NexusFi: Find Your Edge


Home Menu

 





Day Trading Stocks with Discretion


Discussion in Trading Journals

Updated
      Top Posters
    1. looks_one bijeremiad with 264 posts (98 thanks)
    2. looks_two Big Mike with 10 posts (5 thanks)
    3. looks_3 Bermudan Option with 4 posts (4 thanks)
    4. looks_4 VinceVirgil with 3 posts (4 thanks)
      Best Posters
    1. looks_one VinceVirgil with 1.3 thanks per post
    2. looks_two Bermudan Option with 1 thanks per post
    3. looks_3 Big Mike with 0.5 thanks per post
    4. looks_4 bijeremiad with 0.4 thanks per post
    1. trending_up 47,052 views
    2. thumb_up 127 thanks given
    3. group 21 followers
    1. forum 297 posts
    2. attach_file 383 attachments




 
Search this Thread

Day Trading Stocks with Discretion

  #241 (permalink)
 mdl060374 
Denver, CO
 
Experience: Intermediate
Platform: Tradestation
Trading: Equities
Posts: 37 since Aug 2012
Thanks Given: 24
Thanks Received: 12

PErhaps I have missed it, but you can explain how you are narrowing down your focus list of stocks to choose from?

Are you focusing on daily charts setups? average behavior (% average day range, avg volume, etc)?

or some news?

I have always been curious in peoples product selection parameters..

Reply With Quote
Thanked by:

Can you help answer these questions
from other members on NexusFi?
NT7 Indicator Script Troubleshooting - Camarilla Pivots
NinjaTrader
The space time continuum and the dynamics of a financial …
Emini and Emicro Index
New Micros: Ultra 10-Year & Ultra T-Bond -- Live Now
Treasury Notes and Bonds
ZombieSqueeze
Platforms and Indicators
Better Renko Gaps
The Elite Circle
 
Best Threads (Most Thanked)
in the last 7 days on NexusFi
Get funded firms 2023/2024 - Any recommendations or word …
61 thanks
Funded Trader platforms
39 thanks
NexusFi site changelog and issues/problem reporting
26 thanks
Battlestations: Show us your trading desks!
26 thanks
The Program
18 thanks
  #242 (permalink)
 
bijeremiad's Avatar
 bijeremiad 
San Francisco, CA
 
Experience: Beginner
Platform: IB
Trading: Stocks
Posts: 412 since Jul 2011
Thanks Given: 286
Thanks Received: 346


mdl060374 View Post
PErhaps I have missed it, but you can explain how you are narrowing down your focus list of stocks to choose from?

Are you focusing on daily charts setups? average behavior (% average day range, avg volume, etc)?

or some news?

I have always been curious in peoples product selection parameters..

@mdl060374, I currently trade 1 stock, 1 time frame, day in/day out.

When I first started I traded anything that moved. I had to follow a portfolio of 300 companies for work, so whatever was up or down a lot for the day would attract my attention.

Then I decided to focus on just six stocks: APA, CMI, LH, V, VFC, WHR. I chose those by looking at the S&P 500 and looking in each sector for a name that had a stock price >$100. The primary goal was to decrease trading costs, which for me increased with the number of shares purchased. So I could get $50 of risk with a $100 stock with just 100 shares. With a $10 stock (even more volatile, like BAC), $50 of risk would require 700-800 shares...more commissions.

This set gave me an oil & gas, industrial goods, health care, finance, consumer discretionary, and consumer non-discretionary company. I figured something good or bad would be happening in one of those sectors and drag my names along with it. Or if one name was range bound, another could be moving.

Then looked at ATR, standard deviation of daily returns, average trading volume. But for the size I was looking to trade none of that really mattered.

One thing I didn't appreciate at the time was the bid/ask spread. Wider for the larger stocks. Now once you factor in the number of shares purchased, it equals out. However, what it means is that when they run, the can gap. Whereas with a smaller dollar price, every tick tends to get hit running up or down.

Visit my NexusFi Trade Journal Started this thread Reply With Quote
  #243 (permalink)
 mdl060374 
Denver, CO
 
Experience: Intermediate
Platform: Tradestation
Trading: Equities
Posts: 37 since Aug 2012
Thanks Given: 24
Thanks Received: 12



bijeremiad View Post
@mdl060374, I currently trade 1 stock, 1 time frame, day in/day out.

