getting better

i thought we were getting a turnaround, so i bought some x. then got stopped out. no big deal, its the name of the game. second trade area, i bought buy accident, i actually meant to short it, made money on an incorrect trade. then, i shorted it like i originally intended and lost money. the momo felt strong so i went long it. made a couple bucks. looking back, it seems i could have shorted it once again into the strength after i got out of my long. but that wasn't the trade i was looking for. i was looking for a break of that consolidation and started shorting at the high end of the consolidation to get a good price. what happened -> i shorted the consolidation break out.

















shorted as the momo was pushing down. possibly could have held longer, but i feel comfortable with this trade.

















was thinking there was going to be a bounce here. dead wrong. tight stop, no worries.

















looks like i had this one right. stop should have been at .27 but that was very far away from my entry of .01. still it should not have mattered. instead, i get out after the stock jerked around a little bit and then it continues to fall. i was also more jumpy because of the mistake i made in IOC, below.

















shorting this pattern may or may not be a mistake, what was the mistake was not seeing the spread. i hit the button, and i was out of the money .25 immediately. then it ran up, i got out, and then it dropped back down. almost the same trade happened with CELG later in the day, but the spread was less so there was less jerky motion.

















shorting the retracement. did not work the first time. went for it again, worked out, but you could feel it wasn't going to move much. i should have taken another try at the next retracement, but for a $125 stock, i would expect a little bit more movement.

















this one plain sucks. i had this chart up with trendline alerts set if the stock should pass my lines, and for some reason, the alert did not pop up. next time i saw FDX, it was popping on my screens because of huge volume. i jumped in for a little money, but i could have done real well getting in earlier.

















this one came across the screener as a volume spike. i hoped in the action for .16 just to see it ride down $2. you know, you wait days for something like this to happen,and when it does you take a quick profit. i will be better prepared next time.


















this was like the FDX trade but i saw it happening, put out my bid, and it never got hit. i decided not to raise the bid because then my stop would have been wider. that was a mistake.

this concentration on my stops takes me out of some good trades. but maybe it keeps me out of some bad ones. i have to keep watching this factor.