Incompetent.

 I spent most of the morning trading long then short TSLA and came up red. Both great entries. What went wrong? Greed. I ignored my pl target and tried for a homerun. 

This is the trading performance of a child or a novice. I know better than this. Lessons learned a zillion times: I am not smarter than the market; Clockwork works, follow the rules; don't hold for homeruns. Always take a pltgt.

What a way to close the year. -12% on the long and -5% on the short, after each had been up 30%+. There is literally no way to explain this incompetent behavior except extreme greed. 

What was my mental state that posessed me to trade like a jerk? Greed. "This is going to really run"... "This is going to get wrecked." I should BE AWARE when I notice myself thinking these thoughts. These are irrational thoughts.

Taking off until next week. May 2023 be my most profitable yet!!

One and done

Tuesday morning, Dec 27. Happy anniversary!

Friday was half day for the market. Monday closed. Who knows what's pent up this morning? Who knows if there will be action this last week in December?

Reviewed "lekachim" over the weekend. A lot of treasure there. Will organize and post bli neder.

One of the lekachim was from when I used to trade bigger, and reminded me trade management around sizing and max risk. I decided to try working that method again... Basically, go big first trade. If it's a winner I can trade again, but smaller. If it's a loss, I'm done. Motivates me to get the first trade RIGHT. Or sends me away if I don't qualify to continue.

Today the setup I like the best was AAPL. It is LONG TERM failing on the daily/weekly. Shorting weakness in the fin. However, bc I'm in pretty big, I'm taking old pltgt also of 10-15%. Also some support at 130. In retrospect I took it off early. But without retrospect, aka in real life, I like the levels I picked (short on pb to vwap), and I love the money I made. Done by 9:50am. Off to enjoy my day!

THE REAL WIN OF THE DAY is that I resisted other trades as I'm journaling. I decided not to mess with my solid gains...that is a TILT trigger 🌪. Best move is to take my money and run! 

nicks and cuts

Traded super tight tolerances today QCOM, MSFT, MU. Hard work for a green day that was straight down on indexes.As I write SPY -1.8%, QQQ -2.8%. If there's going to be any kind of Santa Claus rally, it's running out of time.  

I might annotate later, but I need to run out and I don't really feel like coming back to it. Frustrating day.

I guess if I think about it more, tight stop is the right stop, and the problem, if anything was that I picked choppy trades vs the no-bid trades that didn't zig zag so much. How can I anticipate that?

Chasing/flushing

Quickie recap today. Over eager before the numbers and then got flushed twice. Need to spend more time with the psychology book! And definitely I need to keep trading small. I don't trust myself yet.

Chased NKE, came out net even on 80%. Then got stopped before the reverse on the ndl so solidify tough net loss for the position. Why was I still holding all the way down there? I held all my stops, just shouldn't have given so much room (or maybe should have given a liiiitle more room?)

Then I got over-enthusiastic on a TSLA long for a reversal that didn't work, also hit with a flush and reverse. 

Looked at SPY after Consumer Confidence number and thought to buy, but passed bc I was overexposed already. Maybe that was the mistake of the day: not leaving myself room to trade after the number.

harnessing that mindset?

Market opens down again. So oversold I think anything could trigger a face ripping rocket launch. Yet, lots of weakness around the open.

My pick, META for a ST level breakdown. 

Entry after pop to resistance and drop. Again I didn't wait for level to develop enough, but in the subsequent minutes it held ok. 

Management. Initial stop ndh, quickly reduced to the level just above my entry. In a few minutes it flushed. I didn't grab the stall, and it rose all the way back. Continued down, but didn't quite make it to my T1 or pltgt. When it stalled down there I though to grab some off, but reduced my stop instead...only to yank it and then actually get my face ripped off. A +15% went -30. I felt all the points along the way I "should have" stopped. First fatal flaw is always yanking the stop. Why!? I can re-enter if it sets up again. Why am I arrogant like that? 

Knowing I was on the wrong side of META, I started a long even before the short stopped. Got a nice winner on the starter and a loss on the add. 

Then the RISK MANAGER arrives. I want to trade again. I allocate myself the minimal increment more money and get myself another META long. It chops and chops. Meanwhile, it looks like the market is going to roll over. I squeeze the stop on the META calls.

