Strengths and Weaknesses 08-31-2015

After having a really solid month it seems like a good time to step back and review how my overall trading is going. Monthly review will be coming shortly, but ultimately this month was a "breakout" month for me.

I think there is a natural tendency to focus on improving weaknesses, but at the same time it is just as important to maximise strengths. That being said, I think I do a good job of that.

For each strength and weakness I will go through and give myself a summary on how currently doing, a plan of attack for the future, and a level of how important it is to attack this course of action.

Strengths:

(1) Using bigger picture to generate a short term trading idea.
              - This is probably one of the harder to measure things. But in general I feel like my bigger                       picture ideas usually work pretty well; and they are quite often held back by my                                   poor/lacking execution on the lower timeframe. For example: If a stock looks strong and I                   want to be long on a break over a key level; but it fakes out I will lose money on the long                     idea, whereas I should have waited for it hold. Or another example (although I'm getting                     better at this one), I think a stock is a short based of bigger picture, then it goes down all                       day and I somehow lose money on it.
                  Having a good read on the bigger picture seems to be extremely handy for developing a                       high conviction idea (one of my other strengths).
              - This is something I would like to work on for, and the logical step seems to be to begin                        swing trading. However, I don't feel that moving to swing trading is needed given my                          current focus on intra-day consistency.
              - Therefore I have no interest in beginning to pursue this further. But when I do, I will be                        sure to keep it deliberately separate in a different account to ensure that I approach it                            differently and that it doesn't draw attention away from my main focus (that is, consistency                  from day to day).

(2) Trading small normally and then switching modes and hammering a "conviction setup" with massive relative size.
              - I think part of the reason I do this so well is because of the emotional disconnect between                    my main account and my back account. In order to maximise this I need to focus on the 3                    identified weaknesses.

Weaknesses:

(1) Developing an idea and going full size straight away or very quickly. This particularly causes trouble when trying to trade size (naturally), but it also harms normal trading significantly as well.
             - I have definitely improved on this a lot. The improvement largely resulted in the                                  improvement of consistency this month. Part of the benefits from going partial size at a time                 is to control risk by ensuring having the largest size on while the trade is working and the                     smallest while the trade isn't working.
                It also helps dramatically improve the probability of success, dramatically helps getting size                 on responsibly, and helps tame fomo.
                Looking at the largest losses I have taken recently they have all been connected with                           getting the size on too quick. This also applies to the losing days in general because of the                   large number of losing trades and magnitude of them when I blunder in with full size.
                It is important to note that the days I am mindful of this are my best days and on those days                 I would almost consider it my strength because quite often a trade idea hasn't worked but I                   have managed to squeeze a slightly profitable trade and/or breakeven trade out of it.
                Another note about this is that quite often I will get to full size and there will be a very                         obvious add point later on in the trade but alas I am already full size. Or a breakout (or                         whatever) will fail and I decide that should have waited to get full size.
              - For the future I just really need to continue to develop the habit of not going in full size. I                   think this goes in line with the focus on consistency as well as well as controlling emotions                 and maintaining patience. Getting into the habit of locking some in before going full size is                 a good habit to create as well.
              - I see improving this as one of the most important things in my trading. It helps avoid the                     really bad days completely, helps improve the moderately bad days, helps stimulate                             patience, and seems to help consistency a lot! It also encourages waiting for the prices/price                 action that I want.

(2) Not paying enough attention to conviction setups.
             - My big money is made on the conviction setups. Accordingly can't really afford to miss                       them while stalking something else. It is important to develop the skill of not trying to hit a                 home run every day (which is another reason having back account for size is important),                     and instead focus on hitting singles and doubles, then changing attitude when the moment                   presents itself for further opportunity.
                This somewhat goes hand in hand with not going full size straight away for two reasons: (i)                 a conviction play develops over time into a conviction play, and (ii) a conviction play won't                 necessarily work straight away, it is just as important to pick spots, pick prices, lock some                   profit in, re-add etc. When I do pay full attention to them I get full size far too soon.
              - For the future I see myself expanding my "conviction setup plays" list. Working on early                     identification and determining price action that will turn it into a high conviction trade. And                 working on size and proper management of conviction plays.
              - I consider this to be pretty important. Particularly the early identification, which should                        lead to better management. High conviction trades would have made my year this month,                    were it not for weakness number 3. Continuing this trend is therefore pretty important.

(3) Giving too much back.
              - This applies to intraday and to longer term (week or longer). However, I am really only                        concerned about the longer term because the magnitude of the give-back, and the steps to                    control it are so much easier.
                 I think it's important to distinguish between pushing it quite hard when trading well and                      overdoing it. I would define overdoing it as more specifically whenever there is a risk of                      giving back more than one really really solid day/huge trade.
                - I haven't managed to shake this. However, on my main account keeping my account to the                  $25k mark has very simply solved the problem in my main account. Therefore I need to do                  the same in my back account. There is a slight complication in having to wait for the                            profits to clear, but I think it is well worth literally just not trading once I decide to do a                       withdrawal, on the basis that; sure I could make more money, but my historical tendencies                   have shown that I tend to get carried away with the substantial increase in balance                               available.
                Another two steps to solving this is scaling in (as mentioned above), but also setting a max                   size for the account given it's current size, and given the optimal share price of the                               conviction play.
               - This is so important that I believe the day I lock in a big profit on my back account (aka                      10k or whatever) I should simply not trade the next few days to ensure I get it withdrawn).                  Stepping forward further into the future this means that increases in sizes will be done in a                  controlled manner (e.g. keeping 1/8th of profits in the account or whatever).

