18T16:33:00.004-04:00

I shorted GS tuesday evening for a quick afternoon fade, but i didn't get it and so i was left holding GS puts !!!
as you know i hate holding stocks overnight in such volatile environment...a little bit of good or bad news and your position is fucked. especially with financials. so i was bummed, since after hours it was spiking higher.

But, on Wed. morning the gov. announced $85 billion loan to AIG. Logically, good news, but the market went ape shit over it. GS in pre-market was down $10....awesome. I saw the first 20 secs worth of action, saw that it would hit 120 and set sell level of $30 for my 150 puts. I didn't even have quotes, the options pit is a little behind in such cases. I was probably one of the first people to make market on that derivative that day. Great nice profit of $12.

I am at home for the moment. I didn't feel like rushing to work. So i am enjoying the moment. Watch the talking heads on CNBC, smoke a cigarette, take a crap (carry the laptop in there too :) and i come back thinking that's the worst. I do another quick trade on the upside, let it go down a little and go LONG. i wait a little bit and go LONG some more. Don't aske me why i must have still been hungover or sleep deprived or to exhuberant over my recent successes, that i went so heavily in. I get to work everything's down, GS down $25...i think great absolute bottom and i buy some more....you know the story the bottom on Wed. was $100....i had 29 $100 sept. calls with only 2 days to go. perfect way to blow your account.

i was up early thurs. morning. i had calculated various scenario's at different price levels and i was ready to take a hit. only thing in my favor was that volatility had created monstrous premium's so even though GS had moved down considerably, i was somewhat compensated. luckily, the market moved up and at $114 i had previuosly thought the risk / reward ratio was acceptable. i wasn't sure it would move to $120 and the hit at that point was not so bad, especially since I had made so much the day before. i am typing in the order, the fire alarm at work goes off, the boss is yelling everybody out, i hit submit and it's filled !!! yipppeeee....later on GS goes back to 100, then goes down to 91, where i wanted to buy it, then to 88, where i absolutely wanted to buy it...but for some reason my IB webtrader wouldn't accept my stock orders!!! i would have done call options but the lowest was 90's and they wanted $10 for it with stock at 88 and 1 day left. INSANE and DEFINTILEY NO WAY! 5 min's later that stock peaks back to 100. that was a definite gimme and i knew it. sigh.

the moral of this story is that i was able to salvage massive losses, buy not being greedy and keeping an eagle eye on the ticker of my stock. this is something i didn't always do before. but, now i know, that if you are trading options which are about to expire immenently you need to watch the ticker on that stock like a hawk. a couple of minutes could cost you thousands.

overall i only lost $500 (thank GOD) but i was up massively !!!

list of trades below:

BOT 10 GS IT SEP08 CALL 25 2008-09-17, 10:06:51
BOT 10 GS IT SEP08 CALL 23.5 2008-09-17, 10:11:25
BOT 9 GS IT SEP08 CALL 16.8 2008-09-17, 11:15:44
SLD 29 GS Option SEP08 100 CALL GS IT 16.50 CBOE(USD) 10:11:29 GMT-0400 on Thu, 18 Sep 2008 new
SLD 2 GS Option SEP08 125 PUT GS UE 13.50 NASDAQOM(USD) 15:50:55 GMT-0400 on Thu, 18 Sep 2008 new
SLD 2 GS Option SEP08 125 PUT GS UE 13.50 NASDAQOM(USD) 15:50:55 GMT-0400 on Thu, 18 Sep 2008 new
SLD 2 GS Option SEP08 125 PUT GS UE 13.50 NASDAQOM(USD) 15:50:55 GMT-0400 on Thu, 18 Sep 2008 new
SLD 2 GS Option SEP08 125 PUT GS UE 13.50 NASDAQOM(USD) 15:50:55 GMT-0400 on Thu, 18 Sep 2008 new
SLD 2 GS Option SEP08 125 PUT GS UE 13.50 NASDAQOM(USD) 15:50:55 GMT-0400 on Thu, 18 Sep 2008 new
BOT 10 GS Option SEP08 125 PUT GS UE 13.00 CBOE(USD) 15:25:53 GMT-0400 on Thu, 18 Sep 2008 new
SLD 1 IBM Option SEP08 130 PUT IBMUF 13.10 NASDAQOM(USD) 15:57:24 GMT-0400 on Thu, 18 Sep 2008 new
SLD 1 IBM Option SEP08 130 PUT IBMUF 13.10 NASDAQOM(USD) 15:57:24 GMT-0400 on Thu, 18 Sep 2008 new
SLD 1 IBM Option SEP08 130 PUT IBMUF 13.10 NASDAQOM(USD) 15:57:24 GMT-0400 on Thu, 18 Sep 2008 new
BOT 3 IBM Option SEP08 130 PUT IBMUF 12.00 NASDAQOM(USD) 15:53:34 GMT-0400 on Thu, 18 Sep 2008 new

my buddy ZSTOCK commented over at beanie's

2008-09-18T16:33:00.002-04:00

zstock quote: "QQQQ chart looking awfully bullish, going into tomorrow. Could go either way, and or, all over the place."

my response: "thanks, that really clears things up :) "

it just really cracked me up....keep up the good work Z.