...and also the risk manager allocates another chunk and I open a concurrent SPY short via 0dte (not even 1dte???) puts. This is a bit of a desperate kind of trade, obv. BH it made my day.

PSYCHOLOGY

1. As always, I like the system of allocating money to myself for additional trading vs leaving it all sit there. Guardrail against bingeing.

2. I wish ruthless-trader will always show up! Shrewd entries. Tight stops. Sync'ed with the market. I should name her and try to invoke her. Where was she when lackadaisical-trader yanked the stop from META?

psychology

 I just started reading The Mental Game of Trading.
Here comes a new season of introspection and improvements!

Today, I was aware that META at the bottom was "hard work" but I went ahead and yanked my stop which is fatal flaw #1. Later in the day, I traded more eagle-eyed and I like that version of me when trading. More ruthless. I want to work on bringing that version of me more often. Details in recap post.

new playbook ideas

Breakout gaps has been a hard game lately. There seem to be rare seasons for good breakout gap trading... when the market is trending strongly. Working on other plays so I can trade additional valid plays.

I'm adding to my playbook: breakouts without gaps (trend trade); reversals off extreme daily levels (fade/reversal trade).

Today, Monday morning after a helluva week. Market is oversold but still showing weakness. The play for 4+ days: sell any bounce. 

AMZN setup = level breakdown on volume

Entry: waited out the opening flush. Felt fomo. On the bounce, it went above vwap, and despite waiting for this bounce, I was overeager on the entry. 

Management: It got near my ultimate stop then resumed down, but when it bounced again I got worried about holding full size so I trimmed part for a loss. Then instead of p/l target, I worked with a stock price target (a old/new technique). When it got below my T1 86.31, I squeezed the stop to capture a smidge more. Then stopped the rest on a different tightened stop while market looked to bounce.

Market is so oversold, I'm worried that a bounce will RIP. Later it dropped strongly as the market made new lows, but that's not my money. There is no scenario where I should still been in for the 10:15 bounce. That would be a re-entry play if anything, but I was done.

IWM setup = reversal off support

Typically I am not good at picking tops/bottoms, but in an oversold market like this, I would like to be able to buy support for a bounce. This is a terribly sloppy example. As the market (SPY, QQQ, IWM) was bouncing, I saw that IWM was one that had some sort of relative strength on the 1 minute. And hadn't broken down yesterday's bar. 

Entry: Very late! Watching lvl2 and very tight stop, grabbed 0dte calls. 

Management: Have to trade these tight, and take profits esp bc my late entry. I like what I did (easy to say on a winner). Initial stop below the previous 1 min bar. Sell half on the stall. Tight trail stop on second half. SCALP! Countertrend trades should be given zero room.

aapl long term failure

In terms of sentiment, AAPL is making a lonnnng term trendline breakdown.

AAPL (weekly)

sidelines

I didn't trade today. Also no trading tomorrow. I'm in the doghouse, calming down from my tilt. Monday and Tuesday didn't go great, even trading small, so I'm discouraged. Headspace is "nothing will ever work ever again". I realize this is dramatic, but it's not conducive to good trading.

I haven't been seeing my "best setups" too much lately and so I hack around on sub-optimal stuff. I feel like I want to work on different kinds of setups, and/or different kind of screening. I'm really off kilter right now. 

It's a frustrating mental space. Maybe it's not the right climate for my system. Maybe I need new plays in my playbook. 

A little crazy how much the tilt affected my mentality. It's been a while, and maybe I thought that I'm past that. I haven't had a max WEEK loss for a long time. But it didn't happen out of the blue. It came after a series of forced trades and silently (actually, not so silent in retrospect) accumulating indiscretions. I need better checks on that. 

Hoping to corner myself to focus on reading and studying. Maybe working on additional plays. 

Anyway, tomorrow a Friday off is definitely in order.

same mistake - LESSON

Today I made the same poor judgement on BA as I did yesterday(inverse) on QCOM. I'm trying to buy a pullback of the gap/go. But I'm actually going in on more than a pullback. 

Yesterday, QCOM was supposed to be a bear play but it opened with a strong bull surge that I tried to short. Today, BA was supposed to be a bull play but I tried to buy a too-big drop. A drop, not a pullback. I should have passed.