When I first started I traded anything that moved. I had to follow a portfolio of 300 companies for work, so whatever was up or down a lot for the day would attract my attention.

Then I decided to focus on just six stocks: APA, CMI, LH, V, VFC, WHR. I chose those by looking at the S&P 500 and looking in each sector for a name that had a stock price >$100. The primary goal was to decrease trading costs, which for me increased with the number of shares purchased. So I could get $50 of risk with a $100 stock with just 100 shares. With a $10 stock (even more volatile, like BAC), $50 of risk would require 700-800 shares...more commissions.

This set gave me an oil & gas, industrial goods, health care, finance, consumer discretionary, and consumer non-discretionary company. I figured something good or bad would be happening in one of those sectors and drag my names along with it. Or if one name was range bound, another could be moving.

Then looked at ATR, standard deviation of daily returns, average trading volume. But for the size I was looking to trade none of that really mattered.

One thing I didn't appreciate at the time was the bid/ask spread. Wider for the larger stocks. Now once you factor in the number of shares purchased, it equals out. However, what it means is that when they run, the can gap. Whereas with a smaller dollar price, every tick tends to get hit running up or down.

Interesting. Thanks for the response. One thing I have been looking at is beta. There was an article (forgot where I read it) that brought up that beta is sometimes used incorrectly as a measure of risk, but really means correlation with the S&P. The idea is that stocks with betas of under .80 (1 = exact correlation with index, and 0 = direct opposite direction) offer behavior that ideally doesnt get yanked around with the overall market...

Another thing that was brought up recently (I think it was a Don Bright article in SFO)is that with HFT, they often sit .001 below/above the spread so for daytraders, trying to get filled with limit orders presents a new challenge, and the best way to trade was taking offers/hitting bids on tight spreads, and avoiding wider spread issues.

I think that scanning for volumes above 2.5M should take care of this..

Reply With Quote
  #244 (permalink)
 
Bermudan Option's Avatar
 Bermudan Option 
Chicago, Illinois
1% better Daily
 
Experience: Beginner
Platform: TradingView
Broker: ThinkOrSwim
Trading: Forex, Stock & Options
Posts: 673 since May 2011
Thanks Given: 838
Thanks Received: 471

Hey how is the trading going?

Sent from my Nexus 4 using Tapatalk 2

Visit my NexusFi Trade Journal Reply With Quote
Thanked by:
  #245 (permalink)
 
bijeremiad's Avatar
 bijeremiad 
San Francisco, CA
 
Experience: Beginner
Platform: IB
Trading: Stocks
Posts: 412 since Jul 2011
Thanks Given: 286
Thanks Received: 346

@Bermudan Option

Took two weeks off. Been trading sim this week and recovered from the disaster of the prior week I traded.

However, I still need to get my analysis together for the bad week - can't let it go wasted. But I am getting hung up there.

I have also been collecting a lot more data on my trades which is slowing me down on getting everything together.

Facebook has a saying: doing is better than perfection. I need to move more towards that end of doing, and less so about getting it all together.

Hoping to go live in two weeks.

Visit my NexusFi Trade Journal Started this thread Reply With Quote
  #246 (permalink)
 
bijeremiad's Avatar
 bijeremiad 
San Francisco, CA
 
Experience: Beginner
Platform: IB
Trading: Stocks
Posts: 412 since Jul 2011
Thanks Given: 286
Thanks Received: 346

Amazing how fast two months seems to go by. I have not been idle. I have over 125 trades to catch up on. But I have not been posting. Now I need to catch up. This is a problem. I get hung up, and then the catch up becomes more work than the hang up and nothing gets done. Just stall.

So I am not going to pause for weekly reviews. Just going to bang through day by day, and will run aggregate stats at the end (which I still need to finish, but will not let that keep me from getting started again). So going to start working on the next entry tonight.

Visit my NexusFi Trade Journal Started this thread Reply With Quote
  #247 (permalink)
 
bijeremiad's Avatar
 bijeremiad 
San Francisco, CA
 
Experience: Beginner
Platform: IB
Trading: Stocks
Posts: 412 since Jul 2011
Thanks Given: 286
Thanks Received: 346

Two trades, two losers, -$102.

