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Apple is my swing trade and small caps are day traders. I usually buy and sell Apple at peaks and valleys on a daily chart. As for my day trades, I look for volatility and volume combined with technical analysis. Remember I am limited in number of trades due to PDT rule. I funded my account today so tomorrow I won't have that problem. I think I timed my sell decently by the chart. What hurts is I can't buy anything today. Would like to pick apple back up below 114. Does that make sense?
I know it is still early but I have to minimize losses and take profits quickly since my account is not that large. Here is the latest chart the red arrow shows sale
AAPL doesn稚 meet my criteria. Too much volume, too many professionals playing games with each other, I don稚 think the small retail trader has a chance.
It doesn稚 have to make sense to me as long as it fits your method of trading. You池e doing much better than I am. I壇 be happy with 22% a yr much less 22% in 30 days.
When I day traded I used 5 minute charts and I found that the decision making process was almost too fast for my feeble mind. I can稚 imagine using 5 second charts.
If I have a day trade now it痴 because one of my swing trades hit my stop.
I have a trading universe of about 800 stocks.
Any stock that trades between $20 and $90 and has a volume greater than 500K and less than 3500K.
I scan these nightly for set ups.
If I find a set up I enter the next morning with a bracket order and let the exits get hit.
"The days when I keep my gratitude higher than my expectations, I have really good days" RW Hubbard
Sounds like you have a decent plan as well. I agree with you about apple in terms of day trading, but when it comes to swing trading, I have found decent success with it. There a few times it would have benefited me more to just buy and hold but I don't like much risk. That 1k day loss really was an anomaly. I usually would never let myself get in that deep. I was just pushing too hard to get to 25k. I now don't have that problem so I can free enter and exit as needed. Also, I trade primarily nasdaq stocks. I just got back from my bank and am waiting for the wire transfer to hit my IB account. It irritates me because if you check apple, there was a nice buyback opportunity that I missed. If you don't mind me asking, how much capital are you working with? Lastly, I doubt I will consistently hit 20 percent or more a month. As you know, sometimes there is no trade and you just have to wait. I have been fortunate lately in terms of trade setup and execution. I feel that shorting is going to be the best strategy for me pretty soon. I feel a downturn (correction) is coming soon. Then again, everyone says that every day! lol
I don稚 think it matters how much capital I have. I知 an anonymous poster on the internet so I can say anything. I don稚 have to worry about the PDT rule. And I can live quite comfortably with a 20% return. If you feel it will help you to know the size of my trading account PM me.
I tend to risk 0.5% of my trading capital per trade.
When I started I had problems with the PDT rule so I moved to swing trading. Once I had enough to day trade I eventually found that my returns from swing trading were not that much different than day trading and I had more time for other things and a lot less stress.
My number one priority is to preserve my capital. I take lots of small losses.
I知 strictly a long trader (Canadian tax laws treat shorting differently than longs) If we hit a bear market I値l probably trade inverse ETFs.
"The days when I keep my gratitude higher than my expectations, I have really good days" RW Hubbard
I hope I didn't offend you. You are absolutely correct. I doesn't matter how much capital you have. I was merely asking to see if we were in similar situations and how our strategies may compare. Obviously you have much more than I at this point but that is not an issue. I am still waiting for the broker to accept my wire. I might find the same as you that swing trading can be just as profitable as day trading, but I like to do both. I take very limited risks as well but for different reasons than you. I have a small account and cant afford a big loss nor would I want one even if it was affordable. Well, if Interactive Brokers doesn't post my transfer soon, I will have to wait till tomorrow to post any new trades. Again, I hope no offense was taken.
If we risk the same percentage of our capital we can compare returns of our strategies. Commissions and slippage should be about the same as we are both using IB.
With regards to the amount of capital and the amount of risk taken I found it sort of counter intuitive that with more capital I seem to take less risk.
When I started trading I thought that as I increased my capital that I would be able to take more risk, widen my stops and give the trades more room to work.
It seems now that I知 taking less risk. Taking losses sooner rather than later. Accepting that small losses are part of the strategy and realizing that I have no control over the market and only have control over how I react to the market.
"The days when I keep my gratitude higher than my expectations, I have really good days" RW Hubbard
IB finally got my wire transfer and I made a small gain after that..... But, like an idiot I forgot to cancel an order and now I own 200 shares of AAPL at 114.03. Trying to get rid of them ah but no success yet. I just got excited when I realized the chains were off and I could trade freely and tried to force a trade just for fun. Dumb idea. Now instead of being up 125 I am only up 83 dollars for the day. Disappointed in myself but that is what this journal is for. In the picture the two red triangles are where I shorted. The first green one is where I covered but I forgot I had another order for 200 that I didn't cancel. So nearly right after covering a short, it spiked and I bought it back and it went down. Pay more attention and dont chase trades especially for only a few dollars.