B"H I got redeemed this morning

If I'm praying over a trade, if the only hope I have left is Divine intervention, I'm not following my plan. 

While I do believe that GD is involved in my life, in the market, in the world, I can only do my hishtadlut. I can only follow my rules. Hashem decides. If I've abandoned my rules, and all I have left is to try to call for a "favor", that means I'm not protecting my capital, I'm not acting with discipline... I'm gambling. And I'm not a gambler. I'm a Trader. 

So yesterday I couldn't get myself to stop NVAX puts (after having dumped my calls, which was the right play). Thankfully, NVAX dropped out this morning enough to get back almost flat on that. 

But it's not progress. I need to move my account forward! upward! and with clockwork trading, not with hope and prayers.

Thank you Hashem for intervening to help me. The help I should be asking for, though, is for self control to make wise decisions and help to follow the plan. 

Friday's loser

 This is a case of a simple loser. Good pick, good play. didn't work. Every loser is a huge bummer at this point, though. I need to stay clockwork and my $ will come.

Descending spiral

Today I am grateful. I took home some calls that I stupidly held overnight. I got rescued from them. Didn't even try to optimize it. Just lucky to get out of wide spread, low volume, tomorrow expiration stupid calls without losing my pants. So I got out for +3% in the first minute and I'm happy as a clam. Whatever happens after that, was not my money. I'm not even going to look back. Today, luck wins.

Then I had 2 more winners in MU puts and NVDA calls. I caught the move and didn't stick around when both reversed hard. That's how I want to trade! In and out.

BUT, I am still in the throes of a terrible descending spiral in my account. I have moved a lot of cash out of my trading account to slow myself down and keep powder dry, so I'm comforted by that, but why do I keep trading like an ass?

I need to follow CLOCKWORK TRADING rules: small size; tight stops; pay myself first. 

What is my major malfunction? I freak out over losing trades. Literally lose my mind! I think my main defense against this needs to be the tenants of clockwork trading.

• Small size keeps losers small
• Tight stops keeps losers small
• Pay myself first ensures I can lock in some profits

I might also add: trade only the most liquid options; trade only the opening move. If I'm not done before 10, something is wrong. 

I think I need to do some research about how to not freak out over losers. Not revenge trade and all the other crap. 

Restraint for +1%

 Just trying to regain my sanity. A few small trades. 

Up is down and down is up

Up is down and down is up again today. The big gappers up above levels, all crushed down. The gappers down, all surged up. WTF? 

First of all, a great lesson in need to take quick profits. But why? What makes a continuation day and what makes these reversal days?

So far 10:45am, I'm flat on closed trades, but have one giant loser still open. I may eat this big. Ugh.

And back down -10%

Clear as day. Started great. Then dig the hole deeper and deeper. How do I stop?

Starting the month +10%.

Extremely strong open this morning. Lots of nice setups that launched🚀 like gangbusters. I was mostly done at 9:47. Fun to get on for the ride.

New trade chart including open/close times

BABA beautiful pennant breakout. Ran so strongly. For a while I was not sure if my market order got filled. Then after it filled I just entered an order for +$100. Then around that time the call simply disappeared from position list without showing in my realized list. Did I ever own it? Did I sell? Eventually it showed up, but it seems like I was trading before the options market had its head on straight. 

Later, as I was journaling, I saw it bounce off the vwap and tried another small position with insanely tight stop.. Got a smidge off that, and it didn't make ndh so I'm satisfied with my sell.

BILI turning back up on daily. Whole market launched. Missed the first entry bc other open trades. Traded a micro entry with very tight tolerances. I think it only worked bc market was to the moon.

MSFT, like the others, breaking above high triangle.

PTON new ath. Got my piece.

+10% day, but very destructive month

+10% day
But very destructive
-13% week
-53% month

A lot of days I liked my picks, maybe I played them wrong. Overall feeling that "up is down and down is up" where good gaps up sold off and good gaps down were bought.

What I can say about today is I traded small and with tight stops. I traded today's expiration, which is both a good way to gain and a good way to get totally burned. Today I gained, bc picky timing and tight stops.

Today I also used 15% pl target vs 12%. I feel it worked well, and I'm glad to keep shaving off these extra dollars.

QQQ gapped up about 1.5% this morning with FB and AAPL each gapping up 5%+ to ath. Looked gorgeous, but they sold hard and I did a good job waiting and waiting.
The picks that were "supposed to" go down, CVX, CAT, GILD initially ran up hard.

Up is down and down is up.
What is the psychology there? Gap to new ath, so profit taking?
The gaps down were arguably gap below middle range bases, so I can't say gap below strength (see AKAM, huge loser). If anything, gap below neutral.

+8% but missed so much more

Market opened -1%, but the only gaps down were breakout failures from yesterday. There were several amazing gaps up, but I was so wary bc down market day.

Market opened with volatility and I had 2 big losers to start. UPS finally made my day, and then good trade in QCOM, but I traded them too tight bc market was down and I was skeptical. Anyway, I still made a nice day, this 9Av.

AKAM puts from yesterday still riding. they are .20x.40. Could go to zero, I presume. Still open.

Small red day, having lost my gains. Partial still open.

I gave SBUX too much room. I didn't take off enough AKAM when I had the chance, but I think that one will still come back (half still open as I write). I wish SBUX didn't drop out so hard, maybe I had a bit high entry, but the market at that time was so strong, so I thought I was preempting the breakout.

Not such a great trading day, but at least I don't feel like I did something impulsive or wrong that caused my losses. Just a standard small red day of my system.

Update: somewhat bigger red as AKAM remainder will probably go to zero at this point. ugh.

Expensive rookie mistake. -15% day. OUCH!

Rookie mistake: MMM puts, I entered a market order (my usual technique) before the contracts really opened. So #1, the pricing I saw wasn't the market and I ended up taking 2x big position as I meant to; and #2, I got a TERRIBLE price. When it finally started moving down I took some off (not enough, in retrospect) and then just kept eating partials as it went back up.

So MMM was an expensive loss, and I didn't trade anything else during that time so I missed anything else.

When MMM seemed to be settled down, I bought MRNA calls that went against me too.
UGH!!

And now, at 10:45, I'm down pretty big on my smaller-account. I feel that feeling where I just need one big trade.

But what I need to remember is: Today is a market inside day, and my trades aren't working. More trading will probably not make me more money. It will just give me more pain and more toxicity. I need to walk away, lick my wounds and go do something productive with the rest of my day.

update I came back for a SPY short at the end of the day which helped. Small position that did really well, but only a small dent out of my terribly big red day.

Small trades add up +5%, and no more sloppy journaling

A satisfying green day!
+5% by 9:55 on my decreased account size--moved money out to slow myself down and preserve ammo.

My plan for the day was:
4 trades maximum
15% pl target (vs 12%)
Tiiiiight stops

AND, plan to annotate my charts. I think I've gotten sloppy/lazy with journaling as I've gotten sloppy with my account. No more zillion trade days that I'm too discouraged to try to annotate. Need to trade clean and clear, and then it should not be hard to annotate.

So with regards to aiming for 15%, I'm not sure how that worked. Today I think tight stops was more of what helped me than taking targets.

I like how I pressed in and got my $$ in the opening moves. I don't like when I mess around after 10. After 10 should be just trimming and trailing, not initiating.