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Upwind Trading Journal

  #21 (permalink)
 Cloudy 
desert CA
 
Experience: Intermediate
Platform: NT7, various
Broker: various, TDA
Trading: NQ,ES
Posts: 2,124 since Jul 2011
Thanks Given: 2,396
Thanks Received: 1,748

Thanks to the rally at the last bit after the Fed's report, my positions recovered a lot of the drawdown from yesterday's selloff. Quite a roller coaster ride. Still about -26k from breakeven, so will see what happens by next week, expiration week..

single calendar spread ordered and sold: TLT , 8/8/11 to 8/9/11: +1320 = (+ .06 x 220 cts x 100 shares)
single calendar spread started today: FXE

Ongoing spreads: ADSK, ASYS, EEM, IWM, RUT

tot: +18,810

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  #22 (permalink)
 Cloudy 
desert CA
 
Experience: Intermediate
Platform: NT7, various
Broker: various, TDA
Trading: NQ,ES
Posts: 2,124 since Jul 2011
Thanks Given: 2,396
Thanks Received: 1,748

Bit more of a boost as the markets start to stabilize. Sold FXE for a -2000 loss. Should have kept watch on Mon. morning as the Euro suddenly shot up and ruined the FXE position. Sold RUT finally for a +6000 gain. Sold ASYS. Sold IWM. They were already adjusted heavily so no real gain, just making back some of their drawdowns. New positions FXF, GLD, TLT. New plan is to hold them far shorter, preferably no longer than 2 weeks. Earlier profit the better with minimal adjustment unless necessary.

tot: +4600

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  #23 (permalink)
 Cloudy 
desert CA
 
Experience: Intermediate
Platform: NT7, various
Broker: various, TDA
Trading: NQ,ES
Posts: 2,124 since Jul 2011
Thanks Given: 2,396
Thanks Received: 1,748


Got killed on ADSK, which I had held and adjusted all this time. Holding during expiration week is risky if that's a lesson learned. And the crash day yesterday.. Closed ADSK and everything else except for FXY, and EEM which I kept the left side calendar. Sold TLT for a profit. Started trades wednesday: GLD, EWY

current individual p/l:

ADSK(closed) -12400
EEM +2200
EWY -535
FXF -2283
GLD +419
TLT(closed) +2890

adj. tot: -11678

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  #24 (permalink)
 Cloudy 
desert CA
 
Experience: Intermediate
Platform: NT7, various
Broker: various, TDA
Trading: NQ,ES
Posts: 2,124 since Jul 2011
Thanks Given: 2,396
Thanks Received: 1,748

Can't believe it's already been two weeks since my last post. closed positions: EEM, EWY.
Adjusted FXF, GLD. New positions: QQQ, SPY, XLE.
Comparing demo account total since last post. Tot dif: +6994
Spent some time reading up on volatility and trying out different ideas for underlying selection.

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  #25 (permalink)
 Cloudy 
desert CA
 
Experience: Intermediate
Platform: NT7, various
Broker: various, TDA
Trading: NQ,ES
Posts: 2,124 since Jul 2011
Thanks Given: 2,396
Thanks Received: 1,748

Since Sept 1st. +14809. total since start of journal: + 7535.
closed all my trades. QQQ, SPY, XLE, and GLD.

GLD and QQQ ended up good winners. More luck than anything probably. Still very risky trading.
I closed out everything since it is option expiration week as option prices are too high at this point and deltas are too big. So back into the positive after weathering two major down weeks. Will continue to look at ways to minimize risk by trying to make better underlying choices, and examining volatility and relative option prices.

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  #26 (permalink)
 Cloudy 
desert CA
 
Experience: Intermediate
Platform: NT7, various
Broker: various, TDA
Trading: NQ,ES
Posts: 2,124 since Jul 2011
Thanks Given: 2,396
Thanks Received: 1,748

New positions:

9/22/11 double calendar FXE, adjusted 9/26/11, 9/30/11
9/22/11 double calendar IWM, adjusted 9/27/11
9/27/11 OIH calendar, adjusted 9/28/11
9/28/11 EWY calendar, adjusted 9/29/11, 9/30/11