LEH rumors sinks my ship

2008-09-11T16:18:00.003-04:00

so i am doing ok today....i'm not feeling the market and keep on thinking i should go home and jack off or do something. last 10 min's of the market are my favorite and i have a nice short setup on AAPL, just watching it to set the optimal sell level. all of a sudden huge spike....everything runs up 2.5+ in 10 mins....unbelievable....

my online friend says LEH rumor that it is to be bought by BAC.....my gut feeling is there is a rumor out there too....this was news based trading, i have been dreading this whole LEH thing....

althought BAC already bought countrywide so that doesn't make sense. i'm dreading Friday now.

this is how accounts get blown out

2008-09-09T16:55:00.002-04:00

super bad day for the markets. lots of traders getting decimated, including yours truly with his epic NUE long, which gapped down 10% today...ouch! no worries. i made up most of the loss with some profits on IBM on Monday. i play the intraday short on AAPL, more money for the account. i'm breaking even overall, it's okay. brutal market.

late in the day it looks like another down play on AAPL is forming. I get in nicely. and it goes down nicely, but i set my sell a little too high and before i can change it, it's gone back up again. it's at breakeven. basically, bought at 151.9, 10 aapl sept 165 puts for 13.9 each.

Fuck James Bond. You want to know pressure, trade options on AAPL.

I have 10 mins left in the trading day and I don't want to hold anything overnight. I could lose some serious money here. What to do?

i am desperately setting my sell levels lower and lower. an idea forms why not buy some AAPL calls for the bounce tomorrow. there should be a bounce !!! BAD IDEA ! time is money, 145 calls look okay, i set the price at 9.1. 3 minutes left. screw this...sell the puts for 14 ($100 profit) and buy the calls for 9.25. 2 minutes left. i refresh the page and all orders executed. $100 profit for all that angst and now i have a serious 10 calls position. what if LEHMAN explodes overnite or Paulson has a heart attack?

Seriously Munney Penney, we'd be PHACKED !!!

finally back after blowing account

2008-09-02T17:09:00.002-04:00

well, i blew my account in end june and on the very day the worst was happening i got offered a job. so phew, i had something to fall back on. i think it's better this way, since i will have something to do all day other than sit and think about my trades. sometimes i get over eager to just trade. possibly i will have more patience this way. this is my last chance. after this there is no more money. EEKS!!

bought 10 NUE SEP 42.5 calls at 6.9 (commodities oversold)
bought 10 IBM SEP 100 calls at 9.1 (oversold -- bought it too early, should have gotten in around 8.8, but i didn't want to be greedy and i am a little bit out of practice :)

see you tomorrow.

a chart for you

2008-06-27T22:28:00.001-04:00

various worldwide indexes:

all liquid....phew

2008-06-13T16:45:00.005-04:00

i woke up early and plotted my strategy, which basically was all about selling everything. only question was prices.

i sold NUE at open for a small profit, although it spiked higher by $1. that was on news on STLD, which i missed. i sold BNI at a pretty fair price. I sold DRYS at a fair price. AAPL spooked me at the open when it dipped like mad. i sold it when it stabilized but not near the best prices of the day.

in the afternoon i slept to give the rally some time to form.

late in the day i shorted GS. not the best move, given that the weekend will eat some premium, but it flew so high that i felt some action was necessary. also, by mistake i bought July puts, so i will be lucky to break even on Monday.

it's fridayyyyyyyyyyyyyyy........

just awful

2008-06-12T23:21:00.003-04:00

i sold my MER calls at open, was trying to sell my NUE but got too greedy. NUE crashed, AAPL crashed bad (on little news), BNI went down and DRYS went further down.

basically, i was long all of these and everything has drastically gone against me. so now i am in the red on my initial investment.

this is so like the decline in Feb., everybody kept on thinking now things will get better, but every damn day was a downward spiral.

i am liquidating everything tomorrow. start fresh next week.

getting screwed

2008-06-11T20:08:00.003-04:00

well i wished evil and it came true. i was talking to my family over the weekend and i told them i wished for a complete meltdown of the markets, so that people could suffer. well, my wish came true as the market melted today. unfortuanately, my account was one of the one's that melted also.

what can i say ? i woke up in the morning and i could feel the storm building and i just couldn't sell, especially BNI down a $1 in premarket, i felt, i hoped that somehow we would pull through. total catastrophe. BNI dropped $4 in 30 minutes and overall dropped $7...unbelievable move !

DRYS also went down $4 and NUE is barely holding it's head above water. add to that i bought some AAPL calls, which are under by $2 and some more MER, under by .50. i just thought we would rally at the close...instead we went lower.

awful markets....BUT, i think we are oversold...i only wish i had more than 1 week till options expiration. that's gonna be killer.

now to get drunk, because you don't lose money like this every day :)

more laziness

2008-06-10T18:38:00.003-04:00

i slept late and upon waking up at 11am was pleasantly surprised to see my RS puts had been sold at the price i had set yesterday. nothing like profit early in the morning.

i bought some DRYS calls but $2 from the low. it's made a strong move to the low. eeks ! bought some NUE calls at the bottom. it was down $3.5 and at that point i felt it was majorly oversold. i tried to sell them at the close, but i just didn't get my bid and since i am already up on them, i don't mind holding them another day. i bought some BNI calls at the close, but i think this stock is trending down also.

i get the feeling people are unsure of direction. oil IS breaking though.

it's so hot and muggy in DC. such is life.

missing journal mon. june 9

2008-06-10T18:18:00.003-04:00

i was so tired from NYC that i slept at my parents place and woke up at 11am. i then lazed around the rest of the day and made some trades which turned out well.

my family life sucks. everybody's fighting.

WOOT

2008-06-06T17:32:00.003-04:00

i was in the IB chat room and i saw the unemployment report and the oil action and i knew this was going to be a huge down day, one of those, where we go down the whole damn day....and i called it 400 points down on the DOW.

did i get it right ? Hell Yeah !!!

as you know, i had a bunch of puts and i made money on all of them. i didn't make mad money though, because some i sold too quick, like BNI and NUE and others like STLD, just wouldn't die. infact, in the morning both my STLD and MON positions were well against my position. MON in particular caused me a lot of heartburn and actually did not break till the end of the day, although i sold earlier for nominal gains.

while, i knew that the full impact would come at the end of the day, but still it was a tough day to hold through, so what little (NOT) i made is still welcome.

i would have made much more playing the volatility, but my family kept on distracting me with chatter. SIGH !!!

