From the (in)activity on this forum, it seems there are not.
I trade stocks exclusively, and would be interested in contributing more to futures.io (formerly BMT)-----but only if others have similar interests.
My trading style is very discretionary and opportunistic.........which means, among other things, that it would probably be of no value to futures traders. I trade traditional chart patterns, indicator signals, and news. A mixed bag.
I use 1 min/3 min (and sometimes 2m & 5m) charts, along with level II and T&S. My profit targets are $.10-.40, usually partialling out---sometimes partialling in.
Am I consistently profitable? I think so........but it's a relatively new phenomenon, and I'm still trading small shares--max 400. I've recently added some structure to my trading which has helped a lot......including a hard daily stop (broker will set that for me). I have no trouble honoring stops on individual trades, but it's the daily stops that have been my bane. Adding the hard (enforced) stop.......as well as the ability to instantly convert to sim trading on the same setup.....has hopefully solved that problem for me.
I have been in a trading room for the last year and a half, and am probably leaving it soon........and would possibly be interested in doing a (text only) IM connection with a few other traders, to replace that room. I find that posting all my trades in real time, for others to see, is of great help in keeping my trade quality high.
If anyone's interested in seeing what the trading room that I'm currently in looks like, it's at: RealityTrader Trading Log
the entire log is posted at the end of each day.
You can read the whole thing (including lots of goofing around), or do a text search for 'strider' to see my posts. I believe I posted everything I took Friday, though there may be some typos and such......
Anyway, if there are others interested in seeing and participating in posts on stock scalping strategies, and possibly in a trading room, I'd like to hear from you.
strider
....just another guy on the lost highway
The following 2 users say Thank You to jmjstrider for this post:
You are right @jmjstrider, unfortunately, it seems there is not a lot of stocks traders.
The $25k rule doesn't help, and most people trade Futures and Options before of the larger leverage you can't have with stocks.
But I think some guys are trading stocks at futures.io (formerly BMT), you may find them sooner or later (my last stocks trade was 6 months ago, but I didn't say my last word...).
Success requires no deodorant! (Sun Tzu)
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Site Administrator Swing Trader Data Scientist & DevOps
Manta, Ecuador
Experience: Advanced
Platform: My own custom solution
Trading: Emini Futures
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Activity breeds activity -- so I encourage you to post and share, which will attract others to do so. There are thousands of stock traders on futures.io (formerly BMT), they just haven't started posting much because no one else has
I trade ETFs and their options, all swing trades, 3-14 days holding period usually. No individual stocks.
My style is mostly global macro, with some vol trading thrown in. I usually don't post about what's in play in my book, and I'm too far from the exchange to manually scalp, but I'm more than happy to trade general ideas.
FWIW I've been paying particular attention to the crude complex lately as I'm short puts, and I'm paying attention to EM Asia equity indexes because I live there. EM momentum in general seems to be weakening and I'm looking at ways to play that.
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I no longer do straight equities... no real benefit to doing so... I use options for all my equities trading.. it can be swing(2-5 days), or day trade... same principles to me, better risk control..
as Mike said, there are lot of members.. just post and you will find those still trading them straight...
let's use the simplest trade ... going long a put/call... all that I risk is my premium if I am wrong on my bet.. I should say, a percentage of my premium.. lots of people dont mind not closing a trade when the prem paid is small... but what about when it is $5K+? I personally dont like to loose premium.. the % lost to cut the trade depends on many factors for me..
with stocks I used to let's say long 1000 F @ $10, trailing stop @ $9 ... position is doing well, I am up to $11... my stop is somewhere around $10... weekend comes around.. news that the UAW is going on strike for 2 months across all F plants because of whatever reason appears... monday morning F is around $7 ... you just lost $3K best case scenario instead of breaking even as your trailing stop should have done for you.
now... lets say instead you long 10 calls @ $10 strike for $0.75... your cost ~$800 ... same scenario... come monday when market opens, you just lost $800... not $3K+..
to me, that is better risk management.. lots of people get into options trading because of the leverage... which trust me, I like as well given that I rather tie up a smaller amount of capital to control the same quantity of stock... but I personally like the protection options affords my capital when I am wrong.
please note, I do not carry options to expiration, I usually never write (unless as part of a strategy or to finance a position) and I never exercise... I only do ITM/ATM and I only care about Delta and Gamma... I am a short term trader... that is what suits my style of options trading... I am not an expert by any means... what is good for me, might not be good for you, and I always recommend that someone finds their own reasons for trading anything.
btw, a good book that defines risks for all the different strategies is "The Bible of Option Trading Strategies" by Guy Cohen.. it has a decent number and it goes into details about each strategy...
