August 12th trading recap

BOT    200    WX    false    Stock    12.149    USD    SMART    09:48:18        1.00
SLD    200    WX    false    Stock    11.99    USD    SMART    09:53:25        1.00
($33.88)

WX was a pre-leader; I tried going long (got a horrible fill) on the $12 cross and got whipsawed out. It later hit a high of $13.49. A looser stop or a willingness to get back in when it went back over $12 would have led to nice profits. ADCT was another pre-leader today that ran well; I missed playing it.
BOT    500    DRL    false    Stock    4.060    USD    SMART    10:19:05        2.50
SLD    500    DRL    false    Stock    3.980    USD    ARCA    10:23:08        2.50
($45.00)

DRL has run in the past; in retrospect trying this on the break of $4 was not a good idea (especially considering its multi-day chart).

Daily Profit: ($78.88)

Disclosure: No positions. I have a disclosure policy.

Watchlist for Wednesday, August 12th

Not much that interests me for tomorrow:

HLCS: crazy stock, crazy moves recently. It will move, but I have no clue which way. I doubt I will play it.

AVNR: gap and crap on positive (but weak) drug news. Was a good short when it failed to hold 4. I thought about shorting when it broke $3.50 but did not. I do not see much further downside or upside and I will avoid it.

JAZZ: up 20% after hours on positive earnings release. There is no play either way that I see.

Disclosure: No positions. I have a disclosure policy.

August 11th recap

Boring day today for me.

AVNR was a pre-leader. I bought on the $4 cross and sold for a fat profit of $0.00 when it failed to move higher. It did not help that the market was down fairly big today. It would have been a great short from there. I thought about shorting it at $3.50 but did not; I do not like shorting fades of stocks up on news and still way green for the day.

BOT    500    AVNR    false    Stock (NMS)    4.030    USD    SMART    09:39:22    BookTrader    2.50
SLD    500    AVNR    false    Stock (NMS)    4.04    USD    BATS    09:40:10        2.50

CHINA was a TimAlerts play. I first played it to scalp a few cents off of TimAlerts subscribers but that did not work so I covered quickly. I held onto 4,000 of my 16,000 shares but covered when it showed some strength at 3pm EST.

+    SLD    6,000    CHINA    false    Stock (NMS)    2.710    USD    SMART    12:36:48        30.00
+    SLD    6,000    CHINA    false    Stock (NMS)    2.710    USD    ARCA    12:36:50        30.00
+    SLD    6,000    CHINA    false    Stock (NMS)    2.700    USD    DRCTEDGE    12:37:21        30.00
+    BOT    14,000    CHINA    false    Stock (NMS)    2.700    USD    SMART    12:43:05        70.00
+    BOT    4,000    CHINA    false    Stock (NMS)    2.670    USD    SMART    15:00:23        20.00
+$61.71 overall

Today’s profit: $61.71

Disclosure: No positions. I have a disclosure policy.

August 10th trading recap: 3 wins, 1 loss, +$80

SPDE was a nice short on the morning panic. It would have been easy to play it profitably for 40 cents as it went red, just like I said on yesterday’s watchlist. OPXA did almost nothing. Rather than trade SPDE, I saw Rentech (RTK) up big in pre-market trading on a great earnings release. It hit a high in pre-market trading of $1 and then opened around $0.88. Buying it was a good idea:

+ BOT 2,000 RTK false Stock .910 USD SMART 09:30:46 9.10
+ SLD 2,000 RTK false Stock 1.000 USD SMART 09:37:31 10.00
+$160 (8.74%)

Pre-leaders that have strong news but open significantly below their highs in pre-market trading are often great longs. Another good trigger for going long pre-leaders (or any volatile stock) is when it crosses an even-dollar amount.

BOT 1,000 YMI false Stock 1.03 USD ARCA 09:33:35 5.00
SLD 1,000 YMI false Stock 1.10 USD AMEX 09:40:35 5.00
+$60 (5.80%)

YMI was another pre-leader with news (drug news that was not that great in my opinion). I bought it as it crossed $1 (when it was alerted by Muddy in the Investors Underground chat) and I sold it after it backed off of its high of $1.20.

