Well that support at $1250 did not last long...I did not think it would...



After such a long battle at $1290 where the commodity price virtually painted the inside of the triangle to its apex, simple drop to $1250 would have been trivial. As you can see it tested the support once yesterday then smashed it today.



No we are looking at $1200 as a support with $1250 as the resistance. $1200 looks to me to be a much stronger support. I hope so as if not we are probably looking at something in the $1000 range.

So....why am I interested in following the price of gold when I have exited all my gold stocks??? The reason is that these stocks will rebound well when/if the price of gold begins another bullish run. I can see a potential fall to $1000 but I doubt very much that it will fall further than that...peace in the real and financial world will not happen in my lifetime...gold will rise again...it is just a question of when and I want to try for that ground floor when it comes.

The following chart is the status of the portfolio as of the close today



Another losing week....no sales other than Oceanagold ....I will just hunker down and ride out this situation in the markets.

Underexposed 

I will just hunker down and ride out this situation in the markets.

What does hunkering down entail?

deaddog 

What does hunkering down entail?

not much of anything...I don't make purchases when groups of stocks are falling for reasons that they have little control. I watch areas of interest to me (eg. the commodity of gold) looking for a turnover.

I will accept paper losses but are wary of converting them to real losses by selling now.

think/rethink some strategy to get through the doldrums...

BTW I liked FC.TO so much I put some money into it and it has not performed too bad....thanks.

Underexposed 

not much of anything...I don't make purchases when groups of stocks are falling for reasons that they have little control. I watch areas of interest to me (eg. the commodity of gold) looking for a turnover. I will accept paper losses but are wary of converting them to real losses by selling now. think/rethink some strategy to get through the doldrums... BTW I liked FC.TO so much I put some money into it and it has not performed too bad....thanks.

It was probably you I was bidding against for FC, not much volume. It's a long term hold for me, replacing some cash I had at Tangerine.

Back to hunkering down, how far do you let the market move against you before you take action? I don't see the difference between paper and realized losses. You are counting on the price to recover but that doesn't always happen. Big losses happen because investors don't take small losses.

With todays inexpensive commissions would you not be better off to go to cash when you are not sure where the markets are heading?
Being out of the market give you a fresh perspective and gets rid of any attachment you may have to a particular stock because you own it. Free up capital and look for other opportunities.

I know you studied the fundamentals and are content to sit a reversal out. But this a demo account and what ever decisions you make don't cost you anything. The decision to hold a stock is the same as deciding to buy it. What type of signals are your technical giving?

deaddog 

It was probably you I was bidding against for FC, not much volume. It's a long term hold for me, replacing some cash I had at Tangerine.

My purchases were made on May 27 and there were 30,000 or so shares traded that day...My volume traded I doubt had much of an effect on the price...which has risen about 15cents since then....yes, it should be a long term hold....I will probably hold it for a year or more given the reliability of the dividend.

deaddog 

Back to hunkering down, how far do you let the market move against you before you take action? I don't see the difference between paper and realized losses. You are counting on the price to recover but that doesn't always happen. Big losses happen because investors don't take small losses.

I am not a newbie at this...I have traded since 2004 and suffered through the financial crisis of 2008-2009. There is a huge difference for me between paper losses and realized losses.

First of all, I don't chose stocks at random for short term gains. Those that do must be prepared for bailing out at the drop of a hat as they are usually betting on a direction. They do not pay attention to fundamentals of a company because for less than a week fundamentals of a company are basically useless in deciding when to get in or out.

I lost a lot of money on paper in the 2008-2009 crash...as most investors did. On paper I lost about 45% on my holdings....but that was a paper loss it was not a real loss. The stocks that I invested in rebounded around March of 2009 and by the end of 2009 I had a gain of 39% from the lows of the beginning of 2009 and the following year I had a 27% increase in holdings. (these are gains AFTER subtracting out living expenses)

Now if I were psychic and sold all of my holdings in May of 2008 and waited til March 2009 before getting back into the market certainly I would have made a killing. But I do not possess such powers.

deaddog 

With todays inexpensive commissions would you not be better off to go to cash when you are not sure where the markets are heading? Being out of the market give you a fresh perspective and gets rid of any attachment you may have to a particular stock because you own it. Free up capital and look for other opportunities.