BTW, oil over 130 is very bad for US economy and around 150 is complete decimation of current levels of the GLOBAL economy.

now we go out to Yuva, for some nice Indian cuisine.

good day, big tomorrow

2008-06-05T16:14:00.006-04:00

i woke up and saw that NUE was up $3 on some good news. Kaching !!! I watched MER at the open and it seemed anemic so I got rid of it also. Financials like GS and LEH were flying but MER was sagging. something's going on.

btw, NUE went up $6 for the day. Heavy institutional buying, which anybody with a brain could see coming a mile away. The thinking on my sell early was, look $3 move is average, i have rarely seen $4 moves, so upside seemed limited, while the downside gapped large. a bird in hand, is better than 2 in the bush. Eh!

Rest of the day I shorted some stocks. I am worried about my NUE short and also, my first MON short, which was initiated at a horrible juncture. Sigh!

I am going to NYC tonight, so tomorrow I trade from Manhattan, Upper East Side BABY ;)

facebook mania

2008-06-04T15:59:00.003-04:00

i spent most of my day fiddling around on facebook...i am a newbie convert and i found a bunch of my friends from my vacation to Costa Rica online. Actually, one of them contacted me and that's how i got into it. so cool.

i wanted to buy some RS puts and the spread was 6.3 on a 6.7, so i put in a buy for 6.5, middle of the road. i thought i would get it, because i am a very good scalper of option prices...you have to be...especially for out of the money options, never pay the ask. but my order never got filled and the stock tanked big time and so i missed out on making some money. i was thinking of raising it to 6.6 too, damn facebook ;)

at the end of the day i bought some NUE and MER calls, for the overnight bump. i don't see anything drastic happenning in either sector, so they are fairly safe.

I SAW A TORNADO...for real...i have never seen one here in 18 years....it ripped out a bunch of branches from this big strong tree. i could see the wind swirling in the tornado style action. there was a woman running across the parking lot, i almost wickedly hoped to see her fly around...i ran down to feel the force, but the tornado was gone by then.

i kick ass

2008-06-03T16:09:00.006-04:00

i didn't wake up on time. i woke up at 12:30pm. for some reason i decided to go out for a beer at 12 am in the morning. there were no seats at the bar. i sat on a stool by the wall. like a freak. i don't know why i enjoy doing things like this.

i was sitting there, wondering what to do, when the entire market started tanking hard. i had no idea why. CNBC had no idea why. the interactive brokers chat room i hang in, had no idea why. i don't stare gift horses in the face, so i got rid of my crappy BNI positions right away. then i looked for stocks to short and AAPL was a prime candidate. i shorted and covered 4 minutes 13 seconds later for a $600 gain. then i switched gears and went long MER and MON. i did good on MON, but got scared with MER, what with the whole Lehman thing. i sold that for a tiny profit, although it ripped up fairly nicely later on. i also shorted some Netflix (NFLX), but i think it was a bad position. NFLX is showing upward momentum and if there's something i have learnt in the last 2 weeks, it's DON'T FIGHT MOMENTUM.

overall, a good day.

new start

2008-06-02T22:03:00.004-04:00

i feel like a new start. last week i just wasn't into trading.

i sold off 20 BNI 120 put's for break even. i still have 10 of 120 and they are fairly out of the money. also, 10 more of 115 puts which are the worst of the lot. really awfull positions. i forgot there was the last 10 of 130 puts, which actually came through decently.

i sold off my IBM puts for a nice profit, although i left over 1.5K on the table. it dived so much.

i still own my MER calls. it's getting close to getting into financials time.

i tried to scalp BNI for some downside action, but the stock behaved like a young drunk girl. wanting to put out, but not actually doing anything :)

fin. el morto.

screwed up big time

2008-05-30T20:24:00.003-04:00

i drank like crazy yesterday and did not wake up in the morning. given the amount of exposure i had that was just plain crazy, but i'm tired of trading and i just didn't give a damn. i've had a great time doing this full time, but it's clear to me that it's time has come and i need to get a full time job and do this on the side. i am pretty sure that i will be a much better trader, if i don't think about this the whole time. plus it will be nice to work with other people again.

anyhoo, i didn't wake up and paid a heavy price. i would have broken even on IBM in the morning. i would have made a small profit on BNI and could have closed my entire position in that stock. IBM is still within target range, but BNI ran up another 2 dollars. it's on a monster breakout and my position in it is definitely hurting. but, i have 3 more weeks and this stock can tank just as fast as it's run up. hopefully, oil will make another run above 130, which is likely, and the stock market will dive one more time (for me). but, overall i am not making profits and that is pissing me off. maybe it was just a tough week, but i haven't been able to tell where stocks are going. all rationale seems to be out of the door.

i am burnt out. i should have taken that vacation to Jamaica like i wanted to. i would have only spent 2K on it and i already lost more than that dicking around.

too early

2008-05-29T18:03:00.003-04:00

i started shorting BNI too early...it ran up something huge today. i might break even on it, but if i had waited i could have made some serious money on it. i got rid of my HPQ position, just couldn't wait any longer for it to turn the corner. plus with the coming weekend...oops, in the case of HPQ there would have been very little premium to lose. in any case this dog has had his day and we need to invest in other venues.

i have been sloppy in trading lately. my heart has not been in it. don't know what to do.

maybe this weekend i will go somewhere. or nowhere.

tough day

2008-05-28T23:10:00.003-04:00

i was not on point today. i had a bad feeling about the IBM puts and should have sold them at the open for a .20 cent profit, but i was greedy and lost .80 cents on them each. Ouch !!! i went back to sleep after that fiasco and for the rest of the day kinda drifted around. i got rid of my NUE position, break even on 10 and small loss on other. I was debating whether to hold them, but NUE was up 2.4 and i didn't feel like tempting the gods. i bought some IBM puts and i feel fairly good about them, but IBM is busting out, so i have to be very careful with them.

i was jonesing for Coke all evening and then finally i went and got some. it was divine.

slow day

2008-05-27T17:57:00.004-04:00

i slept through most of the morning. i kept a lazy eye on the market thereafter and except for a feeling at one point that i should go long, which i didn't act on, due to cooking food and building my resume, i missed that brief opportunity. in the afternoon i watched tv and watched Oil fall. i am not sure it's done, but the buzz is for a downward trend. NEVER FIGHT THE TREND. i shorted IBM towards the end of the day for an overnight play.

i need beer. i love my family, but they stress me out. know what i mean.

