Pavement, "Summer Babe"

It's the first day of summer you silly bitches!



Pavement, Pixes, Fugazi... what would high school have been without these bands?

I Hate Toddlers... Not Really

I'm just in a bad mood from my crappy trading today and would rather vent right now then be peed upon by some potty-training, whining kid. I love kids though. Really.

Anyway, here's what happened today. I simply didn't know what to do!

The whole thing is that I was to trade with more patience. So when I was largely short at 10:00am, and in the money in most of my positions, (MOS, AGU, DE, MLM, GWW, LNN) I was ambivalent about covering and taking the gains. I wanted to take the money, but at the same time, I didn't want to take the money and then see them break to new lows thereby proving that I was trading impulsively, without thought and without a "plan".

So, I held and I lost money.

Not a lot at that point. I lost about $70 in AGU, $70 in MLM, $80 in DE and $200 in GWW. Not a good start, but not a disaster either. I had 100 shares overnight of LNN still and that was up a couple of points to offset some of those losses.

However, because I knew I had losses in my shorts, I made a related mistake and quickly covered my gain in LNN to "lock in" at least those gains... I sold my LNN around 41. It closed at 44.50 off the highs at 46.50, so I left a lot of easy money on the table there.

So now I'm down on the day a little and watching the market spike up. After the sell-off into the close yesterday and then the weak opening I was bearish. I was not aware of this bias however but it is clear now looking back on my trades from the day that this bias messed with my head.

I kept getting short during each pullback and kept buying my shares back at higher prices...

My big ugly loser of the day was in.... TNH! My old buddy, what happened?



Well, take a look at that chart. How could you lose money in TNH today? You could be short. I was short and that, in a word, was STUPID.

No trading system can save you from yourself.

I lost $828 in TNH so it made up the lion's share of my losses today. Not going to over-analyze it. It's obvious the mistake I made... I was shorting a stock that closed up over 10 points on the day!

Anyway, I'm going to keep my chin up. I made some mistakes today trading with my new style. I also learned that if the market isn't trending cleanly that it is much more difficult to hold stocks.

Actually, I also made some churny trades... I will continue to work on my discipline to stop making those trades...

Looking forward to the Russell Rebalancing tomorrow. Should be interesting at least. That's all you can ask for on the first official Friday of the summer!

Here's the stats:

P&L, -$1302
Best, VNO, $394
Worst, TNH, -$828

shares traded, 28,800
stocks traded, 11, 3 positive, 8 negative
total trades, 130 (way too many)

Virtual Office, -$734. Dow, +57.64, 13547.06.

HPT, $1112 on 73 contracts traded.
Evolution, $784 on 48,700 shares traded.
Denarii, -$148 on 2400 shares traded.
Misstrade, -$1180 on 4600 shares traded.
Me, -$1302 on 28,800 shares traded.

I blame the AMEX.

Anyway, after a blowout day for the VO yesterday, today we took a little hit.

Today was a day for the scalpers... this I learned at 10:00am when the market reversed and I was slow to cover my shorts. Reversal days are always good for the quick and nimble.

Anyway, kudos to HPT and ET for a strong showing today. And before you shed a tear for Misstrade, you should know he did okay today in his futures trades.

My daily post will be late tonight. I will try hard to get it on the site but no guarantees. Today is our turn to have the house overrun with toddlers. Screaming 2 and 3 year old kids after a day like today?

Thank goodness I have a good sense of humor...

AMEX Halting Trading Again... WTF?

Really, haven't they figured out this whole "computer" thing there yet?

2 days in a row. Gives you great confidence in that market, huh?

UPDATE: They're up and running again... took them 3 hours to "reboot" I guess!

Lindsay Manufacturing, LNN- Holy Short Squeeze Batman!

Well, I sold my last 100 shares of my 400 share long position at 41. The stock is now over 45, so I left a good amount of easy money on the table.

I sold because when the market ripped at 10:00am the stock flatlined. I got skittish and thought he might take a breather because it had such a strong run yesterday. Anyway, almost immediately after I sold it began it's ascent.

That's some run. Really, thanks to "the Fly" for the call. I believe he started buying at 31.50.

I owe that insect a cup of coffee.

"I'm Rick James, Bitch!" (Parts 2 & 3)

The video quality is poor, but still, it's hilarious.

"I'm Rick James, Bitch!" (Part 1)

You know, it's a slow day... might as well have some fun.

Coconut Records, "West Coast"

I got chopped early when the market ripped up at 10 because I was short and slow to cover. I was trying to be "patient" but instead I got my face ripped off.

We'll see what happens today. LNN on fire! I sold my shares in my trading account at 41 today. Thank goodness I'm still holding in my longer term account or I'd be angry with myself.

Here's a song that you won't be able to stop listening too. I featured the video before...

You can always find more excellent music videos by clicking the "music video" link over there to the right... things are logical like that around here.

Investor's Business Daily, Big Picture

Made a really great point today about the general market conditions.

Despite some of the large drops we've seen in the last couple of weeks on higher volume, like yesterday, the leading stocks of this rally are really holding up.

If the leaders start selling hard, THEN it may be time to worry.

Just a thought.

Animal Collective, "Slippi"

A good song to start anything, especially a day.