The Battle For $LTBR

LTBR

FORD

Trading Mind Set Up

My MIND SET UP IN THE PRE-MARKET RIGHT BEFORE the OPENING BELL
Jan  18, 2018 Thursday   5:30  am

One of the greatest enemy in the trading is my own mind set up before the open.
In which state of mind I am, depends mostly on the previous trading day (s)
As of now, I've been having many many green days in a row, and fairly to say,  with almost NONE, or very very few losing trades. Green has been all across the board. With each green day and green trade, the confidence grows at exponential rate This is where the biggest trouble usually begins. Feeling invincible, bulletproof, strong with fat acct, feeling:
I CAN BEAT ANY SYMBOL out there.
WRONG !!!  It is  EXTREMELY DANGEROUS
I learned the lesson the hard way, concluding that :
I MUST BE AWARE of my emotional state of mind prior the open, as more important factor then
doing the technical analyses for the opening gate plays.
Question to ask myself: What do I feel? Fear? Anxiety?
If YES is the answer, counter-intuitive to most of other jobs or business,
my trading day has a great chance to be a pretty good one.This is simply because these feelings will
contribute to be extra careful, executing extremely per trading plan, leaving no room for errors,
no room or  tolerance  for:

• "It is OK ,I can add here I got a lotta cash, I can beat this, I can't lose caus' I've been green 21 days in a row, I am tha' shit in this business..." 

and all that  extremely dangerous thinking that is derivative of the previous green streak (s).
I learned that when those thoughts come across my mind, I need to immediately hit myself in a head,
electroshock me with dog neck electric collar, self-inflict myself with some type of physical injury , so I can face the reality which is : TRADING IS SWIMMING IN A TANK FULL OF SHARKS that requires an INHUMAN SET OF SKILLS, mainly consist of ability of knowing  your risk, control your risk, and most importantly execute your "swimming" with unquestioned discipline, on every single day , on every single trade. Every single time you get out from the shark tank unscratched, know it was you lucky day. It is well known  fact that 95% of day traders end the day in blood. Some get scratches, some get permanently disabled, and unfortunately most  don't even survive. Must keep this fact in your mind at all the times specially before the opening bell. You are entering the gladiator arena or shark tank , use any term that is more scary, and remember, " If I feel great, If I feel positive, If I feel,

• "Yeah I can do this just as I did the past 21 green days , making $30 20,000 each month for several months, ..."  

IF I FEEL THIS, THEN IT IS TIME TO BE REALLY CAREFUL, because that is the day you will be beaten by the shark, or pierced by the spear , which ever feels worst.

The highlight for my behavior today: The very beginning went perfectly all right shorting MARA, the only reason I did small size ( less then 1000 shares ) was exactly the above : I felt very positive, from all prior green days including yesterday's $1,000 green day.

 I noticed that even if I trade the tinniest size, I could  pace easy $10,000 income per month, which translates $120,000 annually.

And it all looked nice and dandy , till my head got full of WANTS and NEEDS for MARA to drop to $3.75 so I can make more money since the original tiny size apparently was "not enough".

MARA

After making "only $230 " I wanted to drop to 3.75 , I added some more during the lul, 

and sure enough poped up and got stopped. Lost all $230 !!! 

But stucked watching the tape, and saw the sellers used this 

pop  to do some real selling, and re-entered  short again, 

with stop just few pennies above, 4.10.   It took an eternity but patience paid off.

The moral of the story here is:

When ever you are wrong KNOW you must take your loss

But also know the trade will probably turn your way 90 % of the times, and be ready to re-enter.

You are taking that stop, without asking any questions weather it may drop back or not.

In fact I ask myself all the time : Is this gonna drop?  My answer is always the same: IT WILL DROP, almost guaranteed, but the REASON I AM TAKING THE STOP is to PROTECT MYSELF FROM THAT ONE TIME WHEN IT SQUEEZES AND SHOTS UP MANY DOLLARS UP WARDS killing every short that is in the way. 

So next time you are in doubt weather you shall take your stop or not : JUST TAKE IT BY KNOWING IT WILL TURN YOUR WAY and BE READY TO RE-ENTER. PERIOD !!!

On long run you will make less gains, but you will protect your account from blowing up.