For comparison, QCOM yesterday

penalty box

I'm in the penalty box this week after tilt on NFLX Friday for max loss. It's been a long time since I tilted, but I should never assume I'm immune. I am trading 1/10 my usual size this week, but already I've broken a rule on QCOM by yanking my intended initial stop. Maybe I need to paper trade tomorrow.

What I did right today, though, was trading "best setups". Not that they played out for me, but...

RIVN 

Setup - Gap below level

Entry - Strong open down

Management - initial stop above signal bar. Stopped partial on 2 bar reversal, took smaller target and tighter stop when I got the chance.

QCOM - for a short, but it was inexplicably stronger than the market. Is this one of the stocks people love to buy when it's hit? Or did wells fargo downgrade it so they could start buying?

Setup - Gap below level

Entry - I hesitated over really strong opening move, but wanted to short reversal down below vwap. 

Management - Initial stop 117.93, above mini range. Yanked that, then really tested my luck as market ran down without QCOM. Then WTF did I give it so much room? "Logically" because my gap and go is supposed to go. So I gave it room. But I gave it even too much more room.

Distractions

Household stuff, got to my desk late today. Didn't do thorough prep. 

WYNN seemed to be making a move. It paid then failed. That's why I take partials!

fizzle

I had 2 amazing opening trades. Long SPY, short AMZN as the market ripped up and dropped out in the opening 15-30 min. Then QQQ didn't break that range the rest of the day. SPY broke above, but barely, and gave it back. 

By 10:04 I had all green day, solid gains. Guess what happened next? Instead of shutting down my platform, I kept watching the market while journaling and saw a "great" setup....and gave it all back. All of it? Hello?! 

I should never have been in, so I went full size and then scaled around it? At least go smaller if I can't resist! A total waste of my time and money.

Anyway, summary journaling since I'm disgusted with myself but need to record it.

grind down

 Today (as of 1:50) is a big down day, but it has felt like a grind. There was a huge flush in the opening, then a 90+ min grind sideways before the next flush. I had maybe more than average tickers, but I had a lot of exits as I tried to lock some profits but still ride through chop in the index trades. One 0dte trade in the chop was a strong reminder that I don't want to run out of time, so I went back to 1dte. 

Again today I'm at my desk a lot longer than I like to be. I had an opening loss that I felt compelled to reverse. If I could just make that money without the losers... !

The literal worst thing about a trading day like today is the annotating and journaling. I should keep this in mind when I'm tempted to take too many trades or stay at my desk too long. 🤣

Market continues to grind down. I'm fried (esp after journaling), so there's no way I'm going back in!

SI

Setup- Gap below st level

Entry- Turning back down after pop

Management - It blew through my desired initial stop before I could enter it, so I took ndh stop, which gave a bigger than desired stop. Spreads were big here, so I had a small position. Why not just pass? After the fact, pass seems like a good idea.

RCL

Setup - Gap below st level

Entry - puts below opening micro level.

Management - Initial stop ndh. Thankfully I got a pltgt before it bounced. Rode the bounce but as I tightened my last stop, it grabbed me out before another leg down. Still, when I pass on those, I'm otherwise likely to eat it. I got MY money.

GOOGL

Setup - nms, callout on tradertvlive and I liked the action

Entry - short ndl

Management. Initial stop above the bear fin preceding my entry. Then I tightened my stop irrationally tight and stopped out just in time to miss the dummmmp!

SPY

Trade #1 calls Setup - After a big dump to the 20dma, it looked like it was stabilizing. If SPY was going to be strong today, that would be a perfect place for a reversal. Ah! But I'm not good at trading reversals (I say to myself)... so what (I say to myself), and regret it as I very often do. 

Entry - I waited for a slight higher low, then bought calls. Initial stop was ndl, then I saw other things weakening and decided I don't want to give it that much room. Prefer to flip it...

Trade #2 puts Setup - Continuation down

Entry - after I exited calls, I guess all the other longs jumped ship too, so there was a surge down. Waited for the bounce, then shorted. 

Management - Initial stop above the previous minute high (recipe for overtrading but here it worked). Got my target. Rode a too-big bounce, then decided I didn't want to sit in midday chop and lose time -- 0dte always seems like a good idea when I enter, but it's not a good idea -- so I tightened stops on partials to get out.