Commissions are a trivial cost of investing for me....why? Because my gains when realized are a quantum leap from the $20 in and out of a trade. I don't make $60 on a trade and lose $20 of it to commissions.

When a company's shares drop due to forces beyond its control...when it is caught in a net of collateral damage of the fall of other stocks then I will keep those shares and add to them when the panic is over.

When the fall is due to a fundamental problem that directly affects a stock I own then I do exit that stock.

You have seen that already in my handling of this portfolio. Through monitoring the price of gold which fundamentally controls the value of all gold mining stocks...I have exited positions on B2Gold Corp, Sandstorm Gold and now OceanGold Corp. There is no reason to hang onto these stocks while the price of gold continues to fall. However, I would jump back into these stocks easily were that trend to reverse as they are decent companies.

deaddog 

I know you studied the fundamentals and are content to sit a reversal out. But this a demo account and what ever decisions you make don't cost you anything. The decision to hold a stock is the same as deciding to buy it. What type of signals are your technical giving?

The purpose of this journal do me is to demonstrate how I as a long term trader manage my portfolio. That is my goal. The fact is that even though individual stocks in this play portfolio have suffered unacceptable losses by your terms I have not suffered great losses in the overall portfolio and still have a positive gain since starting this journal.

I have not worked a day for a salary since 2004...my sole income (other than the trivial amount I receive from Canada Pension) is from my investments. I believe I know what I am doing...I know I know what I am doing.

I cannot count how many times early in my investment career when I sold a stock in a panic, only to see it rise from the ashes to further gains. I don't panic anymore. I don't have the stress of short term traders. I survived the 2008-2009 crash simply by squirreling away enough money in money market funds that would allow me to continue my lifestyle for at least 2 years...hard rations as it were. I am similarly prepared today. But I do not see a crash of those proportions today...at least not yet.

I will make changes to this portfolio when I see better opportunities. But right now I don't see better ones.



the worse loss I had was FPNewspapers FP.TO

I could have panicked on the second day and sold those shares but through my technical analysis the fall in price was far below the the lower Bollinger bands....this indicates unreasonable panic. My fundamental view of the company is unchanged. If I had sold when it hit that low point I would have had a serious dent in my portfolio and then saw the share rise converting paper losses to real losses...whereas not my paper losses are in recovery.

Currently the share price has re-gained that BB envelope though at first it did not do the normal recover of tending to move toward the 20day SMA....now you can see that the MACD/BBWIDTH pinch is evident and now truly the fall is over for the time being.

Would I put more money into this stock now??? Not yet as this stock is in consolidation and I want to see what will happen when the BB's tighten again...that will not happen for at least a month...in that mean time the shares will continue its climb to the the 20day SMA where it will twist around that line until the BB's get tighter.

I have a different mindset than a short term trader. I don't intend to change that mindset when it has successfully served me for 10 years of trading, one of which was the worst trading year of our generation.

I have no idea why the last post did not show the chart for FPNewspapers [TSX:FP]

so here it is again...then the part relating to that stock will make sense

Underexposed 

I am not a newbie at this...I have traded since 2004 and suffered through the financial crisis of 2008-2009. There is a huge difference for me between paper losses and realized losses. First of all, I don't chose stocks at random for short term gains. Those that do must be prepared for bailing out at the drop of a hat as they are usually betting on a direction. They do not pay attention to fundamentals of a company because for less than a week fundamentals of a company are basically useless in deciding when to get in or out. I lost a lot of money on paper in the 2008-2009 crash...as most investors did. On paper I lost about 45% on my holdings....but that was a paper loss it was not a real loss. The stocks that I invested in rebounded around March of 2009 and by the end of 2009 I had a gain of 39% from the lows of the beginning of 2009 and the following year I had a 27% increase in holdings. (these are gains AFTER subtracting out living expenses)

As good as that sounds you are still down. Of course you took out living expenses but you haven’t told us what percentage of capital that was.