(4) Scalping short term price action.
              - It is without a doubt that my strength is understanding where the stock is going (i.e. the                        bigger picture move). However I lack the (execution) skills to execute scalps to position                      myself in the direction of the move I want to catch. For example as a stock makes a lower                    high and I want to short I have no difficultly reading that price action but struggle to                            execute on it.
                 I feel like I currently negate this weakness by controlling size and only putting it on in                          certain spots. However, that isn't the be all and end all solution. Improving my scalping                        will ultimately improve my consistency and help with putting size on responsibly.
                - For the future, getting my hotkeys setup so that I have an a stop-loss order preset, just so I                   can speed up that part, which will open up a whole range of plays, e.g. momentum                               scalping etc.
                 - While important I don't think this is a priority, it is more a natural                                                          development/progression.


Ultimately this list isn't all inclusive, but I feel it covers some good points and covers what went well this August versus other months. So I will try and do this more often!

Weekly Review: 08-30-2015

Main Account: +$13610

Back Account: +$1907.

Really really happy overall with this week. Had some things going on outside the market that was busy with that's why no reviews or anything and only traded a couple of hours a day mid week.

Really really enjoying the recent consistency I've attained this month; but would like to continue the focus on that to form it into a habit.

Positives for the week:
(1) Did pretty well on the "black monday", especially given first time trading anything like that. Could have done better but can't complain too much.
(2) Didn't get too reckless after getting some good profit on the Monday.
(3) Improvement on executions etc.

Negatives:
(1) Gave too much on MPO and GBSN away. Basically the losses on individual trade were just too large. MPO was a bad trade. GBSN was a good trade but had size on and didn't stop when I should have.

So for the coming week. Happy to continue the focus on consistency and executions, but need to ensure that don't have any really bad trades that I lose far more than I should.

Trading Review: 08-28-2015

Main Account: +$636. Overall pretty happy with this day. Only one real negative; if I could trade like this every day I would be pretty happy. The reason I say this is that a lot of my trade ideas didn't really work. NFLX short, DUST long, UVXY short all didn't work but have negligible amounts for them (and positive). This is because I started small, added when it worked, and took some off for profit when I had the opportunity.

Positives:
(1) Solid execution (NFLX, DUST, UVXY etc).
(2) Really solid development of a good trade. FCX started as a really "good" trade idea, then I developed some price action ideas that would be me into max size. Then when it fulfilled that price action I executed solidly.

Negatives:
(1) MPO was a crappy trade with too much size. Poorly executed. One of those times when I would have traded it completely differently if I had shorts....

Trading Review: 08-24-2015

Main Account: +$12945.

Absolutely crazy day. Will remember this for quite a while because I haven't really experienced market volatility like this before. (I was trading forex part time as an amateur during the flash crash but I don't think that counts).

Really solid reads all day. Except on WBA where I didn't reverse my short to long, and thus missed a solid rally. Am really happy with this, because not being accustomed to the volatility; but knowing that I had to be prepared to trade aggressively, I was a bit concerned about pushing it.

Massive massive mistake today, that I will never repeat as long as I live. I counter trend traded the SPY (via ES) while it was limit down. As a result when the market open it gapped hugely against me and I missed a lot of opportunity. I couldn't add (because it moved so far down and i was in too large). As a result I missed about $7k being long ES, and missed an easy 10 point fade on UVXY that I had been planning to trade with 500 shares.

Towards the end of the day I was getting pretty sloppy, but there was still solid opportunty on UVXY; but recognised the sloppiness and opted to close down. I am a bit annoyed about the sloppiness; basically I wasn't be patient enough for entries and was going full size too quick. Basically the usual mistakes that I struggle with!

Trading Review: 08-19-2015

Main Account: +$2383.

Back Account: -$46881.

The all famous "blow-up". To offer some perspective around the figures I am now down -3227 on my back account for the month, and up 13875 for the month on main account. So fortunately it's not the end of the world, as it potentially would be if I wasn't having a good month (although it's debatable whether it would have happened if I hadn't been having a good month - more below). Taking a step back; I am really happy with raw figures this month, and the general consistency. This is the first negative day on back account (out of 12), and have only had 4/13 days negative in main account; with the magnitude of winning days being substantially larger than losers.

