eventful friday

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.

shitty day

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

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

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.

big day

i should have posted this yesterday, but here goes. RIMM earnings came in very nicely and in after hours alone aapl saw a nice big bump. Kaching !! But, lately I have not been very bullish, so as soon as it hit 150, i sold it. maybe i should have sold half, ahhh fuck that. take profits when you can :) i was very happy, so i decided to go for some coffee. only problem is my favorite cafe Greenberry's, doesn't have internet access. so i just looked at the pretty girls.
at around 1:30pm i decided i should head back. the midday high should be setting in and i was all ready to short the crap out of everything. coffee does that to me. i have been tracking a new stock called BNI, it's that railway freight company buffett bought at 80. nice one old dude. anyway it was close to it's all time high of 96, so i shorted it. then i shorted some RS and later at the 3pm peak some IBM and aapl. i got some movement in rs and bni, but i decided to hold them overnight, since they are low risk and i thought the employment numbers would be bad. the aapl and ibm panned out very well, so i rewarded myself with beer :)

lazed around most of the day

i got scared there might be another strong(ish) rally in the morning, so i sold my aapl puts for a small profit and broke even on merrill (mer). aapl and mer did rally hard and then fall hard, which would have been the play of the day, but i missed it, because i just wasn't in the mood to watch the comp. i sat down toward the end, but couldn't see any plays, except to buy some aapl calls, hoping for good rimm earnings.