My lone loss of the day was a TimAlerts scalp play that I should never have traded. It was my watchlist stock SPDE that he shorted, but by the time I got the alert it was way off the price he traded it. Some may ask why I scalp stocks that Sykes trades. I do it because it is easy money (as long as I am quicker than most of his subscribers). Rarely does one come across a situation where one can predict exactly when a bunch of buying or selling pressure will occur. It is imperative to derive profit from such circumstances. This does not mean that I do not also often trade alongside Sykes on his alerts: I do. It just means that this is one other little niche for me to profit from. (For those searching for easy profits from mindlessly following Sykes’ trades, be aware that I have made almost twice as much money by making trades in the style of Tim Sykes than by following the trades of Tim Sykes.)

+ SLD 2,000 SPDE false Stock (SCM) 2.630 USD DRCTEDGE 09:41:03 10.00
+ BOT 2,000 SPDE false Stock (SCM) 2.743 USD ISLAND 09:48:00 10.00
($246.00) (4.69%)

My last trade of the day was a traditional Tim Sykes-type trade. I bought a steady runner that was finishing the day strongly, in anticipation of a gap up tomorrow. That stock was of course RTK; I sold it in after-hours trading while dealing with my website troubles. If I had not had to work on my blog I would not have followed it after hours and I would have planned to sell the next morning.

+ BOT 1,000 RTK false Stock 1.270 USD SMART 15:47:57 5.00
SLD 500 RTK false Stock 1.3900 USD DRCTEDGE 17:52:13 BookTrader 2.50
+ SLD 500 RTK false Stock 1.382 USD DRCTEDGE 17:52:15 BookTrader 2.50
+$106.08 (8.32%)

Today’s profit: $80.98

Disclosure: No positions. I have a disclosure policy.

Server issues fixed

For some reason both this blog and my GoodeValue.com blog have stopped sending me any sort of emails on August 8. They use different versions of WordPress and are both hosted at 1&1. Even changing from a PHP mail() function to SMTP did not help. Upgrading this blog to the newest WordPress version this afternoon (causing some downtime) did not help. If you have any suggestions please leave them as comments.

It seems like this was a server problem on my web host. All my websites were down for a bit this evening and afterward my website’s email function worked again.

How to scan for pre-market gainers with Interactive Brokers

I often talk about pre-leaders or pre-market gainers. These are stocks that are up in pre-market trading. They often make for good trades. This video shows how to scan for them yourself. As to trading them, I will write about that in the future; I suggest checking out Muddy’s post about pre-leaders in the meantime.

Disclosure: No positions. I have a disclosure policy.

Watchlist for Monday, August 10

I’m keeping it short tonight. Not a ton of great things to watch and I was way late getting home after traveling this weekend.

OPXA – positive drug news sent this up from $0.50 to $2.01 Friday. I don’t think it is that great, but I’ll let the price action determine the move. Either way, this should be volatile

SPDE – same deal, up from $0.85 to $3.11, this time on news of a new solid state hard drive (SSD). I am even more negative on this company and will look to short on green to red action.

Tight stops on both stocks would make sense, especially for shorting. Both still have tiny market caps and are very low float.

Disclosure: No positions. I have a disclosure policy.

Weekly Trading Recap

Profit this week: +$500.64

Overall, not a good week. I lost money on a mediocre trade on GGC short and then missed the great trade opportunity. ICOG was a good trade but about 10% of my ‘fat fingered shorts’ have resulted in Nasdaq trade busts and that trade bust cost me $980. It was still a good risk/reward trade. Today I didn’t focus much on trading because I am still bummed about yesterday and I have new eyeglasses that are distracting me.

Trades today:

+    BOT    6,000    CHINA    false    Stock (NMS)    2.835    USD    BATS    10:46:05        30.00
+    SLD    6,000    CHINA    false    Stock (NMS)    2.860    USD    BATS    10:47:06        30.00

I scalped this for 2 cents when Tim Sykes bought to cover his short. +$88.15

Today’s trading profits: +$88.15

Disclosure: No positions. I have a disclosure policy.

Watchlist for August 6th

There is not much to look forward to tomorrow. Instead, go back over GGC’s chart and study it. Memorize it. Such great opportunities are rare. Do not be like me: be prepared for the next one.

Also look at SUF as a potential long on strength only. It is a horrid company so I won’t trade it, but it may be good for a second up day.

Disclosure: No positions. I have a disclosure policy.