So what actually happened today? Most blow-ups you hear about relate to contrarian trading and doubling down on a stubborn position. That is not the case here. Firstly (and important to note that large loss still occurs on both trades, these problems just amplified the loss), the brokerage account was having issues executing orders. This accounted for approximately 10-25c on each order; which equates to exaggerating the loss by about $10-20k.
The main problems were: putting on too much size, and being way too emotional. For quite some time I have been anticipating a float rotation long setup (given the large number of shorts that have been setting up) and was prepping myself to nail it long with size. For starters this led to fomo, ultimately causing chasing with far too much size and not locking anything in (being greedy on take profits). The trade idea/trade thesis on CLTX was exactly the same for my main account and my back account. However, notice that I made money on main account and lost substantially on back account. Ironically, the trade thesis on CLTX actually worked out and it did close near the high of day; but through sloppy execution I lost a lot of money.

To sum up, causes were:
(1) FOMO/Performance pressure.
(2) Chasing.
(3) Too much size all at once. Risk realised/unrealised PnL when ever put size on. Also was trading 3x the size I have on any of these other "high conviction setups". That's far too much of an increase. Should have been at most 1.5x.
(4) Not locking in profits. Both trades were up around 10-20k at some points. No reason not to take some off. In particular CRBP came into it's all time highs and I was only planning on getting out of 1/3... I should have been aiming to get out of min of 2/3s.

Solutions are:
(1) Was only slight methodology failure ( rather it was poor psychological execution of how it should be traded). General jist is that reads were absolutely fine. It was the failure to trade around the position. Namely, not locking enough in, and sizing in far too quickly. This is further backed up by the fact that I traded CLTX really well in my main account.
(2) Regular wiring out will ensure that my size doesn't increase dramatically in a short space of time. This is a slightly issue given the t+3 withdrawal times... But reality is that I will have to work around it.

Trading Review: 08-18-2015

Main Account: -$669.

Back Account: +$4187.

Some really solid stuff and some really silly stuff today. While yesterday I felt that the positives slightly outweighed the negatives I can't say the same for today.

(1) Getting long quite a bit of size on NURO premarket. Was no reason to do that, and basically killed the day on the main account as well. It actually ended up being a pretty typical fader pattern as well!

(2) Did an incredibly good job of stopping out on OMER. I had massive size on the short and not the greatest average because I had been adding in aggressively (and didn't start in early enough), but I took the large realised loss of around $10k. Naturally as it turned out this was a great decision.

(3) Didn't start in early enough on OMER. When I am thinking of how far these pops/spikes on the open can go I'm always thinking worst case scenario! This means that I miss getting 1/4 size into the pop, which is kinda funny when you consider that the whole reason you go less than full size is to handle is as it goes against you. Accordingly I have done a playbook setup for this short.

(4) Didn't make money on the short OMER on the open. Yes I added aggressively, but should have been in from earlier and covering risk. This kind of sums up points 3 and 5.

(5) Wasn't receptive enough to the fake breakdown below $23. The immediate reclaim of $23 should have been a sign to get some size off.

(6) Did an amazing job of switching bias on OMER and getting long. Very well executed from that point of view. Only fault with the long that could possibly think of was that I could have waited a little longer to add the position.

(7) And lastly the biggest blunder of the day. EVOK... Will sum up the mistakes on it in one bullet point because there are a few. (A) Buying into resistance. (B) Not receptive enough to a fake. (C) Too much size. (D) Understanding what I needed to do (i.e. size down and potentially completely closing it, especially after I actually identified the stuff) but just not doing it. In fact I actually added after that point.

Playbook Review: $AVEO 08-17-2015

Title: Gap and Crap. Premarket Weakness. First Move Down

Strategy Description: This is very similar to the trade on ONTX on Friday in that it showed the weakness in the premarket. The general idea is that you want to short with risk against the premarket high. You should be somewhat prepared for a pop on the open; however the fact that it has shown some weakness suggests that it won't have an enormous pop off the open. For example AVEO was holding a descending trendline, whereas ONTX was trending up after a big initial move around 7am (thus ONTX likely to have more of a pop than AVEO).
I will include a chart of ONTX just for reference.

Now I messed this up. I got a little uncomfortable about the consistency of the premarket downtrend and thought an opening pop could spell a big break. Hindsight I was a little uncomfortable because I had on approximately 2/3s of the position I wanted and it was still technically on the upside. What I should have done is covered half or so and looked to reshort.

Now I just wanted to touch on something that I completely missed. Now usually I love shorting the morning parabolic pops and then loading up size when they fail and create the overhead supply. Now that is obviously the perfect scenario. You need to be prepared for the first move to be down. Now remember that the first move being down is somewhat of a confirmation so it is okay to short at these lower prices. You want to be closely watching the 5 second or tick chart and look for a failure after that first move being down (5 sec chart attached). That's the sign that you can get in. You probably only want to add/enter half as risk is a little less well defined. However that is still the entry ticket! You can see that it was still similar mechanics as the other parabolic ones, just not as nice! The ideal situation is to be short half premarket and then add the half on the failure for these ones. Obviously you don't know what it's going to do, so it's about maintaining a balance when you can define you risk.