Have a happy but scary trading :)

Salute

"DaChopa" 

Win Some Lose Some Green $1,200

                                                                           TEVA

                                                                           ICPT

                                                                          BABA

ALDX

QTNT

VSTM

CORT

WM

The Same Old Boring Scalping

Picture is worth million words

The small secrets of the big traders revealed 

Study and have fun

Stay disciplined !!!

Take your losses timely and per already made plan.

                                                                            KURA

                                                                             FRTA

                                                                              FIT

                                                                             AVEO

 

                                                                              VSTM

                                                                            BCRX

Salute
@DaChopa

Swing Positions Update

It amuses me how majority of the crowds is always looking for stocks that will outperform the market and hope to nail some home runs or super novas. While it is true that there are always such longer term investments that will run to the moon, in my experience of many years of trading prior to my success, I experienced  nothing but losses. It seems like that is the case with 92% of the traders, as the statistics say only 8 % actually make consistently money from trading the markets. To make long story short, in my experience it is much easier to find tons of stocks that will not outperform the markets rather then those few that hopefully  may give the "dream come true" performance. So is the reason why  I have the best results shoring stocks even when the markets are at historic highs.This particularly works for me  on intra-day scalping  for nice gains to the do downside, besides the short term swing trades that usually take few days to few weeks.

How to Scan for Stocks

This may help some  new traders who have been asking me how to find good movers. However learning this , is not a guarantee that money will be made easily from trading. It takes extreme discipline to consistently do the right thing.

To understand the concept of finding a good moving stock lets look at few charts in hindsight first.
What is common for all these movers: The strong above average volume. The volume is fuel to move the stock just as more fuel is needed to move the car over the hill.
Fact is any stock that has nice intraday move could be tradeable,( speaking of daytrading)  such as for instance a stock that has ATR of $1 or bigger. It can be nice directional move or it can be choppy. To make money in directional-momentum move seems to be easier , although making profitable trades in choppy stocks is also possible by implementing tactics which requires different approach ( almost 180 degree opposite approach of the trading the momentum directional move )

The factor here is THE RELATIVE VOLUME. The relative volume scan is available almost on any scanner:  TC 2000,  Finviz,,  Trade Ideas and so on.  Besides that, The variable ( in this case the number 3 )  shows how many times is the current volume at the current moment higher then the average volume that symbol normally trades for the past 30 or 90 days. Each scanner is little  e bit different, with some  you can define it yourself, and some are pretty much fixed on the last 30 days. The bigger the number  is the bigger the relative volume is at the current moment. I look to have at least few hundred thousand shares traded in the first few minutes, or in the premarket, For example: there may be a stock that average volume is only 50,000 per day. Today may trade at 500,000 shares all day which is 10 x the average volume. This stock will not satisfy my criteria to trade it simply because it still has very low liquidity for the day. So I need to have at least couple of hundred thousand shares traded the first few minutes so I can actualy have enough liquidity to trade large size in and out quickly.   So I set the scan like this:

It is simple and clean. Now it is all up to which stock  I select to trade. Quick view of their daily chart helps a lot in finding a stock with the least resistance above ( if long ) or below ( if short )

You can either scroll by hoovering above the symbols or click chart view which will display all daily charts. 

From here it is all about focusing on only few, the ones that you may think are the best,  since trading everything is not easy at least not easy for  me. I'd rather stalk my symbols for the day then jump on many new ones just because I had to take some losses. Weather I will just get in and trail the stop as the stock moves or I sell the pops and buy the dips , it all depends  on how the stock is trading. I love to only trail the stops below. but there are I think more cycles when it is better to sell the pops and re-buy the dips.

Hope this may help.

Have a happy trading

AngelDan@DaChopa

New Trader Exercise WHY WANTING TO LOSE

Probably one of the biggest challenge a new rookie trader has to face is ACCEPTING TO BE WRONG and CUTTING THE LOSES SHORT.

It is easier said then done which is very natural and normal for any human being. To easily admit to be wrong and instantly reacting on it, is simply not built into the human nature, period. So if you are a new trader, and you are struggling to make any money because you are not consistent with obeying your stop losses, do not feel bad. It is very normal and very human.
Developing a discipline to admit that you are wrong and acting upon it, is not a skill you can obtain over night because you just decided to quit  your job and became professional trader. Learning or defining certain rules to trade is the easiest part. Anybody can learn it by reading few books or even by just reading my blog. But why not everybody can make money trading? And why not everybody can simply decide to obey the stop loses and became successful trader instantly?

