2007. The year that was

2007 leaves a bitter sweet memory for me. It was the worst of times and at the same time, the best of times.

The worst of 2007. This year marked the closure and the ending of a dream...Ascend investment club. The club started with a lot of promise 2 years ago with the dream of building a small stake into a 7 digit account but like all dreams and wishes, some will go unfulfilled and die in our memory. It was a grandeur idea with some friends to ride the gravy train (that was my trading) and jump off before it stops. However, right after it started, I went deep down to a deep freeze called drawdown…that trader's illness that happen in all of us. A few losses turned into more losses as we/I tried to force results and discontentment led to withdrawals and loss friends. By the time it’s over, I just decided to cut my losses, cough up the club's losses and return the original amount to each of members. I learned my lesson, chalked up a few more rules to live by, reduced the number of my friends, and started over. And I'm sure they'll be madder as hell when they learn that they just jumped out right at the bottom...just when my returns started to accelerate.

The best of 2007. There are many great things that I am thankful for.

My loving family. Friends who have always been around through good and bad times.

A great turn-around in my trading result as I have dug my self out of the previous year’s sub-par return and finished this year with incredible result. And if my memory and my trading history serve me right, I have just started another great run that could last for years. Since I have started trading I have to 2 great runs and 2 lean runs. Lean run is a year/years of sub-par returns (under 100%) in my main trading account which I sometimes call drawdown. Great run is year/ years when I have multiple 100% return for each of these years.

This blog and the trader friends from all over. For some reason that I completely missed, this blog picked up readers this year. Emails of thank you, questions about trading and a few f..k you email piled up my email-box . I also had the privilege of virtually meeting many traders/ friends from all over the world. And who would not be thankful for Wallstreak?

Leap-forward Capital Investment. After my Ascend investment debacle, I decided to open another LLC account with myself as the major partner and 2 other friends who did not want to withdraw the money from the club as minor partners. This was very important for me because I have always believed and said that I can start and rebuild my portfolio with a small amount. So on September 24, I have opened the account with $17,500 of starting capital. The account balance stands at $46,325.70 at the close of the market today. As I look forward to my future, I'm closely moving to the area of professional money management (ala hedge fund) and this will be my benchmark and my training ground.

Focker. The traderbot that is half done. Even thought my coding has not been completed for this traderbot, the results that it has posted in the last 10 weeks that I have it running are impressive. It returned a very impressive $3,700/week for $25K of capital ($50K of buying power). And with this, a new vision is dancing in my mind….multiple clones of Focker running in every capital market printing money for me while I’m in my own island happily retired.

Have a happy new year!!!

LIVE trading journal for 12/18:Trading Plan

Well, this is the time of year when I usually just take it easy. Park my money into some strong trending stocks, drink and toast my self for being able to find these stocks and watch as my gains pile up.

Instead for this year, that tradition was broken up. I'm in for a tough fight, many small paper cuts (aka stop losses) and I've been bitch slapped by this market so much that I cannot tell if it's up or down. I've been keeping my position size small and stops wider. How else can you fight a freight train that goes forward and back so many times?

I've let go of all my long positions last week and picked up some inverse etf SKF SRS FXP EEV and PUT option contracts on the shippers (DRYS DSX).

I'm not looking to initiate heavy long positions but if opportunity arises, I might take on some daily swing trades ( 5-10 days ).

Trade well!

LIVE trading journal for 12/10:Trading Plan

I'm closely watching VMW because I'm salivating at it's future prospect as the major player in the server virtualization and CPU hoteling. Having said this, a better price action is desired as it starts to build its base. I have started to pick more that a pilot position as this stock price action starts to show some support at the current level. I will buy some more as it clears $97 and will load up when and if it clears $125.


AMZN has just completed building the right side of the base and few more days on these sideways consolidation will give this stock a much better launching pad for higher prices. As I have mentioned in my previous post, I have started building my position in this stock at much lower prices but the real fun begins when and if the price clears the latest consolidation. My trade plan is to buy some more when it clears $95.25 area and I will let it confirm the breakout. I will then buy some more after it pulled back to complete my position allocation.

LIVE trading journal for 12/06:Trading Plan

First, I modified my size parameter yesterday to 300 shares/position so that the my traderbot can churn more trades and I can have more data sampling. But unfortunately the focker choked up yesterday, crashed but did not burn my account.

Aside from AZO and HOKU that it was already holding, the focker bought CHNR CTV MOS CPRT SIGM which is just fine. It's when it tried to buy SNP and CHA that the problem started. For one, there's a minor problem of limited funding on the account so it used up all the buying power already and when it tried to send and order to buy, the orders were rejected.

The focker does not want rejection so it just kept sending orders to buy SNP and CHA and that is where the real fun started. It clogged up its trade log database and it also entered into and infinite repeatition of buy/rejected cycle until it crashed. Focker.

One thing is clear though, this traderbot knows how to buy...but it needs discipline and oh, that very unimportant matter of trade exit.

Later.

LIVE trading journal for 12/05:Trading Plan

I sold most of my options last Friday when these stocks started to break-down after a gap up. The price action last Friday meant that the market could go sideways until the fed meeting. Market going sideways would decrease the premium on these contracts. I am just carrying 50 contracts on each of my top 4 positions.

I also added some more to my AMZN CHL VMW positions last Monday and yesterday as these are showing signs of strength.

I sold my remaining position in RIG yesterday when it gapped down.

I will not be doing much today. Just adjusting my trailing stops.

Currently holding in my main porfolio:

• MA+options
• AAPL+options
• GOOG+options
• BIDU+options
• CHL
• VMW
• AMZN
• AGU

I'm also currently testing a new price action filter which picked up these positions. All trades are just in 400 shares position size.

It picked up SOLF at $17.30 last Monday and I manually sold 300 shares of the position yesterday at $28+. I'm not really keen on holding this one until next week. It also picked up AZO at $117 yesterday and HOKU at $8.90

Currently holding in my traderbot account:

• SOLF - traderbot
  
• HOKU - traderbot
  
• AZO - traderbot