IWM

After exiting SPY puts I was still greedy. Reevaluate indexes for weakness and I assessed IWM had the most potential for further downside (see below)

Entry - break below level

Management - Initial stop above the fin. Got some pltgts, had to shave some off near b/e, but really wanted to ride it for the daily breakdown. Agonizing wait! Then traded around IWM price levels for targets and stop areas.

preempting and oversizing

Market opened inside with a bearish bias. Big economic announcement expected at 10am. Frequent arrogant mistake: I thought I could get a quick trade off before the announcement. Correct mentality would have been... no moves are going to really happen before the announcement, I should wait.

^LESSON

Going back to an older format to try to focus on skills. Last trade was definitely trade of day on UAL.

TSLA

Setup - gap down against green bar. 

Entry - breakdown of opening range, breaking vwap

Management - stop above igniting range.

Comments - at first not sorry to be out. Later the short did play out. Of course I should stop, but perhaps I should have found another chance to re-enter. In reality, it didn't do what it was "supposed" to, so I stopped watching it.

QQQ 0dte

Setup - nms.

Entry - break above opening range

Management - initial stop 290.59, below igniting range. When it stalled at the first top (a premkt level) and other watchlist fading, I yanked a smidge. In retrospect not enough. Rode one bounce down to vwap, but then raised my stop. How did I lose so much while exiting ~around my entry? I bought on a surge, so option price was exaggerated. I lost some time and the option was shrinking before the ISM number. 

UAL

Setup - gap (inside) then trade above short term consolidation

Entry - looking to break the box. 

Management - Initial stop below day low. 

This is the one I should have waited (obv! in retrospect) until after the announcement. When it held and then showed real strength after the ism dump, I found a chance to add. Now I'm oversize. Hoped for a really big move, so I took only half the original position at pltgt, leaving 3/4 my position which I shaved of in tiny bits until I gave up. It got to an equal high to the Nov 15 high, it had climbed a steep trendline and I dumped for the tl break.

After my close, it went up much more, but I don't think I would have gotten very much more out of the option. There was approx 10% spread in the option, so I traded a bit scared. No regrets for a really nice trade. I got my piece. Peace!

hard day for easy money

I had nice gains today, but I let the last little runner of SPY calls run all day (illusions of grandeur) and it was a literal pain in my neck.

Accumulation

 Ok yes. In mid October I did mistrust that bottoming bar. 

Since then, follow through. A few really nice green volume bars, that accompany big price-up bars and a net uptrend in play for a good few weeks. None of those accumulation mega-days have been breeched downside. It's the definition of an uptrend, but have we seen THE bottom? Time will tell. 

For now, what is the price volume action saying?

Wisdom teeth and JPow

Last week was short week for Thanksgiving. This week also a wierd week bc H had the oral surgery I've been dreading. It's been ok but tough on sleep and trading schedules. 

Today was full of economic announcements and Fed Chair J.Powell had scheduled remarks at 1:30. Morning trades didn't work, even with all the news. Everyone waited for Powell. I underestimated that and hacked around in the morning. I thought there would be some opening trades, but it was inside all morning and gappers didn't work. 

I was busy with H, so I missed the 1:30 trade and the next 2 legs. But there was a lot of power there so I got the last ~90 min move w SPY calls for stellar returns. Made back the morning hack and much more, all with a small $ input. When those 1DTE options go in the money then plow higher, that's the dream! Glad I gave myself one day out so I didn't sweat so much, even though I'm sure the 0DTE paid more. I traded MY trade.

First try at SPY calls at 2:30 was jumping on extreme strength. No regrets for a small try, and no regrets taking a tight stop on only partial and trying to ride the rest. Also tried puts, even while holding calls, bc sooo overbought. But the strength was truly there so I had more confidence and a better pivot when I went added long again at 2:49. 

It was a bummer to take those small targets... but only in retrospect. The trade was choppy for a while and It was 100% the right thing to pay myself first. Take some gains and let the rest ride. Clockwork! And it paid baby!

nip it! also, brackets?

Did I think I could resist a trading day? Am I addicted? Maybe? It just seems too easy to sit down at my desk for a few minutes and squeeze a few bucks out of the market. However!!... yesterday I made an imprudent IWM trade. It was nms and it messed my gains. I've been kind of slacking on this in general - hacking at nms. Remember: I can't trade just anything.

