Back on Top

 I made a successful trade today for a 12.4% gain!

I started in premarket.  Saw a stock come up on my screener with a big premarket change, watched the chart to insure it was bullish, made sure it had a news catalyst and bought it.

Then, I sweated it out for about 30 minutes when the chart turned bearish.  I put in a limit sell, and when the market opened, the stock popped again and I sold at my limit.

What did I learn?  Set a limit sell right away.  Don't wait to see what the stock does and hope that it really takes off.  I could have sold at the limit I ended up setting about 20 minutes before, but I was too greedy and hopeful.  This is a lesson I have been struggling with during my day trading project.  I have to keep reminding myself that I'm not looking for a grand slam.  I just want to take some percentage points off the top and move on with my day.

Ticker purchased:  SYPR

Price purchased:  $6.05

Price sold:  $6.80

Gain:  $14.25, 12.4%

Total amount for day trading:  $130.70

Can't trade tomorrow again.  I would put more money in to prevent this from happening, but every time I have more money in I end up going long on something else.  I'm going to end some of my long positions soon, and I'll be able to trade more frequently.  

And, in most wonderful news, Gamestop is making a move again.  Hooray!

Learning When to Enter Trades

 Today I bought CLSN at $3.05 at exactly the wrong time. They had news regarding a cancer drug they produce, and it had a lot of momentum.  

I didn't give a full analysis of the chart and purchased at the wrong entry point.  Blek.

Fortunately, the chart showed that there were a few bulls around, and I was able to exit at the right time--$3.17.  But, I was sweating on it most of the day.  

I watched a few more videos on how to enter and exit and set up a better premarket screener...I hope.

So, I finished the day 3.9% ahead with a total of $116.05 in my day trading fund.  

I can't trade again tomorrow.  The delay in settling of funds is quite annoying, but it also gives me a chance to regroup and learn. 

Premarket Discovery

 I have grown frustrated with day trading the past few days as I would see stocks making huge gains premarket only to fall as soon as the market opens.  Like Bernie Sanders says, "it is rigged."

Well, I finally figured out how to rig it up in my favor.  Etrade allows for extended hours trading for a 1/2 penny a share fee.  When only trading $100 on a few stocks, sign me up!  

I didn't discover this until 9am, so I didn't get to capitalize on it a lot today.  I did give it a try with GTEC and made a quick 1.3% during premarket.

I also broke all of my rules I tried to establish yesterday.  I get alerts when  stock gets halted.  PHCF got halted early on in the trading hours, so I jumped in and bought as soon as the halt was over.  Sold it for a cool 13% gain, approx 1 minute later.  

I'm learning slowly...very slowly...how to set limits based on a small gain.  My instinct is to want to keep holding because it might go higher.  So far, my candlestick charts haven't told me wrong...I've just ignored them and what they are telling me.

Summary:

Sold SENS at an 8% loss which put me below my $100 at $98.77.

Bought GTEC and sold for a 1.3% gain, brought my balance to $99.97.

Bought PHCF and sold for a 13% gain, brought my balance to $111.97.

So, I'm up 12% overall, or a 1.5% average daily gain since I started.

I can't trade tomorrow because I made 3 trades today, so it will take a day for the account to settle.  I'm going to use the time to settle down my emotions as well and study how to stick with charts and use them to my advantage in premarket.  

Breaking all the rules

 Yesterday, I bought SENS towards the end of day based on a good chart and decided to hold through close as it had all the indications that it would continue to rise today.

And, it did rise...in premarket.  It was up and beautiful, and I had visions of wonderful gains dancing in my head.  On market open, it immediately plummeted.  Should have entered in a limit sell after I bought it :{

After the initial fall, it has stayed almost in the exact same range all day.  This is called consolidation and usually happens before the stock makes a big move.  

I believe that because the overall markets are down buyers aren't quite as active today...something my day trading book said would happen.

So, I'm breaking my own rule and will hold SENS until tomorrow.  I will definitely sell it tomorrow without a doubt.  I have also created a  new rule to use for picking stocks that I want to day trade:

1-Make 5 stocks to look at from pre-market change

2-Wait until 10 to see how stocks are moving, analyze the charts, and have bias towards any stock that is moving based on news.

3-Sell based on the chart only-don't keep holding for possible bigger gains because those only result in definite losses.

I got greedy with SENS.  I kept holding when I could have set a limit for it with a 3% gain.  Lessons learned.  It made my day very boring to watch one stock stay almost the exact same price all day.

A good day and hopefully a good tomorrow

 Tickers Purchased: NAT @ $3.62/share

Reason:  Above 20 and 200 period moving average over all time periods.  Had strong support and resistance.  Thought earnings would come out, but that was #fakenews.  Did not buy until 9:45, and I could see a clear in and out.

