I would like to take this opportunity to officially announce my retirement from modeling. Well let me modify that statement. I will not model another day unless I get paid 10k. Ok now that makes more sense. So Steve and I were asked by Trader Monthly to do a shoot for an article they are writing about SMB Capital. The … Read More
Tier Size
The last few days have been a bit slow after the Open. We must adjust. One adjustment I make on such trading days is to lower my tier size after the Open. I traded HPQ on the Open (chart below). It held 45 and made a nice upmove to 45.25 where it was met with resistance. After a struggle at … Read More
Best Pizza
So one of our new traders, who grew up near my home town, and I were discussing the best pizza. For some reason there is this false notion that NYC has the best pizza. They don’t. The best pizza, Colosseo, is from my home town. This is not some parochial or biased call. I have traveled quite a bit. And … Read More
Vacation
It is important to take vacations during the trading year. Trading for one day is like working three days at another job. I remember in law school taking finals. We would learn and study for half the year and then take one exam. For example, I took Constitutional Law with the Jeremy Paul, now the Dean of UConn Law School. … Read More
Alert
Well yesterday was a bit slow. We trended up and then trended down towards the Close. On the Open I traded FCX and HK and recognized light order flow. I was aware not to get caught in the Low Volume P. For SMB that means the low volume programs where the short term longs lose as the stock is dropped … Read More
Formula for Success
This is a tough week for us. We’re narrowing down our invitations for our September class for which, along with June, we essentially recruit all year. We have received thousands of résumés and have sifted through them, searching for those with the background necessary to be a good trader. We interview only some of the applicants—and only some of those get … Read More
Compete
An experienced trader, GM, emailed me late last night as the Yankees were getting pounded again by the Angels. GM had some very kind words for my previous blog post, which I appreciated and made the latest Yankees loss more palatable. In return I would like to spend some of this Saturday AM offering some guidance on his recent struggles. … Read More
Getting Flustered
We had a film review yesterday with one of our better young traders. The young man can trade. But he under-performed on the Open. So we watched the video of his Open. It was like someone else was inhabiting his body. I did not recognize this type of trading from him. In fact I am not sure you can really … Read More