5 replies to this topic

[CLK]

Stop outs eat up the majority, if not all, of the profits realized upon eventually being right.

[CLK]

Another thing, as good as some traders are on this board, I've seen EVERY one go cold for months straight.

[relax]

Seems like a lot of people are looking for that big move down

instead of focusing on the trend

Longs may lose big time my being in the market for the crash, but before that that will have won more by being in the market

Big events week: existing home sales and friday's GDP figure - da boyz are usually active a day in advance, so watch out monday and thursday

Another thing, as good as some traders are on this board,
I've seen EVERY one go cold for months straight.

[Cirrus]

CLK....agreed. It's VERY difficult to short in a high liquidity environment. I made a killing on my housing shorts and didn't take enough off the table and gave quite a bit of what profit was left back. Other attempts I've made in sectors and stocks have been hard to come by. Again, the world is floating on 'money' so shorting is like going to a casino and gambling. You may win sometimes but overall the odds are against you. The trend is soundly up and that is simply not debatable. I've found the easiest trades are playing the weekly charts and position trading in secular bull groups like energy, uranium, materials and some select stocks in a grab bag of groups that have fabulous weekly charts. I found months and months ago that playing the daily charts is difficult. I started trading around were I percieved others stops to be, too. The obvious stops and price levels seem to get hit with regularity.

[SemiBizz]

Well, I made money today short... I think a lot of people are trying to be lazy and think they can just "catch the top"... It does not work that way. What you have to do is look for good risk/reward opportunities, have modest targets (considering we're in an uptrend), and if you short successfully enough times... ONE of those times will be THE TURN... This is a lot like flying an airplane, you only have so much fuel. So you try and navigate from point to point and refuel. So that's where your ABC's come in. As a pilot you have to know what your PRIMARY INSTRUMENT is. For example if you are mountain flying, airpspeed is important, but your altimeter is CRITICAL. The market is the same way, you have to be able to identify key sectors and key stocks within that sector, identify which sectors are going to be "RUN" and it's usually the worst laggard, last quarter it was commodity and oil stocks, the quarter before they turned the housing stocks around, measure it, project targets for it.. Right now, it's the SOX index. If you read my blog, you know that I identified the SOX as the next one for this quarter If you don't have a plan, if you don't have a vision, if all you do is follow impulses, you're never going to make money trading... But if you are not looking for utopia, and are agnostic, and apply reasonable probabilities and targets, step up and take your profits, you can make money short or long. Today it was obvious when INTC would not break, that it was time to set your stops if you were short. Key Sector, Key Stock... Critical Instrument. You can't HOPE your way through this, you have to assign probabilities and then measure, measure, measure. When the conditions change that predicated the logic for your trade, you got to change with them or become ROAD KILL. I made $$$ short today, and I"ll make money shorting all the way up, and one of those will be the turn. I made money long SMH and select semis over the last month too, when a lotta folks were bearish... There's plenty of ways to skin this cat, you just have to WORK FOR IT ! You know I'd have to say I recommend starting a blog too, because putting it down in writing does help...

[CLK]

Thanks for the responses. My indicators work for a moderately advancing or declining or sideways market. Parabolics like we just witnessed off the lows blow up my indicators. They still signal, but turn back up too soon. And since I can only watch the last hour or two, I can't take precise profits like I used to when I was home all day. I can guess, and put in a limit, but I'm not trying to scalp, I'm after a five day sell off. All the weekly IT bottoms the last few years I messed up, oh I caught most, but took profits way too quick. Then started shorting way too soon. As glamorous as shorting is, and it does feel good to catch a quick 5% down move, it just does not justify all the stop outs from false starts. I've already posted what the results would have been to buy the weekly momentum bottoms and hold them for a double, might have taken a few months with in the money options but the downside is nearly zero. I don't like chasing extended markets, sometimes to be safe one needs to be in cash and wait. It appears there is less risk shorting overbought markets, but it's alot of work for little gain. Unless you are wrong buying into an IT top, the trend will eventually bail you out. Alot of people on this board have been counting on a C down move past the lows and I suspect it has put a dent in their accounts.

Edited by CLK, 20 April 2007 - 08:08 PM.