Friday, May 23 post

2008-05-27T17:52:00.002-04:00

i took the day off to hang out with the family. markets are closed on Monday, May 26th also. I checked in the afternoon and NUE was doing badly, due to the extra shares they just issued. the issue price was 74, which was good though. that's my break even point also. Friday's sell off was unusual IMHO. definitely oversold. i put in an offer to buy MER at 43, but it never got filled. it gapped to 44 on tuesday. sigh.

no pic as nothing was traded.

friday-d-day and long weekend coming up

2008-05-22T19:36:00.003-04:00

tumultous week. my long positions not doing so well, especially HPQ, but otherwise i am ok. i bought a bunch of calls on MER (merrill) and NUE (steel). first time in a while that i am buying on valuation. Mer at 44 is damn cheap and NUE at 74 is insane cheap. if they don't bump up on Friday, i might hold them till next week. my Oil short on USO went very well. I might become an Oil day trader yet. NYMEX here i come !!!

going out for a couple of beers. tomorrow is my Dad's graduation from Executive MBA program. Shout out to my 60 year old Dad for putting in the 2 years of work.

i feel good

2008-05-21T16:09:00.005-04:00

i woke up in a grumpy mood, because i didn't get much sleep last night and looking at the market i couldn't tell dinky donkey shit which way it was going to go or what to do. plus i didn't really care and so i sat there watching CNBC idiots. DRYS was going up nicely and my STLD puts, which i was afraid about, were within the strike zone of small loss. I said "what the hell" TM, put in sell orders for both for prices which i thought were reasonable and went back to sleep.

i get up at 1:30pm and both my orders are sold and at the BEST prices of the day. DRYS only went .50 cents higher from where i sold it and STLD's low of the day was where i sold and then it zoomed off in the opposite direction. I RULE !!!

sadly, my MER and HPQ calls are taking a beating. MER i am still optimistic about, but HPQ i think i will have to take a loss of 1-3K. thank GOD, i only went into earnings with 20 calls, i had 30 the day before. but, see that was good RISK management. YAY me !!!

over the afternoon my mood has improved and mostly i fooled around reading blogs and tormenting AAPL longs on the Yahoo message board. that's my favorite hangout to talk shit. I bought some NUE calls hoping for a bump and also shorted OIL, by buying puts on USO. Nue i had a chance to sell at close for decent profits, but a little birdy called GREED was chirping on my shoulders. oh well, i do have to pay my parking tickets somehow.

i need cigarettes. ran out last night. ate some indian candy for lunch.

cousin works in bulk shipping business

2008-05-20T19:41:00.003-04:00

why do i tell ? because DRYS fell, even on good earnings, taking some of my money with it. not yet but i think it will. good company though. that's why i never play earnings. market reaction is often very unpredicatable.

market tanked. i bought a bunch of calls and puts. sold most but holding to MER calls, STLD puts (yuck), HPQ calls (earnings were a disappointment, should have sold yesterday when it touched 48, i was thinking that too). i should trade less and waste more time screwing around. i trade better that way.

it's tuesday, one of my favorite days for drinking, but i feel bleh, because i messed up my sleep cycle. don't ask.

good start to new monthly cycle

2008-05-19T17:42:00.004-04:00

the day went well. i took it easy in the morning and went to Murky's coffee shop. i proceeded to get 2 more parking tickets, despite getting the same two last week. damn that heartless parking bitch to hell. i know it's my fault, but cut me some slack fellow soul fucked human being. anyway i thought the market would go down and shorted BNI and RS. boy was i right. i sold RS too cheaply, but held BNI decently enough. market tanked big time. i bought some DRYS calls at the close. their earnings report was good and they are up after hours, but it's anybody's guess what will happen tomorrow.

coffee, my poor stomach. and now i pour some beer into it.

horrible 2 weeks

2008-05-17T19:11:00.005-04:00

i don't know what's up, either i have gone plumb crazy or i just got my ass handed to me. i lost about 18K in the last 2 weeks. a ton of it on my NUE puts and some on others. i did make a lot also, but i just feel that i did not follow my risk management schemes and i was all over the map. a month ago, i was such a risk adverse freak and then i made some money, and i am buying 40-50 puts on one position. it doesn't help that steel made such a strong rotational rally. i shorted NUE and it goes up big and stays up there, then i short RS and it goes up big and then i short STLD and it breaks out too. all three stocks in the sector, went up breakout big. should i have seen that coming? was it inexperience or stupidness or just plain bad luck that caused this fiasco?

i feel a little deflated. i will be on record mode, meaning double think/analyze all moves, till options expire in June. I need a longer term analysis of how i handle a month's worth of trading.

forgot to post on Friday. Saturday, went for coffee in beautiful weather, read a ton of interesting articles to satisfy my head, ate a cheeseburger at the East - West Grill, kabob joint but excellent fries, and now hopefully i will sit still to watch La Maman Et La Putain(1973).