As for the rest of the play it is just the same mechanics, hold some until end of day for lows.

AVEO Intraday:

AVEO 5 Sec:

ONTX:

Trading Review: 08-17-2015

Main Account: +$307.

Back Account: +$1002.

Overall am mildly happy with the day, there was some good trades and some bad trades. The trade of the day would have to go to the TSLA short, fading the gap up from the enormous profit target; the approx $200 from this trade came from a small position size which makes it pretty solid!
AVEO was a 100%+ gap up and I basically completely missed it. I was short size premarket on main account and got nervous around the open; thinking I might get a chance to add on opening pop. The opening pop never came and so of course I missed it. I actually tried to reshort but missed it. I have done a playbook entry on my errors and how it should have been played. I think there's about 3 important takeaways from it:
(1) When looking to take some off/being nervous as a general guideline just look to size down to 1/2 or 1/3 instead of taking the whole lot off.
(2) Don't overthink things. AVEO is probably the most likely of all these 100%+ gappers to fade given the thick float.
(3) These big faders will offer re-entry opportunities into pops/resistance. I did a better job of this than I have in the past; but can't be afraid to (what seems seems like a chase) short mild pops so long as below vwap.

Positives for the day:
(1) Some really solid ideas. BLUE was an excellent idea (poorly executed - in negatives below); same with TSLA. AVEO was a great read, poorly executed.
(2) Sizing appropriately ensured profitable day (once again).
(3) Despite mentioning that can't be afraid to short these massive gappers lower, I didn't get fomo on it and didn't chase it lower, I waited for spots. Despite missing some opportunities I am overall happy with this. As mentioned it was already an improvement.

Negatives:
(1) Some chasing still! BLUE was a chase entry should have been about 50c on 100 shares better. And there was some mild chasing going on with others.
(2) Lost a lot on some "feeler positions". Along with the idea that with all these excellent faders short there's going to be a long float rotation play I initiated feeler longs on ITEK, ICLD, VPCO, RTTR, and OHRP (all low float plays) just to keep better track of them and although I added to some on average I think I lost about $20-$30 on each feeler, which is too random and too much for a feeler. Ironically the only one of the feelers that kinda worked was OHRP and I closed that right at the lows.

Trading/Weekly Review: 08-14-2015

Main Account: +$3183.

Back Account: +$9878.

Coming into today I had the thought that I wouldn't trade, and would take it easy because I was a little overdone from the prior days. I only showed up to take advantage of some really good opportunities. And of course there were two really solid opportunities (PBMD, ONTX), which were nearly exactly the same as the setups that have occurred all week.

However, aside from the perfect setups that occurred on ONTX and PBMD I put too much size into other non-perfect setups which is a sign that I am not focusing on the disciplined side of trading. So this week, number one goal needs to be to keep the profits from this week. Trade everything small and focus on the max drawdown of $200 unless the perfect setup occurs again (which I would add seems likely given there was one or two every day this week).

I think this week really emphasised the importance of narrowing down my "playbook" and honing in on the amazing plays that I am happy to load up in.

A note on PBMD. Because it's a low $$ play important to focus on scaling entry over time and price in order to control risk. It is very difficult to get a good risk-reward purely by an initial entry and stop-loss.

Trading Review: 08-13-2015

Main Account: -$383. Note that the SHAK realised loss is how much was lost on SHAK.

Back Account: +$5350.

Absolutely crushed EBIO on the exact same setup that CERE had the prior day, except that EBIO isn't really low float so that was really good. I would give my execution on EBIO about a 8/10. I did better at waiting to initiate the position... But once I decided to initiate it I was in a bit of a rush, whereas adding to a winner (over time as risk become better defined) would have been a lot less risky.
The other comment about EBIO was that I picked my level to add to position (below $5.70) just like on CERE and I was looking add another 8000 shares (so substantial amount) but it dropped out extremely quickly and I missed the add. Where CERE gave quite a nice/classic retest and fail EBIO dropped out too hard and only have a very small bounce (but didn't come back up on retest), I think given the unrealised profit that I was up I could have justified chasing that down. Given the conviciton and unrealised profit it's a lot different to my chase entries on AQXP for example.

Aside from EBIO pretty obvious that trading the size has got to me. AQXP and ITEK were not high conviction setups; however they were worth establishing a starter position to add later. Likewise with the accuracy in the main account. A lot of the ideas would have worked with patience and discipline with execution and picking prices. E.G. SHAK better patience on waiting for flush (that I was aware it would flush as well) would/could have caught a $1 bounce instead of stopping). Many of them would have worked if more picky and not so jumpy.

Playbook Review: $CERE 08-12-2015

Title: Float Rotation Gap Up Morning Parabolic, Overhang Created

Strategy Description: This kind of trade can be applied to a multiple of stocks but wanted to hone in particularly on the lower float small cap type of trade because that's where the biggest edge is found.