Site Administrator Swing Trader Data Scientist & DevOps
Manta, Ecuador
Experience: Advanced
Platform: My own custom solution
Trading: Emini Futures
Posts: 49,733 since Jun 2009
Thanks: 32,283 given,
97,464
received
For those of you trading stocks, please create some new threads in the Stocks section of the forum. Thread title is basically the stock symbol/company name, and within the thread you can post some charts and talk about what you are seeing on those instruments.
It will foster new discussion for stock traders on the site.
I've invested in stocks for decades and day traded for a while a few years ago but lately tend to swing trade them only in my retirement accounts--an activity I consider low risk given the nature of the accounts. I also hold a number of high yield Canadian income trusts (on their way out) and stocks derived from them, trading them rarely--maybe a little market/economic cycle trading.
I subscribe to a 3rd party system--kind of mickey mouse but costs only a dollar a day and implements a number of techniques I'd use myself if I ever get my own system off the ground. The features of the system I depend on most are derived from Gann S/R levels (similar to the Murrey Math indicator) and a derivative of Hurst's cycle trading method, but find most of the features more helpful than not.
In preparation for cobbling a system together I've been capturing closing data for all North American exchanges from another service for over a year now via a PHP script running as a scheduled event in Windows. The script is capable of updating a MySQL database but that part is not automated.
That said, since discovering that I can use margin without bankrupting myself I've been pretty much focused on currencies and futures for the last year or so at the expense of stock trading, and am considering learning something about resource & agricultural commodities.
Day trading for me is mostly futures but I do trade stocks probably 2 or 3 times a week. Either because the futures are going nowhere or I'm in a trade and just sitting there waiting for it to play out.
I'd certainly like to discuss this more here.
I moved to futures after seeking mentorship on tape reading as I found it hard to use T&S with L2. After spending time learning the 'art' on futures, I have found that T&S and L2 has become much easier - although this could be luck as I'm not trading it all the time.
I'd love to have discussions about the tape reading/order flow aspects.
I 've been very interested in tape reading. Have tried to view all materials about it, but still don't have a good grip on how to use it. What has made most sense to me, has been the cumulative delta indicator representations of bid/ask volume. Just looking at the T&S window generally just frustrates me, as It is hard for me to pick patterns that way. How do you use T&S tape reading it in your trading?
Site Administrator Swing Trader Data Scientist & DevOps
Manta, Ecuador
Experience: Advanced
Platform: My own custom solution
Trading: Emini Futures
Posts: 49,733 since Jun 2009
Thanks: 32,283 given,
97,464
received
I think IB is pretty good for equities as a broker. I used Worden stuff most recently, mainly for the scanning capabilities, and I would go back to it if I was getting heavy in stocks again.
Scottrade, TDAmeritrade and ToS. IB is great, $0.50 commission per hundred shares. I use IB's BookTrader with is a price ladder. I can trade everything and anything around the world. But I am using NT7............for my technical analysis for stock trading. I am trading stocks and options because I don't have my game together for futures or forex.....yet. I am trying to pull it all together........now. I do trade stocks live, but this week I have been working on some new ideas, so I sim traded. And the stock market was in "no mans land" this week. Today, I made two short (200 share) trades on SSO, S&P 500 Ultra ETF.for 132 pts.
I am working with all the great ideas on futures.io (formerly BMT), which I used in today's trades. Trading is trading, no matter what. And I also have a stock trading coach from 9:00 to 11:00 that is teaching me to trade "his way". But "his way" works with weekly, daily and 15 min charts. Mainly you trade the daily chart that trades with respect to the weekly and you maintain the daily based trade with the 15 minute chart.