big day friday

2008-05-15T18:46:00.003-04:00

i have a bunch of positions both long and short and they all EXPIRE on friday. ah, the magic of options !!! i made a nice profit on my STLD calls and then shorted it when it rose later. ok position, i started shorting too soon. i also shorted RS and BNI at the close. these positions are not so bad. plus, still holding my HPQ calls and they report after close...quick let me check....nope no earnings yet...so as you can see a lot hangs on the balance of one day. not the best situation, but i am starting to see that i am not as much of an accountant personality as i presumed...i am more like a maniac gambler...and they always meet a grisly end.

sigh!!! i did grocery shopping, pasta with vodka cream sauce, then some cola and now i am going out with a friend to some show :) la dolce vita (while it lasts).

drank too much last night

2008-05-14T22:57:00.006-04:00

oy vey !!! the title says it all. i had a brutal hangover and couldn't get out of bed until 1pm. i really agonized over my stocks, especially my RS puts, but, i was in serious agony.

anyhoo, waking up in the afternoon turned out to be very good for me. for one HPQ leapt 2+ dollars and all of a sudden my may calls were near breaking even. wow what a reversal by the market. i lightened my position on HPQ to 20 may calls. depending on tomorrow's action, i might hold them till after hpq reports on thurs. close. the risk now is manageable. i made very good profit on the one's i had bought at yesterday's close (see trades)....i shorted IBM and played it very well. sold it right at the absolute bottom !!! i tried to get rid of my RS since it had retraced all the way back to 66...but just couldn't. i think it will shoot up tomorrow, but hopefully in the morning's choppiness i can get rid of it. i bought a ton of STLD, but i am kinda regretting it now. absolutely speaking 34.5 is not quite the price level to back the truck up. we shall see tomorrow. i am also tracking DRYS closely, earnings for it after thurs. close as well...it's been on a tear.

i had dinner at my Uncle's house...yellow daal and rice...yummy home cooked Indian food. tummy satisfied.

i need more fans

2008-05-13T16:26:00.007-04:00

one of the day trader blogs i follow is http://beanieville.blogspot.com, infact he is the inspiration for this blog. beanie has many good points and some bad ones. good is he posts recommendations and has a huge fan base, who all post fairly good recommnedations. bad is beanie rarely tell's of his losses and seems to make insane amounts of money. he also flips on his positions quite quickly and pumps stocks fairly often a la Cramer. but, overall he's a good guy. also, his "buy this stock" links are quite informative and rumor has it he feeds pain killers to his dog (see his avatar pic).

in comparison, my main good point is that you know exactly what i bought, when and how much for and ofcourse my profit/loss. bad is i post after the trading close and often ramble on.

today was an EMO day (note i skipped the tional, that's because i'm the real deal). i woke up and hpq went down $3 more...disaster...bni was showing strength and i couldn't tell if the market was gonna go up or down. i felt it was a gray day. i felt i should write off the morning and come back in the afternoon. but, first i got rid of BNI, i didn't even like it when i bought it yesterday. i got into bed and i couldn't sleep. i kept seeing my account balance. no more eating out. fking bread and water from now on. maybe i should get a job. activate my resume's. actually, two headhunters had just submitted me for jobs. i had flunked the java test for one of them. none of my references seemed to be alive.

but, from my bed the sky was clear and the rose i had stolen yesterday from somebody's garden was blooming. i said to murky coffee it is. murky had a good effect on me. maybe i was just people starved. but, seeing everyone there, girls and guys, cheered me up. i was ready to fight. i tracked HPQ and bam got some right at the bottom. but, mostly i screwed around and checked out the chicks. me so horny. it's the reality. fuck it, i'll scream it in this crowded murky room right now. prozac anyone. i liked the restraint i showed towards the end and very selectively bought some RS shorts, which is breaking out, but should be good for an overnight dip. also bought some more HPQ calls, because i think the bottom has been set. or so i hope, please GOD.

i had silver diner for lunch...so so...i'm gonna go drinking tonight...4 days of rain fuckers...plus somebody i know it's their birthday so that's like, you know, flick my blond hair, another reason :-)

why even bother blogging?

2008-05-12T22:52:00.004-04:00

no one reads this crap. sigh! sorry it's been rainy and sucky for the past 4 days, since Sat. and i forgot to post on last Friday. why, you ask? because i got rid of my super sucky money losing NUE positions. man i took a hit and yes i was taught not to start sentences with because. i wonder if ending them with because is ok? in my desire for revolution, in the world of grammar and otherwise i may have inadvertently shook the foundations for my own inner peace. how tragic !!!

i lay in bed most of the morning, because it was raining and i had the blues. market was up when i got up. shorted ibm, but was uneasy, too much strength in that stock lately. big money could be getting in. i watched like a hawk and sold soon on a dip. it never broke 126, but still wise decision to sit and watch sometimes. i sold STLD for a nice profit. and then cnbc did a breaking news on HPQ (hewlett packard) buying EDS. i checked HPQ's quote and it was going downwards and i thought buy, because HPQ in the service sector through EDS is a pretty good move, plus good buy, plus hpq earnings later this week. i bought some June calls, to give me time for the bump. but, lo and behold HPQ kept screaming downwards and then i bought some short term calls....and it kept going lower....argh another disaster so soon....but i really believed in this stock...so i bought some more. thankfully, it held these levels. but, it was a $3+ dip on a stock which on average doesn't move more than $.50 cent a day. INSANE. my position is precarious, what with 40 short term calls, but i will watch like a hawk.

then i went and got a Gyro. I also got a kibbeh, which was so delicious.