Given a $100,000 portfolio a loss of 45% would leave you with $55000
Increase that amount by 29% = $70950 and increase that amount by 27% and you have $90,107. You still need an 11% gain to get back to even.

The other aspect is that you didn’t have any capital to invest when the market bottomed and started back up.

deaddog 

As good as that sounds you are still down. Of course you took out living expenses but you haven’t told us what percentage of capital that was.

And why should I do that....it is none of your business frankly to be able to calculate my real holdings.

deaddog 

Given a $100,000 portfolio a loss of 45% would leave you with $55000 Increase that amount by 29% = $70950 and increase that amount by 27% and you have $90,107. You still need an 11% gain to get back to even.

First of all....you cannot live on $100,000 for the last 6 years and have no other income....this portfolio in this journal is simply an amount for instructive example.

Second of all...many investors were completely wiped out by that financial crisis and have yet to recover. You are quite right in your calculation that I am somewhere in the neighbourhood of withing 10% of what I had back in 2008 but while you may pooh-pooh this situation...I don't....I was not wiped out, I continued to live my lifestyle of travel and hobbies AND I did not have to go back to work to earn a living....

deaddog 

The other aspect is that you didn’t have any capital to invest when the market bottomed and started back up.

That is ABSOLUTELY wrong...I told you that I had salted away sufficient funds to live on in Money market mutual funds for 2 years...I did NOT exhaust those funds during that 10 month period of decline so I had funds available....ALSO when it was clear that there was a recovery I actively traded stocks at that point...taking capital losses then to balance the capital gains I was making during the recovery....I did not stand pat during the recovery...that would have been stupid.

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Since you are so interested in my finances let us take a look at your potential gains/losses from your journal

Now I will assume you are trading in your journal the same as you do in real life.

from May 1st in your blog

Quoting 

Position sizing: I show my position size as a percentage of capital at risk. I predetermine how much capital I want to risk on each trade. I take the difference between my calculated stop and my entry price and divide the risk capital by that amount. For example; Account size = $100,000 Capital at risk =0.5% = $500 If the difference between my entry and my stop = $1.00 then position size is 500 If the difference between my entry and my stop = $2.00 then position size is 250 The percentage amount I quote is the least amount I will lose. In a falling market I can lose a lot more as stops get filled as market orders.

Hmmm...you limit your wins to basically $500/share

from April 28 in your journal

Quoting 

Picked up some QCOM @ 77.96 Stop @ 77.30 Initial target 80.00

so you would purchase 250 shares as a position because it is a $2 spread

so your investment is 250 X $77.96 = $19,490 to make a potential $500

but you did not make $500....you stopped out at $78.70...or $0.64/share or a total of $0.64 x 250 = $160 but you would have made less than that as your commission costs are not included at $10 in + $10 out your gain is only $140.00

and this seems to be one of your better gains...there are a fair number of losses that you report and admittedly a few wins.

Frankly I doubt you could make a living at this even if your capital was 10 times this amount...you are basically breaking even from the look at it.

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as far as the status of my portfolio goes currently it stands at



I am currently up about 3.76% or $3,760 on an initial investment of $100,000

My dividends represent a significant part of that total and will escalate nicely in the future



with no changes whatsoever I will earn about $800 per quarter from those dividends

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No...I do not have to apologize for my approach to long term trading.

I thought I would comment on the price of gold and an interesting observation in the gold spot price chart.



this is the hourly chart....we are back to this triangle formation again....again the seller is backing down accepting a lower and lower high but this time digging in their heels at what looks to be about $1242.00

I doubt very much that the support level will hold for very long...it will probably break down in 48 hours or less.

this chart for the spot price is VERY interesting.



First of all the spot price is tracking the lower Bollinger band...the BBwidth is rising, the MACD and Slow Sto are falling....there is nothing here to suggest anything but a continued fall.

HOWEVER....look at the volumes (ounces traded or contracts?? not sure what they are) but whatever they are the volumes are sooooooo minor as to be almost non-existent compared to previous volumes of the past months.

I checked the chart back 10 years and there were no similar cases where the volume fell to almost zero.

I wish there was as there might be a clue as to what this represents.....I will be watching this closely.