Trade 1 Looked like a valid pullback after break out. Strong open and run up (too much?) Then a retest of yesterday's high and the EMA21, after the second test of yesterday's high I thought I was good to go. I chased the market a little as i flipped from a limit order to a market and lost 7c on my entry. But no follow through the next Resistance. Probably held on to this too long, could have punted at HOY. Others were trapped two as slippage was miserable getting out.

Trade 2
I took as price cleared above the EMA 21. Price had come near a support trend of prior days; I even saw a strong down bar on highish volume rejected. But was too early. Second test was needed. I was done for the day by then.


Attached Thumbnails
Click image for larger version

Name:	20130314VFC.png
Views:	133
Size:	137.1 KB
ID:	115621  
Visit my NexusFi Trade Journal Started this thread Reply With Quote
  #248 (permalink)
 
deaddog's Avatar
 deaddog 
Prince George BC Canada
Legendary Market Wizard
 
Experience: Advanced
Platform: National Bank Direct
Broker: NBD/BMO/Questrade
Trading: Stocks
Frequency: Every few days
Duration: Weeks
Posts: 1,283 since May 2013
Thanks Given: 183
Thanks Received: 3,962


bijeremiad View Post



I also need to write down my money, risk, and trade management rules. They are floating around, but need to be explicit and reviewed regularly.

Have you done this yet?

Reply With Quote
Thanked by:
  #249 (permalink)
tradingkevin
los cristianos
 
Posts: 5 since Apr 2010
Thanks Given: 1
Thanks Received: 1

Love the way you take notes on your trade bijeremiad...top notch. I will use some of it ; )

Kev


bijeremiad View Post
Two trades, two losers, -$102.

Trade 1 Looked like a valid pullback after break out. Strong open and run up (too much?) Then a retest of yesterday's high and the EMA21, after the second test of yesterday's high I thought I was good to go. I chased the market a little as i flipped from a limit order to a market and lost 7c on my entry. But no follow through the next Resistance. Probably held on to this too long, could have punted at HOY. Others were trapped two as slippage was miserable getting out.

Trade 2
I took as price cleared above the EMA 21. Price had come near a support trend of prior days; I even saw a strong down bar on highish volume rejected. But was too early. Second test was needed. I was done for the day by then.
/IMG]


Reply With Quote
Thanked by:
  #250 (permalink)
 
bijeremiad's Avatar
 bijeremiad 
San Francisco, CA
 
Experience: Beginner
Platform: IB
Trading: Stocks
Posts: 412 since Jul 2011
Thanks Given: 286
Thanks Received: 346


@deaddog.

Short story is it never happened. So none of the upcoming trades any rules other than a $40 stop loss and two losses shuts the day down.

Here is what I have so far. Rules (always to be honored) and guidelines (strive to do, but discretion will dictate each situation).


Capital Management

Capital at risk
R1. Max risk per trade is $40 (in reality this should translate into $40 +2 commission + $10 slippage for $52 total, which is 25bps of capital)
R2. Max risk outstanding at any time should be $40. If another position is added, open positions' stops should have stops at or beyond break even.
R3. Trading day stops after two full stop losses.

Position sizing
R4. Position size will be 100 shares (stop <$0.40) or 200 shares (stop <$0.20).
R5. 200 shares if ATR5 < 0.20. Some discretion ATR <0.25
R6. No trades when ATR5 > 0.50
G1. If position size of 200 shares then NBBO - order price < 0.10.

Stop Management

R7. Stop cannot be moved to increase initial risk.
R8. Stop cannot be moved to decrease risk until (this is a guideline for Counter Trend and Trading Range trades)
i) a SL/SH has been put in,
ii) I take heat on the trade of at least 1/2 my risk,
iii) price hits R:R of 1:1
G2. Stop should be placed behind a market structure point: EMA21, S/R, or SH/SL

Visit my NexusFi Trade Journal Started this thread Reply With Quote




Last Updated on March 10, 2014


© 2024 NexusFi™, s.a., All Rights Reserved.
Av Ricardo J. Alfaro, Century Tower, Panama City, Panama, Ph: +507 833-9432 (Panama and Intl), +1 888-312-3001 (USA and Canada)
All information is for educational use only and is not investment advice. There is a substantial risk of loss in trading commodity futures, stocks, options and foreign exchange products. Past performance is not indicative of future results.
About Us - Contact Us - Site Rules, Acceptable Use, and Terms and Conditions - Privacy Policy - Downloads - Top
no new posts