Friday May 9 - missing post

2008-05-12T22:24:00.005-04:00

i woke up on FRIDAY and the entire market was going down and Nue with it and since i didn't know how much down and my Nue position was so badly out of shape, i sold it at 79. i should have held out a little bit longer, because it went down to 77.12 and i should have been able to nibble atleast 60 cents more of that, which on 40 puts would have been 2,400...but i was super nervous and it was a big weight off my shoulders with that sell. rest of the sells were good, MER at the peak and IBM close to the trough. bought some STLD, because at 34 it's just insane. i love that stock. then i went to sleep.

as i slept, i thought about what i did wrong with Nue (ok actually later, as i was drinking). first of all my play was slightly bad. i entered at 76, when i should have waited for 78/79. at 78/79, i would not have lost so much money. 2nd, Nue did do an insane break. it just screamed upward for no reason, no other steel stocks following, just Nue going nuts by itself. sucks, but it happens. 3rd and most importantly, i just didn't know how to handle the risk. i am used to 10-20 puts, where even a $2 loss translates to $2-4K. i think when i saw the $5-10K loss (on 50 puts) my position was initially taking, my brain shut down and my heart was like NO NO NO...basically i gotta grow the balls for these kind of big positions.

i woke up and saw NUE had gone down even more. ofcourse i over analyzed that for the rest of the afternoon. cmon people it was a $16,000 loss over the course of 1 week. i'm good, but that hurt.

STLD had dipped down even more under 34 (wow, backup the truck :) , but it was at basically unchanged levels and i felt ok holding it over the weekend, since i was LIQUID other than that.

then i got drunk. really drunk.

rainy day

2008-05-08T17:42:00.006-04:00

i woke up and it was raining. i checked my Nue and Mer positions and they were sucking. I didn't feel like trading. I went back to sleep. In the afternoon, i wasn't quite in the mood either. i was watching the movie Tenacious D (not as bad as i would have thought) and bought some IBM puts. mixed feelings about those. i had a chance to sell the first lot for slight gains but the volatility spikes were so fast i missed all the chances. whatever.

im just going to starve myself today. penance for my greed.

still hanging on to my loss

2008-05-07T20:33:00.003-04:00

i am still hanging on to my 50 Nue puts, but i feel sad every time i look at them. patience Sunny. my theory about the rise being tied to Oil was dashed as Stld and RS, fellow companies are not tearing upwards. this could be a straight break out for the 80 level by Nucor. the company is still terrific, although steel is trading at record prices. who knows ? i'm going to hold through this week. man, the market goes down but this puppy is just not budging.

other than that, i just tore up the market today. sold my Stld and RS from yesterday. shorted IBM and took a nap. reshorted RS and almost shorted Nue, but i am scared of Nue at this point. it took a while for ibm to roll, but i got out of it at the perfect point. the RS paid off nicely too. i was a champione.

i like my new regime of wake up for the morning trades, then nap some more, run errands and then catch the last 2 hours of the market.
i already had Pho. perfect hangover food.

argh, major loss on the way

2008-05-06T16:51:00.003-04:00

i overleveraged myself by buying 50 puts on Nue at a bad price. my gut told me to hold till 77, but i bought at 76. it's at 79, right now. there will be a downside, but it probably won't blow below 77. it's gonna be very hard for me to wait and hold and pray for 76. my gut says, if i get 77, sell and take the 5K loss.

bought some Stld and RS puts. more steel you say ? i still strongly think they are at their peaks and will go down. Nue just happens to have greater visibility then these two.

i need beer. i just bought these yesterday and in one day i am ready to cry. that's options, folks.

didn't sleep last night

2008-05-05T20:48:00.003-04:00

as the title alludes i didn't sleep at all last night. i was playing minesweeper and listening to music and the birds started to chirp and i thought let's just watch the sun come up. it was glorious. the traffic humming below and the golden rays of sunshine penetrated my room's windows. i watched some more youtube and then got ready to go to Murky coffee.

my trading software was very quirky and would not plot any graph's of the stocks. plus i was tired. i shorted and covered Aapl for a profit, but my main focus was DRYS. it had gapped upwards and i felt frustrated. why ? unfortunately, there is no single reason. the stock market is a collective hive, each bee with it's own reasons. i shorted some more. i also shorted Nue. Oil was up and people were doing commodity plays. you have to be counter trend. but, then sometimes you get played. i sold all my Drys shorts and was able to break even, especially after my .40 cent loss on expedia puts. i screwed up and bought Nue puts at low levels. with my experience should have known to buy at the close. now i have 50 puts. you do know that a .10 cent fluctuation at this price equates a profit / loss of $500 :)

i hate coffee. i had some pastrami and fancy french cheese, while watching the joggers on the trail below my apartment. bon nuit.

god saves my stupid ass

2008-05-02T20:14:00.003-04:00

i had a large position and a bad feeling about it and as usual i couldn't sleep. i woke up at 7:30am, then tossed and turned till 8:30am...crap, the unemployment report was unusually good...argh...all futures are up...no real bad news on the horizon...the rally from yesterday should continue...breakout levels......basically i was freaking the fuck out. i had 30 Aapl puts and 40 Bni puts. as i watched the tape into the open, i had a feeling it was not going to be so bad. trader's gut intuition. it just doesn't matter what the Cnbc idiots are saying or what anyone is saying, at the end of the day it's just you and the tape. you either FEEL IT or NOT.

well i had a feeling we were not going to go up much, but my positions were too risky and too big. aapl opens i watch for a little while and going with my gut liquidate all my positions. Loss. i watch Bni and it's weak from the start. i gauge and set a sell level. it comes close, then goes way opposite, i curse myself. patience. i am listening to drum n' bass music, jumping around, i look again, it blew all resistence levels and i am liquid. i left 30 cents on the table too and that's with a 40 put position. sigh ! adding it all up, it's not such a bad day. thank you GOD. did i doubt your existence ? never :)

happy but tired, i hit the sack, wake up at 3:40pm...argh...a quick look at everything and DRYS, which i had been tracking, looked really high. i hit it right at the top for some puts. good thing i slept till the end, otherwise i would have bought it more expensive. i love how this sleep thing works out sometimes. party till 4am, sleep in the afternoon, doable possible :) watching the tape afterwards, i think i should have doubled down. it's really extended on no real news, other than Oil.