Learning is the easy part, but becoming successful trader is all about practicing what you learned by doing it over and over again by implementing a extremely high level of disciple. I am referring to such level that is equal to a professional athlete who keeps practicing constantly even at his pick performance.

How do you practice discipline? It is  extremely difficult specially if you have no pointers which direction to take. Do you just decide  and say: "OK I will be disciplined from tomorrow" and expect the magic to just happen...  LOL 

Here is one pointer that may help a struggling trader. I heard it long time ago from a master trader who shared this with me so I share now with you:
THIS IS A DRILL ON HOW TO LEARN TO EXECUTE those darn stop losses that you always plan to take but when the stock gets there you just simply change your entire plan and do something totally different, or stupid, which  one day will cost you your whole acct.... if it hasn't happen yet it will happen guaranteed and you can take this to the bank. 


Let's assume that you know to pick good entries,  the easy part that everybody can learn quite quickly anyway.. 
For  ONE WEEK YOU MUST IGNORE ANY THOUGHTS OR NEEDS OF MAKING MONEY ! 
Instead of focusing on "HOW MUCH I CAN MAKE" you will focus on:
 "I WANT MY STOP TO BE HIT ASAP AND I CAN'T WAIT TO EXECUTE IT"
And every time you execute your stop you will give yourself  one reward point. Your goal is to accumulate as many award points as possible by the end of the week. 20 would be a great number to achieve. However you must collect 20 points by consistently obeying all stops. If you disobey ONE STOP even if the price afterwards goes in your favor YOU FAILED ! Start from zero again. Remember: doing 20 in a row is of essence for a reason. The winning trades in between are just winners and you do not count them.   I know it sounds scary on a first thought right?  Wanting to lose on purpose? How crazy this is? Why would I want to lose on purpose??

BY FOCUSING ON THE:
"I WANT MY STOP TO GET HIT !!! "  You WILL NOT ACTUALLY MOVE THE STOCK TO HIT YOUR STOP!!! You ARE NOT ABLE TO MOVE THE STOCK ANYWHERE!!!! Regardless of what you think, what you want , what you wish , what you think you can predict, or what you actually do, the stock price will move UP or DOWN  and there is absolutely NOTHING you can do to change that. ( Unless you are Martin Shkreli and buy the entire float and move the price from $3 to $54 in one day ) 


By focusing  on "I WANT MY STOP TO GET HIT !!! "  you will ONLY MAKE SURE THAT IF THE STOCK GETS THERE YOU WILL 100% execute your stop simply because you set your mind to WANT TO DO THAT , and you will protect your acct  from potential blow off. 

 After completing this exercise SUCCESSFULLY  you will never be the bad old trader you always was: THE STOP LOSS DISOBEYING GARBAGE TRADER .

Now get this question  into your mind : ":Do  you really think  that after you enter a trade just by WANTING TO LOSE ; THE STOCK WILL ACTUALLY HIT your STOP???
How often when you entered your trade,  you WANTED TO BE A WINNER but it just went totally against you? How often it went to your planned stop loss area that you did not want to happen? And how easy was it for you to execute that stop loss that you DID NOT WANT TO HAPPEN?
This is very serious mental game no joking !
YOU HAVE TO WANT TO HIT YOUR LOSS SO YOU CAN EASILY EXECUTE IT RIGHT THERE WHEN or IF the price gets there.


If you DON'T WANT YOUR STOP LOSS TO BE HIT , and the stock goes there , DO YOU THINK YOU WILL BE ABLE AND YOU WILL WANT TO EXECUTE SOMETHING THAT YOU DID NOT WANT TO HAPPEN IN THE FIRST PLACE ???

It is extremely hard to execute something that in first place you DID NOT WANT TO HAPPEN !!!  Do you agree now?

SO YOU MUST LEARN TO WANT THE BAD THING TO HAPPEN SO YOU CAN EXECUTE  your plan WITHOUT ANY SECOND THOUGHTS when it happens !!! Ok?

This is the $1,000,000 post that  you may want to save print and read every morning before market opens.   

Try for  ONE WEEK to IGNORE ANY THOUGHTS OR NEEDS OF MAKING MONEY!! 
Limit your size accordingly to the amount you "WANT TO LOSE" comfortably AND LETS SEE WHAT HAPPENS. Again, this is assuming that you already know what are good probable entries where you have an edge. 

Happy Trading and if you want to drop a line how did this exercise go,  that will be great to see .

AngelDan@DaChopa