I am reinstating a zero-tolerance policy on undisciplined trading. Last night I moved 75% of my cash out of my account to make sure to keep it small for several days. It's Thanksgiving week. We're in a several day market range. This market calls for strict discipline.

Several picks this morning, oddly enough. But anticipating a thin market I need to be selective. 

ZM caught my eye early as a big gap down. Opening minute a down bar, but market initially popped. I need a pullback. Then it popped to ndh. Now I want short below vwap. This was trading wild, so I took a starter position. I wanted in, just in case, but wasn't ready for size. 

Before I could even enter my stop order, it popped to ndh (would have stopped me). Another volatile bar, and then I put my stop above that new high. Entered the stop for full position size (in advance of building up). When it dropped below vwap and market was also dropping, I got full size. Stop was already in place. 

Then something very interesting that I want to look into more. The bracket order. Because ZM options trade wild, I opened my initial starter with a 20% profit bracket on it. As the option crossed the profit target I worried the bracket wasn't going to execute. but it executed WAY better. This also happened a previous time I have used a bracket like this. I wonder how it works, but based on 2 instances, a bracket seems better than my usual limit order. I wonder how it works for stops, but generally I don't use option pricing for my stops so I don't see how I could set that in a brackte.

Back to the trade. After I took off a too-small piece for my pltgt, I tightened tolerances and skimmed off other partials. Another push down gave me a great gainer and final bit out on a stop.

After this glorious trade, I implemented another bit of discipline I'm trying to impose and I quit my platform. No data capture, no recap, no looking around. File-Exit. Came back several minutes later to restart, capture data, and quit again. No messing around! Use strong guardrails to backstop myself.

Thanksgiving break

 Today is my only trading day this week. Thanksgiving is Thursday and we're getting hectic quickly. I think the market will be slow.... so I will surely have fomo. 

Ripped off a few quick trades this morning for small net gains. If I could undo one trade it would be IWM. Not just because it was a loser, but because if I'm trading indexes it means I can't find something actually good to trade. Index trades should maybe go on the blacklist.

Gave back gains

Gave my day back today by messing around. 

Did great with TAKING TARGETS on PANW long, M short. Then a loss on AMD long and a hella beauty on TSLA short. 

And then... my fatal flaw... even though I said to myself in the TSLA trade, this is my last trade of the day... Go out on a high.  Then I went ahead and tried spy calls for a loss and spy puts which finally paid on a flush, otherwise it would have been a real loser instead of just give-back.

Need a guardrail to stop myself when my brain says stop, even if I still have itchy fingers. Maybe exit the platform instead of keep watching.

pullback day

 Today we are finally trading below a 4 day range. This is the move down that I was trading for yesterday but it didn't crack. And yet, stuff isn't really dumping. This is a down move in context of a generally up month in which we had a strong bottoming bar and another 2 igniting days. Maybe the move was already in the gap. Important levels are being respected in SPY, QQQ.

I was looking for shorts for daily followthrough: short after a 1 min bounce. I caught TSLA short twice, AMZN short for wins and NVDA short (chips extra strong!) for a loss. Based on the action, I decided to take more conservative exits. Easier targets, more off at the target, tighter stops. That served me well, for a tiny green day bc NVDA full loss.

What a day!

 What a day! I missed it. The market gapped up a few percent this morning (after -2.5% yesterday), and proceeded to trade up like gangbusters all day. An amazing day, but the market still doesn't look good. Maybe, though, this was the follow through day to the Oct 13 bullish bottoming bar I was so skeptical about. Time will tell, but I really hope so.

I got a META short in the opening pullback for +13%, but missed the whole day runup in everything. Not my money today.

META

day after midterm elections

Inside day for the indexes. Don't expect follow through.

Trades were hard to find. I went with 60 min setup on META gapping above oversold levels, and DIS gap below major long term levels on earnings.

META was very volatile. I didn't enter or exit well, result was a very small net loss. 

DIS was also chop. I got a good entry and was able to have a good trade. 

Add to my analysis: inside day = don't expect followthough AND expect choppy trade. Wait for levels. Don't chase.