it's frriddddayyy and now for some shots of chilled Belvedere vodka.

shorted the rally

2008-05-01T16:06:00.003-04:00

the first day of the new month and the market rallied strong. i thought there might be a dip towards the end so i shorted BNI and AAPL. I like the level for BNI although there is more upside. the problem is that i have been in bearish mode for too long and maybe this is a genuine market rally. and if it is a true rally then there can be multiple up day's, rather than the up and down that i have gotten used to playing. we will know tomorrow. Aapl in particular is of deep concern, this stock has very strong momentum and i wish i only had 20 puts not the 30 that i hold. it just did not break towards the end.
i have now been blogging for over a month. Yay me !
i need beer. but, first an arthouse flick to recharge my batteries.

tired

2008-04-30T19:50:00.005-04:00

FOMC minutes were supposed to be released today at 2pm, so i took it easy in the morning, figuring nothing big would happen...wrong...when i checked in the afternoon, most of my stocks had gapped up big then faded downwards, except for Aapl, which opened at 176 and stabilized at 178. this was a disaster for my only open position, aapl may 180 puts bought at 171. yesterday it had gapped up to 175, which was still okay, i figured fluctuation and it might get down to 172, but this solid move, meant serious losses for me. luckily the market tanked after the FOMC release, mainly because it had ran up too much too fast. aapl tanked 4 bucks in 20 minutes. i didn't quite catch the absolute bottom (173), but i was able to offload them at 174. 3K loss, sigh! in a twist of fate, i had bought aapl puts before the meeting, figuring it was too high, however i sold them in the volatility after the release, not imagining such a big fall.
now for some milk and banana nut cake, courtesy of my Mom.

action day

2008-04-29T17:23:00.005-04:00

new desktop background :)

i got to my laptop at 9:50am and straight away i noticed i had missed the drop in Aapl. i had bought puts at 171 yesterday and it had gone up to 173. i was hopping to catch the drop...would have sold straight away, but by 9:50 it was at 173. sigh!

i sold all my Nue puts for nice profits. YAY me :) i then watched tv and slept some more.

around 2:30pm i was watching the tape again and aapl was totally pissing me off. it just kept going up and up, no news, very unusual action for the stock. i felt it was near it's top, i watched intently, i swooped in like a hawk, i held through the drops, waited till the close...10 cents...20 cents...every differential counts...sold for a profit. but, still a huge unrealized loss on the remaining puts. grrr !

monsanto died spectacularly today...why? i was watching cnbc / fast money and saw that oil was down big, the end of commodities, maybe ag's going down on that...it's on my watch list now.

i need cigarettes. oh my rotting teeth, grin :)

keep your personal life in shape

2008-04-29T00:54:00.003-04:00

i was not on point in my personal life and some of it affected my trading today. this is something you have to try and control as much as possible. i woke up on time and got rid of the Monsanto (MON) puts within a reasonable period of time. i left some on the table, but it was a risky trade and i am happy with the profits we :) booked. i sold off the NFLX puts for par, although it went down later. it was a good trade overall, because if it's not going anywhere or in the direction you believe it should, get liquid. better to be even than at a loss. plenty of fish (trades) to be caught in the sea.

i thought the market would go down for the day and bought some Aapl puts, but it went up $3 from where i bought it and it was a terrible buy, although i really liked the level at which i bought. NUE went up like insane and my $80 puts are doing terrible. they are nearly 1.5 in the negative and i have 20 of those. i still could not understand why nue was going up so strongly, so i shorted it some more. maybe i was overzealous :) i found out after close that US Steel (X) is reporting tomorrow. that was the reason for the rise. that's good for me actually, because if X disappoints, nue tanks, if they are good, even so the upside pull for nue will be limited i think. basically, what i am saying is, this stock is up on speculation. i was worried there might be some real news that i missed.

deutsche bank (DB) reports tomorrow. my sister works for them, although i think they will disappoint big time. lots of earnings this week, plus GDP and FOMC rate cute news. dangerous week, i like it calm and quiet.

i read articles, researched stocks and earnings for like 3 hours, so now it's time to eat food and watch tv.

shoot me

2008-04-25T17:20:00.004-04:00

i was going to title this post, "i commit suicide", but my parents occasionally read my blog...first a little background, i have been trying to quit smoking since yesterday and i woke up early and the last couple of days i have spent all day watching the tape. as you can see i made a ton of trades, with well over $100 in commissions (which is another story altogether). basically, i suck when i watch the market all day. somehow, my judgement fades away and i buy and sell arbitrarily, hoping now it will go up or down. basically, time is my enemy. so, a combination of that and smoking jitters, caused today's disaster.

now, on to the disaster.

i got rid of my STLD calls at the open. good trade. i reshorted NFLX at a better price and sold for a small bump. good trade. i should have liquidated my entire position as the one i had bought yesterday, didn't seem to be working, but i didn't listen to my gut. then i FUCKED up big time and sorry to my readers there is no other way to put it. i started selling my BNI puts at good prices, but instead of putting 11.3 in the sell field, i put in 10.6, which was the lower portion of the spread and had stuck in my head. as soon and i mean microseconds after i clicked transmit i thought "Shit" and it was gone. u have to understand whoever i sold to made $400 instantly, absolutely no risk. well that blew my entire profit and handed me a $-100 loss on that position.

i decided to compound that error by buying Monsanto (MON) puts over the next hour and then praying for the rest of the afternoon that it go down. Did it go down ? Ofcourse not, i got to enjoy watching it go up. Why so strong ? People are starving man. Bounce play. God hates me. Pick your reason. Now i have a huge short position on a stock which is going strong and it's the weekend, meaning tons of bad news can come out. Like, all of Asia bans food exports. That would be the end of me. I also bought some NUE puts, because it was flying too high and if you are going to commit suicide you should go all out.
i am not kidding, almost everytime i have lost big it has been with a pattern like this. you only need to slip up once kids.