As I have noted multiple times there are a couple of reasons to consider shorting float rotation on day 1:
(1) Enormous move.
(2) Below vwap post 10-11ish.
(3) Float bigger than usual.
(4) History of failing moves. Note that have to be careful of this because the one where it runs it likely runs far.

So the only criteria CERE didn't fulfil was having a small float. However that becomes a non issue the moment it is below vwap because there is a clear and easy stop above vwap.

The setup:
- Establish a bias. In this case my thought process was that everyone was scared to short it because of how AQXP behaved recently so it probably just fulfilled recent patterns of failing. Remember that a long float rotation setup occurs if holding above vwap post 10-11ish, so that would have been the trigger for a change in bias.
- After the morning push failed completely the overhang was establish, and risk was defined, so looking for shorting opportunities from there.
- Important to realise that there was no rush to get position on. Had until at least (9:45-10:15). I started in a little early that's why I'm noting this.
- Start into the morning parabolic, but NO SIZE until overhang established.
- Add on the $4 stuff.
- Max size once below $3.80. Risk now over/under $4.
- Cover half into downmove and hold rest for most/all of day.
- Look for opportunities to reshort during the day. All pops should be sold into and should close near the low of day.

Trading Review: 08-12-2015

PnL Main Account: +$150. The DYNT trade was impulsive and oversized. A little bit of recklessness creeping in from the monster win in back account.
Also should have been short size on AQXP instead of 150 shares. It was definitely an A++ trade. Will look to short size on it again tomorrow if it sets up.
3 positive days this week. Aside from a really solid AQXP setup want to be very very selective and get another positive day!

Back Account: +$16100. Developed two high conviction plays and executed size on them. Was a little early on both, not so much on CERE though (got the size on once back side confirmed), but I never should have been shorting it as early as I did in the premarket. One mistake on CERE that I made was covering the remaining 1/2 or 1/3 early. The play there is to hold some until the end of the day, so missed about 50c on 3000-6000 shares simply because I decided I was up a tonne and wanted to cover. That's not really the way to maximise an edge!
EBIO was just poorly executed, should have been chase size where I got short, and then there was a crystal clear spot to load up the size and of course I was already in. This was an overconfidence thing and easily could have gone wrong. Plus of course I would have made more...

Playbook Review: $FORD 08-11-2015

Title: Float Rotation Day 1 Failure with Nasty Volatility Halts Every Minute

Strategy Description: The prior day closing price on $FORD was around 60c so only a very small change was required to induce a volatility halt. Couple this with a small float, a thin stock and fresh news and you're going to get a lot of volatility halts. This play is identical to shorting other day 1 moves except that the volatility halts made it a little more complicated, more nerve racking, and required a little more execution skill.

A common pattern when a stock is going through multiple volatility halts is for it to move big in a direction, halt, gap in that direction, move in that direction, halt, gap in that direction ec etc. Then the moment it stops gapping in the one direction (i.e. momentum breaks) it will start going the other way (I think because the halts have created an overshoot), then it likely repeats the same pattern in the other direction.

To refresh shorting float rotation stocks on day 1. Requirements are:
- Not actually that low float.
- Massive move.
- Early morning failure, and subsequent move below vwap.
- Don't fight it once the day is moving on and it is holding trend.
--- So FORD fulfilled all but 1 of these. Once below vwap the usual strategy is to hold at least half until near the day end. I actually misplayed this in that I only played it for the move back to vwap and accordingly missed a big portion of the move.

Looking at the intraday pattern of FORD it is pretty clear that it did the volatility halt pattern extremely clearly. The psychology behind the move became more clear to me as I thought about it more... Unfortunately this meant that I was a bit slow to get short and missed shorting in that 1-3 minute window near the top once the momentum was breaking.

It was a bit far from vwap, but combining the understanding of the volatility overshoot (creating the overhead supply) it seemed very viable as a situation to short day 1. Of course hindsight I should have played it as I would on other ones (that is hold half until eod).

Trading Review: 08-11-2015

Main Account: +$5850. Didn't take the screenshot before it rolled over and statement doesn't consolidate the trades like the ST statement does so no screenshot here. Was made up of $5891 short AQXP and a couple of small disciplined trades some that worked and some that didn't.

Got lucky with AQXP covers and covered most near the lows as I decided that it was starting to get a bit overextended, close to me target, and not the right time of day for a continued trend.

Really happy with three things:
(1) Again I didn't have AQXP shorts available but I put in the order where I wanted them and eventually got them.
(2) I very nearly closed me AQXP right before it started rolling over, as it was sort of strong (and stuffing) and I was getting annoyed with it.
(3) I kept the core consistency aspect of trading consistent which should help when I stop trading this AQXP with size (aka ensure I don't overstay my welcome and give too much back).

Back Account: +$979. FORD was a really unusual setup so have done a playbook review on it.

The Ideal Long Float Rotation Setup and How to Get Size!

Wanted to get down an exact set of guidelines for when to go for the home run trade long on float rotation, and how to play it. The idea is that it will be something to print out and refresh over when the setup occurs next.

