You mention, “Stocks in Play” a number of times.

At the risk of sounding a bit green, I suppose this means stocks that have enough volume and movement to make it worthwhile to trade, correct? If this is the case, I’m wondering why you don’t trade the S&P emini? Maybe you do, but I haven’t heard you mention it yet and I’m on chapter 8. It’s got plenty of volume and movement so it would seem that it fits your trading criteria. Just curious about your thoughts on the ES. Thank you for your help!

Yes we trade Stocks In Play because they offer the most opportunity for short term trading.  A cheat sheet for Stocks In Play are:

a) stocks with unusual news
b) news that is substantially better/worse than the Street expected
c) stocks that are trading independent to the market
d) stocks that are substantially weaker or stronger than the market
e) stocks that tend to be cleaner and trend

We do write rules to spot such stocks intraday using volume, ATR, RVOL, price movement, gap percentage. Here is a list of Super Stocks In Play. Steve explains why we trade Stocks In Play. Steve has been arguing for intraday traders to trade Stocks In Play since we started blogging.We have been asked a similar question in the past about whether it is best to trade Stocks In Play or a basket of stocks.We will trade SPY and IWM and index ETFs on Market Days.  A Market Day is when the entire market may move substantially. Remember we are mostly looking for stocks, Stocks In Play, that will move more than 3 percent intraday and trend cleanly. The overall market does not offer many days like that so we trade Stocks In Play.

What is your opinion on trading futures v Stocks In Play?

“You can be better tomorrow than you are today!”

Mike Bellafiore is the Co-Founder of SMB Capital and SMBU, which provides trading education in stocks, and options. Bella is the author of One Good Trade and The PlayBook.  He invites your questions at [email protected].

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