DO NOT WORRY, part of this pessimism is nicotine withdrawl. let's keep our fingers crossed and now to get drunk.

i work hard

2008-04-24T20:47:00.003-04:00

as you may know i screwed up yesterday and sold short 20 NUE puts. Yikes !! needless to say i was up early and ready for the opening bell. I did not think Nue had upward strength and even more importantly i did not like the amount of risk i had in the position. i thought about various price levels, the losses associated and what i was willing to do. it opened and i must have been half asleep, because i sold at the Ask price, which is the upper limit of price offered. I didn't haggle. must have been confused, i mean i was short a short...Huh :) Luckily, that was a very good move, because unbeknowst to me, commodities were tanking and Nue tanked big time also. But, after I sold and realized my loss, a burning anger filled me and I said DAMN you Nue and shorted it again. (Actually i felt it had more downward potential). Get this it goes down like 20 cents and i had 20 puts, i sell and make 20 and it tanks 2 dollars. No kidding. I left 3K atleast on the table. now all this is happening at break neck pace. minutes literally. i see it go down and i buy calls on it, it goes down a little more, i buy more calls and then it rally's strongly and i make a lot of money. i also bought some RS at the lows and got in the rally. basically, i was all over the map early in the morning.
at about 11 am i decided to go to Murky's. Rest of the day it trended higher and i shorted BNI, MER and NFLX. I sold my LONG term play NCC for a $50 profit. I misplayed it, should have gone long stock and played for the bump. I sold my MER puts at the close, because it was rallying too hard. Bni and Nflx didn't give me a decent opportunity, so i am comfortable holding them for another day.
coffee makes me too jittery, i am switching to juices from now on. or i should. it's Miller time now and there are plenty of juicy leftovers in my fridge.

i make money

2008-04-23T20:52:00.004-04:00

as i was telling my kurdish friend at Murky coffee, i was itching to make money. two days of financial celibacy were killing me. i concentrated and came through. good execution throughout the day, although i hope i was not over adventurous in buying 20 calls on STLD, towards the end. we shall see tomorrow.
crap, crap, crap...i just took a closer look at the pic above and realized i had sold NUE puts BOTH the times. i thought the first had been a buy. Good Lord !!! i am truly retarded, there go my profits, what a rookie mistake, fucking kurdish idiot, i knew i shouldn't have let him go on and on like that. Fuck !

not much happening 2

2008-04-22T15:56:00.003-04:00

earnings season rolls on and i am still too scared to play anything much. i bought a bunch of Netflix (NFLX) because a 26% drop for such a good company is unwarranted. but, it's a bump play, hopefully i will be rid of this by Friday. as a long term buy it's not attractive at $30. my NCC play from yesterday, made some small change and i realized i had played it wrong. I should have bought stock, and it being at $6, i could have afforded it and got about 30/40 cents on it. oh well. DryShips (DRYS) is going all out for RIG. great play, i like that company a lot, so i'm gonna keep a tighter eye on it. Oil is insane. I looked at shorting it, but the options on USO were frightening. I am not sure i have enough expertise to play this field reliably, but i would love to short Oil.
that's all folks, at this rate Ramen is what i will be eating soon :0

not much happening

2008-04-21T16:09:00.003-04:00

Third Friday of every month is options expiry for that month, which means the next week the option premium's are once again quite high. i.e. last week a 150 call on aapl, would be quite near aapl's real price, however, now that we have more time till May expiry those same calls will price $3-4 or even more for the extra time that you get.
well i had been playing so close to the money that i wanted to take it easy on this first day and just watch the tape. plus there was no real volatility. i tried to trade, but i am getting better now and i try not to force it. 2 other reasons were that this is earnings week and especially in these volatile times, that's doubly dangerous. i don't play earnings, things can move too much either way and you can lose big. that's gambling, i like things to be nice and quiet. do it the ninja assasin way.
that said, i did pick up some National City Corporation (NCC), Jan 2009 options. I was conflicted about this, but i was only staking $2K on it, and it was beat down 26% and hell they didn't even lose that much money + raised $7 billion, but the lollipop deal on that capital was very nice. Some good old Merrill boys got a chunk of that. 8% convertible at a price of $5. that's how the rich become richer. that was on top of slashing dividends to 1 cent. I'll put this one away in my vault along with my 2009 and 2010 Blockbuster (BBI) calls, bought May 2007, which are in the red by the way.
I was looking at some financials and i noticed that Wachovia (WB) had bounced back nicely. Remember, I had bought it last week at 25, May 2007 calls and sold it 2 days later for a 20 cent profit. Well, the next day it went up a dollar and another dollar the day after. I'm telling you Financials are at death's door, they really are very good bargains out there. Big banks are very stable and they are gonna mint coin some time in the future, probably sooner than later.

another good day

2008-04-18T15:57:00.003-04:00

i saw the Google news yesterday, the market gapped up big, but i had thought it would be more choppy in the morning, well i was dreaming that...i woke up at 1pm and it was the perfect time to start my trading day. i looked around and aapl was too high, earnings next week Wed., but $7 rise was unwarranted. drop looked imminent and i swung in like Bond on bad guys. bim, bam, bap...little profits racked up. my bread and butter. although it was on options that expire today, so risky, but then i was trading the stock and the risk is the same that way. you gotta believe or you don't. the may options were a joke.
now to outback steakhouse for some moo moo....i'm a fat cat banker after all :)