The Setup (remember this is the optimal where push size):
- Gap Up on positive news. Day 1.
- Consolidate and digest gap while putting through float rotation.
- After breakout from opening range put in a big wave one. Consolidate/pullback for 20 min or more before breaking out again.
- Note that if it's going to be an absolute beast there will most likely be a second leg. As always patience is important!

Execution/Trades:
- If ever feel like it's going to go without you just get like 1/5 or something quite small. Lock some in very quickly but this way if it does end up going can always buy higher and maintain a good average.
- It's day 1. Hold 1/3 of position for the entire day. It likely closes near the high of day. DO NOT selling this 1/3 into parabolic because a para from $3 to $4 will look enormous on current charts but at end of day when it's at $8 it won't look so big. Only other reason2sell is if it does go enormously parabolic (think +200%) and it breaks the trailing stop-loss on trend.
- It will move in waves (if behaving second wave should be somewhat equal to first wave, or way bigger) so use every miniature pullback (within wave) to add to position and trail stop-loss to get enormously large. Just a note on this point: As the stock moves should be anticipating and making guidelines for what it needs to do to increase size. As it fulfills those expectations it is therefore confirming that have a good read on how it's trading and you earn the right to start putting size on.
- Whenever in size always sell some into strength. This is very important.
- The first leg is where you are aiming to lock in decent profit. By locking in realised profit on the first leg, and by having the 1/3 still entered (to retain a good average). Adding size on a higher consolidation b/o is less risky.

Attached is a screenshot of AQXP wave 1 and wave 2. AQXP was a massive one so pay no attention to the size of the move. But more the point is that while it was within the waves higher buying more and more and trailing stop-loss worked until it didn't (by which point because you have size on and are selling into any strength thus locking it in) you just take the stop-loss and give up unrealised profit.
It also emphasises the necessity of keeping 1/3 as long as possible!

Wave 1:

Wave 2:

Weekly Review: 08-09-2015

Main Account: +$1107. Pretty happy with the week overall. Was the first week trying to contain everything relative to max drawdown of $200. While I didn't succeed I definitely made some good progress. and I definitely noticed an improvement in my consistency.

Things to work on:
- Keep the size off the fade trades when trying to anticipate.
- Don't chase... Generally this is with respect to adds. Ensure to either wait for confirmed trend change OR a really superior risk-reward add.
- Little too much focus on achieving profit target and adjusting individual positions to achieve that. Not too worried though if it helps improve consistency.

Back Account: +$2174. Massive under-performance on AQXP. As mentioned in weekly review work done on this to ensure I don't under-perform again because I underperformed on the last one (ITEK).
I think that it is possible part of the reason I underperformed is because I am becoming more patient for entries and these stocks are one of very very few times it's okay to not be quite so patient.

Trading Review: 08-10-2015

Main Account: +$1947.

Back Account: +$3974.

Crazy day. Massive massive range on AQXP. Gapped up from $11 to approx $17 then gap and go to a high of $55 then closed at around $19. Unfortunately it never gave a nice defined risk-reward opportunity for the long and so was a missed opportunity. I managed to catch 500 shares on the opening drive from $18ish to $25ish before it ripped straight to $55 (also sold 400 shares somewhere around 20ish). Reality is that I had to sell though because it was straight off the open and there was never any way to control risk; which is of course such a shame because if it gave the right setup I was prepared to put massive size on the long after reviewing the mistakes I made on the Friday. But given the opportunities I capitalised fine. In fact I would go so far as to say that I overcapitalised because I had fomo and started in a little earlier and a little larger than the gap and go setup justified.

A couple of notes:
- Usually wouldn't be prepared to put size on the long side on day 2 for a float rotation play. But the news and combination of gap, and resulting smaller float meant it was okay.
- The profit in my IB account mainly results from shorting AQXP. Once it was extremely clear the top was in I put a resting order to short in and slowly got filled. I actually only got 187 shares short but because it was such a massive range that obviously amounted to a lot.

Negatives for the day:
- Got and felt a little reckless after the morning excitement. It wasn't so much the money but just the enormity of the move.

Trading Review: 08-07-2015

Main Account: -$354. Sort of had this coming. Haven't been managing position sizes very well the last couple of days. But I'm happy enough.
The loss on SLCA was poor trading rather than size related though. Switched bias too easily; and then chased; and then too wide stop-loss.

Positives for the day:
(1) SRPT exactly how you want it to be done. Very small while not with the trend, never added because it never gave the trend change signal.
(2) Nailed the buy on open on NVDA and made quite a lot. Was a really solid well defined risk trade.

Negatives:
(1) Too much size too quickly.
(2) Chasing (SLCA, NVDA, NFLX).
(3) In general entries were just too poor (coming from chasing but just elaborating). For example NFLX my average should have been about 40c better on 150 shares which is very significant.

To sum up the negatives. It feels like I was trying to force it a little too much. Little too much fomo etc.