A couple of intraday option trades on 9/30/11
NNN +140
DISH +150

Month of Sept total: +21638, journal total: +9573

Probably the best month of this journal doing time spreads so far. Why calendars? Easier to put on and remove since the strike prices are closer to ATM. And more realistic in terms of filling and closing in TOS papermoney than say iron condors, butterflies and other complex and costlier spreads. Maybe knock off 5% to 7% off profit due to actual market maker spread tolls if considering live. However changing volatility and underlying price changes throughout the expiration month is always a major danger to calendars as my earlier losses showed. My positions were fortunate in that they took advantage of the rise in overall volatility (VIX) on the climb, during this turbulent month, while my adjustments were fortunate enough to stay within the strikes' ranges this time. Still nerve wracking to trade options this way , but less so for me imo than continuous minute-to-minute futures daytrading which I continue to practice but not journal here for now. In general it's easier to pull the trigger, but may be harder to close positions and limit losses due to greed and/or false hope since it's a positional time frame. Yes, I've traded this way before on live, but have always lost money. Hopefully this journaling experience will help when I get back to live one day.

10-2-11 update: I screwed up my total calculations. Last post, journal total was +22 , not +7535. I'm looking back on TOS account statement history and realized I got the previous post's total figures wrong.

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  #27 (permalink)
 Cloudy 
desert CA
 
Experience: Intermediate
Platform: NT7, various
Broker: various, TDA
Trading: NQ,ES
Posts: 2,124 since Jul 2011
Thanks Given: 2,396
Thanks Received: 1,748

Screwed up again. I should have taken profits earlier. As we know the DJIA went south -258 in the last half of the session. My positions weren't severely hit as before but could have taken profits earlier since it was stable at first, at the start of the NYSE session. Not knowing when to take profits at 10% gains and hoping to hold out (greed) longer in this dangerously volatile market with the VIX going up from 42 to 45 today. Then I put on a bad IC position (fear) and took it off incurring more unnecessary loss. Took less profit on a couple of positions , closing them.

Closed positions: EWY, OIH
Adjusted: IWM , took profit on one calendar of the double.
New positions: SPX calendar, SPY iron condor.

total: -2193 , journal total: +7380

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  #28 (permalink)
 Cloudy 
desert CA
 
Experience: Intermediate
Platform: NT7, various
Broker: various, TDA
Trading: NQ,ES
Posts: 2,124 since Jul 2011
Thanks Given: 2,396
Thanks Received: 1,748

Since Oct. 3, +5246, journal total: +12626

sold RUT . sold IWM ,SPY, and SPX earlier.
New position FXE with Nov. expiration.
Rocky market again. Will watch FXE everyday. Not placing as many trades during expiration week.

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  #29 (permalink)
 Cloudy 
desert CA
 
Experience: Intermediate
Platform: NT7, various
Broker: various, TDA
Trading: NQ,ES
Posts: 2,124 since Jul 2011
Thanks Given: 2,396
Thanks Received: 1,748

Sold FXE for a loss. the Euro had shot to the upside. Had new trades double and triple calendars
on OIH and IWM and broken wing butterfly on RUT.
Adjusted OIH. Was down -8k from Oct 18th for a while. Finally the OIH
and IWM option prices stabilized last week

total since last: + 4144, journal total : + 16768

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  #30 (permalink)
 Cloudy 
desert CA
 
Experience: Intermediate
Platform: NT7, various
Broker: various, TDA
Trading: NQ,ES
Posts: 2,124 since Jul 2011
Thanks Given: 2,396
Thanks Received: 1,748


With all the turbulence of the past few days, at least OIH ended up where I hoped it would be. IWM turned out ok and I had sold it two days ago. But FXE was again a loser two weeks ago. And the temporary drawdown was tremendous at one point a week and a half ago. I had adjusted OIH three times, but finally turns out a winner for this month.

The main thing I've found about how I adjust with minimal loss trading this way, is to adjust only when the position is positive. For example selling a bad calendar as part of the OIH triple calendar only when the profit/loss curve is in the positive or breakeven so you are not losing money when you get rid of part of it. And then add another calendar in anticipation of the movement in the week or so to come. Otherwise the safest adjustment seems to be adding more spreads rather than adjusting by removing spreads. Still it's very high risk and requires an obscene amount of margin requirement for the total position, so at least 50% or preferably 60-75% of the account should be left over after initial positions for adjustments down the road. And of course some or a great amount of directional price gauging on a daily or weekly time frame still primarily drives the success rate even after taking into account the greeks, IV and option prices. One has to be right of the general future price of the instrument including sideways movement or lucky.

since last update: +14869, journal total: +27495

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Last Updated on February 27, 2012


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