Anyhow, I attached the images of the two trades. And I love Iron Condors.
The following user says Thank You to Tiberius for this post:
I have been slowly migrating towards futures' contracts but still, half my trades are using stocks/ETFs (which is good because my expectancy is still better there). Anyway, i trade with IB and use Esignal for my charts.
Have a great weekend
The following user says Thank You to Myshkin for this post:
I trade portfolio stock systems with IB, usually the systems run on a portfolio of 100 stocks. Commissions are good, mobile applications so I can monitor things if I'm away, no complaints here.
T&S is a lot easier to read on stocks that have a moderate volume - i.e. not the Citi 300 million per day. CD is good to track moves over time. Certainly easier than trying to track ratio of buyers to sellers in your head.
Where you get the benefit is using T&S in conjunction with Level 2. Level 2 shows you intent and a lot of it is fake. For instance you might see a rising stock come towards a price on level 2 with a lot of size on the offer. When it gets there you see those offers shrink rapidly as orders hit it - this is a fairly good indication that the size was fake (or it's real and being eaten) and that in the short term a continuation up is more likely.
T&S alone will let you monitor the pace of the market. For example - if you see 2000 buys tick up, 2000 buys tick up, 2000 buys tick up, then 10,000 buys NO tick up - you know something is changing. Alternatively if you see diminishing volume as you tick up, this also tells you something.
So - you can see short term moves that would not be apparent on a chart or on the cumulative delta. If you combine this with price action - i.e. a short term move indicated by T&S/L2 that is occuring at a place price action dictates a longer term move could occur, then you have a chance that there will be follow through on the move.
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I was at first wary of them given the bad things some folks say about them on the Internet, but I've come to believe they cater to the knowledgeable investor and hence hand you more than enough rope to hang yourself, which apparently some seem wont to do.
Are you still in that room? I went to the chat transcript from yesterday and I didn't see your name. Or did you move to a different room or are you just trading on your own now?
Apart from the very occasional tiny bet on certain indices, I trade stocks exclusively. But I am based in the UK, so the stocks I trade won't mean anything to US viewers. Neither will the fact that I trade almost entirely via spreadbets. Been trading for a living since quitting paid employment Xmas 1997. Generally small/medium stocks.
The only US stock of interest to me at present is Smith Electric Vehicles. But that ain't available yet (Nasdaq ipo supposedly this year). I have a stake in Tanfield Group - the UK engineering company that used to own Smith, and which currently maintains a 32.2% stake in it. I'm naturally hoping that any pre-ipo hype will drive up the percieved value of Tanfield's stake - and crossing my fingers that Tanfield don't sell down their holding before the ipo announcement emerges.
Currently using TDA, with their ToS, which I had been playing with before the acquisition...
OEC for futures, although I have an equity account there too. Better commissions than TDA, so I've contemplated using OEC for all of my stock, ETF and options trades, but I don't think I'll give-up TDA for two reasons: ToS (great for options) and the data.
What brokers offer NYSE and NASDAQ volume, put / call ratio data, advance / decline info and / or the McClellan Oscillator?
I've checked with OEC, and they don't offer this data. OEC has TICK, TRIN and the VIX, which I like for sure, but TDA has those also...
In my July 23rd post I indicated that I was awaiting news of an ipo for Smith Electric Vehicles on the Nasdaq stockmarket.
The London-listed stock Tanfield Group (32.2% stakeholder in Smith) saw their stock price climb strongly last week (up 36% over 5 days), and responded on Friday by issuing a formal announcement which possibly indicates that the ipo is not far away now (depending on how one interprets the somewhat cryptic wording!).
The wording could alternatively indicate merely another private fundraising, similar to the one last March when, US investors privately pumped in $58m in 24 hours. But most forum discussion in the UK seems to interpret the announcement as referring to an imminent ipo.
Goldman Sachs are known to have been assessing market interest for several months.