Back Account: +$1298. Really really annoyed about this. This was a float rotation long play (aka my best setup), and this one went further than the one I made $18k on earlier this year. Although I absolutely crushed the 18k with size perfectly, anything under $5k is enormous underperformance (although more realistically I shouldn't be happy with anything under $10k) on this stock.
So the course of action I have taken is to develop some rules and guidelines for how to play them, and what the perfect one looks like. Then I have hung it up near computer screens. They don't come up very often but this is a play that I can easily crush with enormous size.

Playbook Review: $PHH 08-06-2015

Title: Buying washout on volatility halt.

Strategy Description: This trade is virtually identical to buying a normal washout but I just wanted to note some price behaviour around the volatility halt which can result in incredible entries.

As beginning to scale in on the washout (ideally don't have any before the halt of course); provided that don't have any size, when it unhalts you want to be bidding below the volatility halt as it is likely to be very spready and all over the place when it unhalts for a few moments (in this case about 4 minutes, but could easily be just a moment). This way you get some incredible entries, rather than just paying up and around the halt price.

Also after the spready behaviour to the downside if it fails to continue down then it is highly likely that is the bottom. Which makes a lot of sense when you consider that the halt is a sign of a massive speed up and flush, so if it doesn't continue down after halt it has reached its max speed to the downside.

Trading Review: 08-06-2015

Main Account: +$816. Another solid day with plenty of opportunity. Again fell into the problem of putting a bit too much size on with respect to my max loss. Today I was able to pinpoint this into the fade trades. Which kinda makes sense that I try and get quite a bit on near the bottom and then add. So will need to bear that in mind for future.

A note on GMCR. In the SMB midday meeting it was brought up that because it has such a high short interest and has a massive gap down on really negative news the short side is likely to be crowded and therefore it's more likely to be range bound rather than trending down. This obviously didn't apply to LL yesterday (even that gave a nasty squeeze on open) but I like the thought process. I usually only incorporate a high short interest into squeeze ideas or when thinking of a low float short as crowded.

Positives for the day:
(1) Really solid patience, waited for the prices I wanted and then managed to keep a small portion of position for decent move.
(2) More solid reads and high probability of success today.
(3) Hit target for the day really really early (9:45). That's why I continued trading (although I took the foot off the pedal a little). Cool thing is that at this point I hadn't used too much size and had simply met target from catching solid moves.

Negatives for the day:
(1) As mentioned got sizing wrong on the fading moves. Was also a bit pre-emptive on adding to one position once I thought it had trend changed rather than waiting for it to tell me when trend had changed.
(2) Aside from the open didn't get amazingly good entry. Was a sign of impatience re-entering my mindset.

Back Account: +$193.

Trading Review: 08-05-2015

Main Account: +$540. Really really solid day. Met target very early and took most positions off. CYH and one NFLX trade were taken on top of that once I had finished. Little bit greedy, and some positions were a bit bigger than they should have been but 10x better than yesterday. However, one thing of note. The positions taken after I met my goal were small and I had a much much better mindset taking them. AKA I knew I didn't want to give any back so used small positions and good setups.

Positives for the day:
(1) Met target!
(2) Really solid execution, patience, and sizing can see even the trade ideas which turned out to be duds were still profitable.
(3) Two best trade ideas (AAPL, NFLX) off the open were both fades and were much better  ideas and executed than fading AAPL the prior day.

Negatives for the day:
(1) Wasn't quite prepared for the NFLX parabolic and how far it could go (even though it went 1 ATR as exactly outlined in a possible scenario), and so ended up with a worse average than I wanted.
(2) Took a little too much size on AAPL/NFLX. Partially because they went further than expected (for some reason).
(3) NFLX and AAPL could have been massive trades if managed a little better. They both went about $2 from where I got flat.

Good news is that I'm not particularly concerned about those negatives and I got the execution, sizing and patience good today which is my target.

Back Account: +$538. This is the AVXL trade. I deliberately oversized it like I would in my back account; but I don't have access to OTCs on my back account so the deliberate oversize has to go in main account. Not a habit I want to get in though. All oversized trades should go in back account.

Trading Review: 08-04-2015

Intraday Trading: -$146. Really disappointing day overall. Started off pretty well but ended up under water quite a bit on AAPL, with a little more size on the front side than I should have. From there size slowly crept up and traded began trading a little more poorly as the day went on. At the peak I was up about $350 but had too much size on and was being a bit greedy. I was actually trying to call it a day but narrowly missed limit orders that I had set.
One interesting perspective I realised today is that when I want to be targeting more than $200 a day a really solid way to increase the max PnL is to lock in $200 (either via realised, or via trailed stop-losses) and then let winners run when there are setups where you expect a move for the entire day. This minimises the additional trading from targeting more than $200. Once get the hang of that begin slowly increasing the $200 that want locked in.

Positives for the day:
(1) Fought the AAPL downtrend for a decent portion. Got pretty beat up, but never greater than max drawdown (although it was a lot bigger drawdown that it should have been).
(2) The big trade (BXLT) was a slightly oversized position but good risk-reward was only risking about $100 if not less.
(3) Did a good job on waiting for trades to come to me (patience).

