A few days ago my trading clerk asked me to take a look at QIHU. It had exploded above its ATH on heavy volume. I didn’t take a trade in it on Day 1 but made a note of the 36.50 pullback low after its Opening Drive. On Day 2 after a stock has broken out I like to get … Read More
My Thought Process: $AAPL
Here is a timeline of my trading thought process starting on April 24th the morning after AAPL reported earnings through April 29th. I want to put this first StockTweet in context. After AAPL released their earnings report trading was halted. AAPL announced a capital plan to return about $100 billion dollars to shareholders via dividends and stock buybacks. They reported … Read More
Rich Trader, Poor Trader
Trading is inextricably linked with money. You are taking risk in the markets because you want to make money. If you trade well over a long period of time, then you will make lots of money. We all know what the results of trading success can look like, and that motivates us—the cushy bank balance, nice house(s), etc. Most traders … Read More
Four Ways To Get Your Trading Ready For the Summer
In most parts of the US and Europe, this winter has been positively arctic. Record snowfall, freezing temperatures and howling wind. It can be a downer, even for the hardiest of souls. Even then, most traders are in the office, focused on their screens and their results and not paying any attention to the weather. Summer may seem like the … Read More
Time & Price
This afternoon I tweeted that price was insufficient to confirm a move and that you need time as well. What does this mean? As traders we attempt to capture a new trend in the market we are trading. One of the most commonly used signals for a new trend is a powerful change in price. I have heard many traders … Read More
Finding a Jungle Guide
It can be a rough and cruel world out there in the markets. The competition is high, people are cutthroat, and the markets are never easy. Sometimes it can feel like a feral jungle, with danger lurking everywhere. You want to give yourself every edge and extra chances to succeed, but what really makes the difference? Simple: A mentor. In … Read More
The Intraday Swing Entry
In October 2009 I began talking to our desk about “Intraday Swing Trading”. This discussion was preceded by about six months of mounting frustration from a large group of traders. Our desk at the time consisted largely of traders we trained in 2007-2008 a time of extreme volatility in the market that favored a very aggressive style of momentum trading. … Read More
Should Short Term Traders Consider News–Part III
On Friday I was chatting with a non-SMB prop trader that I trained several years ago. He was long DLTR when the WMT “news” broke around 2:00PM. From the chat messages you can see that we were in agreement that there was a short term “fading” opportunity in the retail names that had been quickly hammered based on a leaked … Read More