Sold:  $3.72/share

Reason Sold: It got to its resistance, and the volume was very low.  So, I got out right when I should.

Ticker price at End of Day: $3.68, so I found the right exit.

Balance of my $100:  $107.47, a 2.7% increase

I spent all weekend reading "A Beginner's Guide to Day Trading" by Toni Turner.  Learned all kinds of neat things.

The most important thing to keep in mind is to only be concerned with making a good trade...not how much money it involves.  Must keep emotion out of it!  Definitely served me well on the trade today. 

I decided to make an afternoon trade after lunch, so I bought the ticker SENS.  It was making a break out-was at an all time high above all of its moving averages.  I purchased it because it was at a high and had no resistance to stop it and decent support.  After reading about it, I discovered that it is being propelled forward by the reddit crowd on the news that this company will soon have a diabetic medication to market.  Because of that, I decided to hold until the morning.  Toni Turner said that if you are in an uptrend and you end the day on a doji, you should hold overnight.  

I'm going to follow her advice for this trade and hope for a good tomorrow.  It feels good to have a stock readied for tomorrow.  It's a little stressful in the morning trying to pick one :)

Finished the week with a gain!

 Tickers Purchased: DNN @ $1.18/share

Reason:  Pre-market increase with gap of greater than 4%

Sold:  Decided to try the split the difference method, so I sold 42 @ $1.25 and 43 @ $1.14

Reason Sold: I watched more youtube videos on analyzing the charts, so I noticed that there was a good point of resistance at $1.25.  I decided to sell half to see if it would break through the resistance and move up.  It obviously didn't, and I sold it before I would be in a loss position.   

Ticker price at End of Day: As of 3pm:  $1.10/share

Balance of my $100:  $104.67, gained 1.3%

I spent some time yesterday watching youtube videos.  I found a new free software to use as well:  tradingview.com  It has a much better screener that is easy to filter.  Surprised that what I used it for was free.  

I learned today that it is best to focus in on those stocks who have pre-market gains but not excessive gains.  The ones with huge gains all went down when market opened.  

I also learned a lot about support (low levels) and resistance (high levels) and how you can use those trends to determine your entrance and exit points.  Obviously, that worked great if I had just decided to sell all at $1.25.  But, I'm glad I stayed in to learn that exiting at my first good point of resistance is best for a day trader. I'm looking for small gains that add up, rather than a grand slam. 

I'm starting to set my rules of engagement for now:

1-Select stocks that moved up in pre-market less than 20% with a greater than 4% gap

2-Stay true to the support and resistance levels--don't deviate for the hope that it will push through the highest high

3-Print out candlestick patterns, so I can start learning them better.  There are so many different patterns:  morning star, spinning top, hanging man, tombstone

Glad the market is closed on Monday.  It is getting a little exhausting to watch the market all day.  I'm hoping to change my strategy to be in and out within the 9:45-10:30 time frame, so I can go about my day.

You Win Some, You Lose Some

 Tickers Purchased:  INFI @ $5.34/share; CTRM @ $1.59/share; NAKD @ $1.95/share

Reason:  These were all market movers when the market opened.  They all had decent high volume.

Sold:  INFI @ $4.47/share; CTRM @ $1.73/share; NAKD @ $1.56/share

Reason Sold:  I went through the throes of Ecstasy at the beginning of my trading day.  Gains of over 20% were dancing in my eyes.  In the end INFI was a total heart breaker.  Because I couldn't watch all day, when I started losing I just set my sell at close of market.   

Ticker price at End of Day: All were sold at close of market

Balance of my $100:  $103.28, lost 4.1%

The chart above shows my great excitement about INFI.  In the first half hour I owned it, it seemed like it was about to hit the sky.  So, I walked away and counted my gains in my head.  When I came back to the computer, it had fallen terribly.  I held until end of day in the off chance that it would rally . The company had good news today, some drug showed great promise on clinical trials.  But, like all biotech companies, it did not have staying power.  Once the news goes cold, the stock goes cold as well.

Lesson learned:  I decided to buy 3 stocks, so I couldn't easily review all three.  I'll go back to purchasing just one from now on.  I read some articles about what kinds of stocks to purchase:

1-A Float of under 100m shares, ideally under 20m

2-Strong daily charts above moving average

3-High Volume, at least 2 times its average

4-Some kind of new event or earnings release

I also learned about the bull flag breakout pattern on the candlestick chart.  So, I can give that a go next time to figure out when to buy in.  I'll close out my position on the first candle that closes red.

Tomorrow, I'm going to try using the finviz free screener and put in the qualifications above, pick the stock that has the best premarket data, and keep my fingers crossed.