Negatives for the day:
(1) Ignored my $200 target for the most part. Can't let this happen because number one priority is to develop consistency and that will only be achieved by hitting a fixed target for a period of time to help change attitude.
(2) Too much size on some trades as the day went on. Lost focus on keeping size relative to the range of stocks and my max drawdown.
(3) Too much size on fading stocks in general.

Playbook Review: $NFLX 08-03-2015

Title: Buying at Morning Support

Strategy Description: When a stock has an opening drive lower and then has a hard bounce off the lows set off the opening drive it present a seriously good risk-reward opportunity to buy into that support. Note that it is important the stock had a solid bounce off the lows because that indicates the bounce potential for a second time.

This trade somewhat comes from the intraday chart, although it obviously helps if the level is significant on the bigger picture and/or in the direction of the trend.

Simply buy at support from the morning as it moves back to the price. Aim to get a ridiculous risk-reward ratio because a play like this can present it!

Be reasonable with objectives, this (likely, that is unless part of entry into bigger picture play) isn't a trend play; it is just a high risk-reward scalp off the lows.

Trading Review: 08-03-2015

Intraday Trades: +$251. Really solid day. Underperformed on the open given the opportunity available (which is relatively unusual for me so I'm okay with that). But kept cool head and scaled into a decent position on LXRX which ended up being a solid winner. Closed trades somewhat prematurely because I had met target for the day, and that worked out pretty well overall. Trades I had on did carry on a little bit, but not a huge amount.

Positives for the day:
(1) Really solid patience with moves. Had high conviction with LXRX and traded it patiently.
(2) Amazing discipline today. Got trade sizes really nice and good stops.

Negatives:
(1) Didn't quite get the whole concept of "buying dips, selling rips" on LXRX.
(2) Wasn't paying close enough attention to LXRX on the open and was short into the premarket high, when a clear seller had disappeared and as a result missed the b/o.

Overall though really solid day, would be very happy with a repeat tomorrow.

Back Account: +$145.

Playbook Review: $MDVN 07-31-2015

Title: Midday VWAP Rollover

Strategy Description: This trade applies to any stock that is respecting vwap, which will usually be when there is institutional interest and fresh news. In this particular instance it applies to a stock that was gapping up on earnings; however after this I will post a similar setup on LNKD which gapped down.

Based on the daily and the failure to retake the premarket high ($110) was looking for short opportunities. It becomes clear that the vwap zone is a pretty significant level around midday where it held early morning and then is tightly consolidating around it.
If not already short then below vwap (and holds) is the key to initiating a position and then taking profit into any downmoves and adding back around vwap.

The mistake I made while trading this is that I was looking for a solid rollover and trend lower... Accordingly I trailed stop-loss. and was stopped out at the X.

Included LNKD in this post. The intraday chart is very similar, you notice that dips to vwap are originally being bought, but the bigger picture gives different reasons to try and get short.

Daily (MDVN):

Intraday (MDVN):

LNKD:

Playbook Review: $UVXY 07-31-2015

Title: Buying VIX at Range Lows

Strategy Description: As the VIX hits extremely low levels and cannot move lower it presents a nice floor to trade UVXY against. As of this current market environment this level is 12, and while I can't imagine it going lower it could, but the point is that the VIX itself is asymmetrically skewed at this level.

Remember that can only pay attention to the intraday UVXY chart and pay a tiny bit of attention to recent levels.

As the VIX enters the buy zone (and trending down) look for buy opportunities. The general jist at this stage is to buy new lows and sell pops quite small with a wide stop-loss; slowly adding to position. As it changes trend add quite aggressively to position because risk is better defined now and should hopefully have some profit locked in from the counter trend trading.

It is important to hold some of the position, as it move sin your favour, for as long as possible because of the skew, say 1/4.

VIX:

UVXY:

Trading Review: 07-31-2015

Intraday Trading: -$269. This is effectively one of the days that I need to learn to avoid. Trim the loss on MDVN down to a respectable size and the day would have been relatively neutral.
So what happened with MDVN. Firstly, it wasn't just one oversized trade that I took a beating on which is a good thing. I think I was slightly oversized at some stages which definitely contributed (but not enormously). The real fault comes back to (surprise surprise) not picking my prices well enough. On the open I added when it looked like it was cracking, and instead of stopping out the moment it didn't crack I rode it to my original stoploss (fault 1). Now of course, that original price was close enough to the big level from the premarket where should be looking at entering short at resistance (fault 2).
The third fault was trying to get too cute with my adds and not having a wide enough stop-loss on a solid play. This can be the result of adding a little too much and basing stop-loss on how much prepared to risk rather than where it should go  (playbook entry for this particular play that I made).
Otherwise I'm actually pretty happy with the day. Although I should have stayed away from fading the WBAI move up once it proved it wasn't worth it - Chinese name, heavily shorted, can't find catalyst, thin, day 1 etc...

Back Account: +$224.